Smash your lip!

[Doc_Jones]

I just got a personal tip from Skip Healy (Skip and I are very close now that I signed up on his automatic email list )

Anyhoo, the tip was to press the flute against the fleshy part of your lower lip instead of resting it under the lip. He says having the flute under your lip obstructs some of the air stream and effectively gets in the way of powerful playing.

Well I gave it a whirl. I haven’t been fluting for long but have been really pleased with the steady progress of my embouchre but the power and tone that came out of my tooter using Skip’s advice was a quantum leap for me sound-wise.

It’s great to be able to learn from the giants of the business. Hats off to you Skip and thanks for the tip.


Doc

[brianormond]

My experience with Skip’s tip echos yours, Doc. It also seems to make it easier to find the precise headjoint rotation angle at which
upper octave is neither shrill nor piercing, -something I’m improving on to the delight of neighbors.

[jim_stone]

Will you say something
more about how to do this?

[Whistlin_Dixie]

Skip’s site has a whole archive of information that is informative as well as amusing. I would recommend you check it out if you haven’t already.

[BillG]

Skip’s web site is http://www.skiphealy.com/

Have fun

BillG

[jim_stone]

Thanks, much good fun!

[Doc_Jones]

Hi again gang,

Here, with Skip’s permission is the entire text of the tip:

Hi Everybody,

Skip Healy and John Harvey here again shooting straight from the lip this time. This tip is inspired by a question sent to me by Bill Goelz.

Bill came to me a while ago with a question about my embouchure. He observed in different photographs that I play with the flute set on the fleshy part of your lower lip, as opposed to just under the fine line where the lower lip and the chin meet (which is another common position with many flute players). Bill wanted to know how, why, and whether or not he should do this as well.

So let’s have at it.

Bill’s observation is correct. I do rest the flute against the fleshy part of my lip when I play and I recommend this position to my students. My feeling is that if you position the flute beneath your lip, you create the possibility where some portion of your lip might cover (if not go into) the back side of the embouchure hole.

Some people find it easier to play this way, but what you are actually doing is reducing the size of the embouchure hole by blocking off a portion of it. This makes the embouchure hole more narrow from front to back and artificially increases the compression, thus making the flute function with less air flow.

However, less air flow means less power and dynamic range. There’s also a chance of increasing the amount of embouchure “hiss”. Is it easier to get sound out of a flute using this position? Yes. But are you also limiting your potential as a musician with this approach. In my opinion, yes.

Flutes are really just a set of numbers. If the flute is carefully and thoughtfully designed, then these numbers work together to produce a certain sound when “X” amount of fuel (air) is forced into the chamber. The chamber is a hole (the bore) that is a calculated size and length for producing a certain pitch when the resonating chamber (plug face to foot) is filled with air. The size of the embouchure hole is calculated to allow a precise amount of fuel to flow into the chamber with tone holes of exact size and placement releasing the compressed fuel at precise locations. The changes in air pressure are the notes that we hear.

By reducing the size of the embouchure hole, you’re messing with the numbers. It’s just like having a blocked fuel line in your cars engine. The vehicle will run for a while, but not very well.

By properly venting the tone holes (see Skip’s Tip #11 – Release Me, Let Me Go) and using the entire embouchure hole, you get the best airflow. Along with that, you’re now capable of getting the best possible tone and range.

Of course, when you are trying to do anything to it’s maximum (as opposed to minimum standard) it is harder to control. That said, with practice you can achieve greatly varied volume and tone color. The nuts and bolts of it all is that you’re in control of the flute, and not the other way around.

And last but not least, this approach also helps to prevent the player from puffing their lips out, which also creates a less focused tone.

To paraphrase the old expression:

There is many a slip
'Twixt the flute and the lip.

I hope all of that makes sense! You all know where you can find me if it doesn’t…

All the best,
Skip Healy

Thanks much to Skip for permission to post and for the great tip.

Doc

[rama]

An absolutely wonderful explanantion from Skip. Thanks so much for passing it on! Sheer delite, I think ole Charles ‘Iron Lip’ Nicholson is smiling . - rama

[David_Levine]

All the scrips for lip placement will vary due to the different lips we are born with. Seamus Egan nearly covers the embouchure hole and has soft, puffy lips. And a wonderful sound.
A lot depends on the flute as well. One thing is for sure: barring mechanical problems within the flute itself, upper octave problems nearly always have to do with air-stream focus. It is the focused stream of air rather than the force behind it that will yield good upper octave tone.
Try this: Start with the low G and by focusing more, rather than blowing harder, try to get the upper G cleanly. Go from the low to the high G and back again. Play slowly at first. Then go down to the F# and do the same thing. Go from lower to upper octave smoothly and cleanly. Then on to the E, on to the D, upper and lower octave on the one breath. Then back to the A to A’ and then to the B and B’. This comes from Eugene Lambe and Michael Hynes, my first teachers.
Patrick Olwell’s suggestion for an exercise is to blow as quietly as you can on the upper G, A, and B. The quieter, more whispery the better. This will help you control your focus and avoid over-blowing (and consequent sharpening) on the second octave.
Don’t be in a hurry. Be patient with yourself. It takes a while to develop a strong embouchure.[/i]

[norseman]

As a beginner, I admit I’m a bit confused by Skip Healy’s article. It’s very likely I’m misunderstanding it.

All the instructional material I’ve seen recommends that the lower lip at least partially covers the embouchure hole to verying degrees. That includes “TIMBER, The Flute Tutor”, “The Essential Guide to Irish Flute and Tin Whistle”, Paul Mulvaney’s Flute Tutorial, and “Illustrated Method for Flute”.

It seems that Skip’s article is recommending not covering the embouchure hole with the lip at all. Am I misinterpreting this?

Thanks,
Bob

[Blackbeer]

Dont worry about it Bob. There are as many ways to play these things as there are things to play. I use Skips method, not because he told me about it but because these lips had spent their first 55 years with absalutly no intention of trying to get music out of a hollow tube with holes in it. They mostly thought they were targets for someones right jab or roundhouse kick, or my horses head in her daily attemps to through me off, or some piece of draft horse gear flying through the air in their direction. Not to mention the head of a nine iron snapping off and .......... well you get the idea. So in order to smooth out some pretty irragular peaks and valleys I ended up pressing up against my lower lip. Now as for the "covering up part of the embouchour" deal its like this. I have flutes that sound better when I feel the bottom of the hole on my lip. They usualy have pretty big holes. My baroque flute I find plays best when my lip is below the embouchour. It has a very small hole. The thing to do is to play in a way that pleases you right now and develope your technique as time goes on. There are no hard and fast rules. Its like training horses. Everyone has a different way of doing it. It is the results that count. My advise, for what its worth, is , dont limit yourself by other peoples techniques. Use them, or try them for sure, and if they suit you fine, but they aren`t rules and your joy in the music you produce
with whatever technique you use is the important thing.

Tom

[treeshark]

Yep were all different…
http://www.larrykrantz.com/embpic.htm
This page drives home the point!

[Whistlin_Dixie]

Tom!

What have you been up to, friend!
It’s been a while.

How are things going in Alaska?
Are you gonna stay there, or what?

Mary

[Blackbeer]

Hi Mary, yep I know paradise when I see it. I have been working 12 hour days 7 days a week and just havent been able to be coherent enough to type anything that made any sence. I do read the posts though. In fact what I do is bring the forum up on my confusser, put a flute together and just start playing while I read. I wouldnt call it practice, just a way to keep my lips in shape until I have the time to get on with it. I heard I might have tomorrow off and if so I will try and give you all an update. I have picked up a few flutes of late and I can`t wait to tell you about them. Take care I have to go get my horses ready for todays battle.

Tom

[norseman]

Thanks Tom. I am making good progress in tone production on my Sweetheart flute using the ideas in the materials I mentioned. What seems to work the best for me is where my lower lip covers about half the embouchure hole for the lower octave and a little more for the 2nd octave. I haven’t tried many flutes, but from what I’ve seen in pictures on the web, the Sweetheart flute seems to have a fairly large embouchure hole.

When I read Skip’s article, I had a little bit of the feeling that even though what I’m doing works, there may be a much better way. With my flute and lips, I don’t really think so, but my engineering background makes me look at all possibilities and reject those that don’t work for me.

I’m still not sure I understand what Skip was saying because when I try what I think he’s saying, all I can get is a very airy tone with no volume or focus.

Bob

[Nanohedron]

Yeah, Doc, that’s what I’m going for right now is the “smash yer lip” thing for the sake of volume and richness. BUT: my normal habit has been per Fintan Vallely, that is to say partially covering the hole with the lower lip, and I could muster plenty volume (think playing all-by-your-lonesome solo for +/-28 yammering céilí dancers in a dance hall. OK, the acoustics were a blessing, but still.) with no problem, and the reediness was easy to get that way, and it was a “cutting” sort of reediness. That way works fine, no problem.

Why I’m making changes amounts to 1) further timbre options, as the fundamental tone is just different enough (fatterand more colorful, I think, but still reedy-capable) for me to care, 2) embouchure flexiblity, as who knows but that I may want to have it both ways, not a bad thing, 3) it SEEMS to blow easier when my habits aren’t getting in the way and I can get it to work, and 4) just a plain old dumb-guy “whut happins if I do dis?” thing. I can always go back to Plan A if need or sheer frustration drive me to it. Plan A already works, after all. As has been said before, we’re all different, and that counts, too. Still, it’s not a bad idea to experiment, especially if you want broad tonal horizons.

My $.02.

Oh, and good to see you back, Tom!!!

[norseman]

Well, I guess it does help to do what the subject of this thread suggests, smash your lip!

I am starting to get fairly decent tone by doing this and reaching more with my lips towards the far edge of the embouchure hole. I assume it’s really just a matter of getting the same distance between the lips and far edge as with the other lip position I’ve tried.

My tone is still not as focused as with the other lip position yet, but I assume that it’s possible with enough practice, right?

Bob