G’day all,
I’ve been wondering lately,why,when the Fluter has dry lips,does the sound suffer ?? I imagine that the air stream is still the same shape,delivered at the same pressure and still pointing in the right direction…what happens here??Whats the mechanics of it ??
On a similar note…when I play the Low Whistle ,and the tongue/back of the throat area becomes dry…a similar ‘going off of the sound’ occurs..
Any thoughts on this ???
Bye for now…weedie…
Which of two identical race cars goes faster, the one that’s clean and polished, or the one caked in mud?
Obviously, the clean and polished one goes faster.
So…
If your lips are wet and smooth, then they are in effect lubricated, and air can slide smoothly by them, but if they are dry and rough, then air drags by them, causing turbulence.
Get the idea?
Thanks Cork…nicely explained…
So are you saying that this turbulence affects the accuracy/speed of the air stream ??
Exactly, weedie! Turbulence defies focus, so accuracy diminishes. Edit: in other words, the air stream spreads out, and focus is lost.
Avoid: coffee, tea, soda, milk, and anything which tends to dry your mouth.
If thirsty, or dry of mouth, go for a not-too-sweet fruit juice, or water.
bah!
I’d go with a nice smokey single malt.
Pedantry Moment: so far we have one (1) phenomenon (dry lips). Phenomena = plural…
So what about using a little polish and slick coat?
i.e. some lip balm or petroleum jelly or the like to keeps
the old smackers moist??
Any one experimented with this?
.
That’s just trying to put a gloss on it. 
I’ve got 'em licked! Failing that, you could always “wet your whistle”.
Yes, but, apparently there are two lips in discussion here, an upper and a lower, so apparently there would be a plurality of lips.
BTW, Jem, it got my attention, too.
Yes, but, apparently there are two lips in discussion here, an upper and a lower, so apparently there would be a plurality of lips.
the correct one is phenomenon do you actually study greek and latin? cool i though only in italy people studies these stuff
I remember that last time I was in Rome… Veni, vidi, vici baby!
Hey! Aren’t the Italians the ones who invented these word endings, just to confuse the rest of us?
I know many players who sound great after a pint or a bit o’ whiskey!
I play the flute in church. I gotta remember to carry lip balm.
There’s the old flute player’s trick, to put a clean dime in the mouth, under the tongue. The silver gets the saliva going, which in turn keeps the lips wet.
I tried it once, just to see if it works, and, by golly, it does work.
hmmm… thinking about where those dimes might have been, i dont know if i’d put it in my mouth!
Ah, but the qualifier is clean, and I mean clean. It can be done, but otherwise I agree with you, that money is about the dirtiest thing to be found.
An old hiker’s trick was to use a pebble for the same reason (not to keep the lips moist, but the saliva keeps you from being thirsty). A variation we used when I was in the Army was a coffee bean. Not only does it keep the saliva flowing, but it’s caffinated to boot!
LOL
After my experience with Army coffee, I’d say any kind of coffee tastes good!
Lip-salve works fine for me when needed - not so much when actually fluting, but as I drive for a living my lips quite often get a bit dry and I just use normal lip-salve (the lip-stick kind) when they feel a bit dry or flaky. Ditto if they get a bit chapped from being outdoors a lot (rare for me these days…). As for dry mouth while playing - certainly at sessions, I find a pint of Guinness (I usually have to drive, so one pint usually has to last me 2-3 hours!) strategically sipped between sets does wonders! (Proper West Country farm cider is even better.)
Back to the serious business: linguistic pedantry…
Two lips, upper and lower are plural, but their being dry/flaky/chapped is a single and therefore singular phenomenon (Greek loan-word). The phenomenally deleterious effect(s) of such a condition upon (attempting) to play the flute may well be scientifically discernible as multiple (e.g. poor lip-hole formation due to stiffness leading to wasteful, poorly focussed/directed and hissy airstream; direct hiss caused by passage of air over flakes of skin, etc.) and therefore plural phenomena.
One should not need to have studied classical languages to know this kind of thing - it ought to be part of general knowledge about one’s own language, its roots, mechanisms, borrowings etc. It is part of learning English (or whatever one’s milk-tongue may be) to be able to identify loan-words, their origin and, where appropriate, their grammatically correct variable forms as accepted in current usage. Obviously, having studied other languages helps one to identify sources of loan words (and other cultural borrowings) and to recognise more of them and know more about how they are used in their source setting. I have never studied Greek (did do Latin - was not at all good at it…) but I can recognise it and distinguish it from Latin in modern usages, just as I can mostly discern Romance sourced vocabulary from Germanic in modern English, spot loan-words from Hebrew or Indian (sub-continent) or whatever sources. That kind of thing is just about being interested in words and their workings and being observant on a basis of some fairly low-level general knowledge. Love it!