Losing Your Tone While Performing - FluteTips 183

Have you ever been performing a piece only to find that your tone gets worse as you go along? I remember discovering this in college. Even when practicing went well, in a performance my tone would get thin, and I might even lose my low register!
Part of the cause could be the tension from performance anxiety. Rather than relaxing, you get tighter with each measure. But a bigger part of the tension in your playing is understanding how to adjust your embouchure, and your breathing.
The real trick to not losing your tone while you perform is learning how to loosen your embouchure, and when to adjust the embouchure shape, widen your teeth spacing, and even out your breathing.
Here a link to the flute & headjoint demonstrated in this video:
William S. Haynes Custom Handmade Flute
Coin Silver (.900) hand-cut body, sterling silver lightweight mechanism, Haynes pinless mechanism, soldered silver tone holes, sterling silver barrel, rings, ribs, and posts, modern Haynes scale, French (open hole) model, pointed key arms, gold springs, Straubinger/Pisoni S2 pads, 0.014” / 0.35mm tubing, A=442, offset G, split E mechanism, C# Trill key, B footjoint. Handmade in USA.
flutecenter.com/products/will...
Haynes Silver Handcut Headjoint - Coin Silver (.900) Tubing, Silver Lip Plate and Riser. 0.016” / 0.40mm tubing wall. Nagog cut. Handmade in USA.
flutecenter.com/collections/c...
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flutecenter.com/pages/trial-form
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Losing Your Tone While Performing - FluteTips 183
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[@jeromevicogne3990]

Always the perfect words to describe and demonstrate something not natural and easy to understand for a student. Thanks a lot for sharing your knowledge and passion.

[@DoctorFlute]

My pleasure and thank you for the compliment.

[@yvonneburdine670]

Excellent! I will keep these two tips in mind: the embrochure being in a state of flux and taking a yawning breath during rests. For me, this is your best video to date. Thank you so much.

[@DoctorFlute]

Whoa! Thank you for that high praise!

[@theresa_s]

excellent video, also just discovered the Hungarian Fantasy by Doppler and it is a beautiful song on the flute i wish to learn as well! 😊

[@DoctorFlute]

Thanks so much. The Doppler is well worth practicing! It is really fun to play.

[@achaley4186]

Very helpful video, and moreover, what gorgeous playing! Thank you 🌺🙏🏼🌸🙂

[@DoctorFlute]

Glad it was helpful and thank you!

[@PlanetImo]

Tension is a right pest :) Gaagh.

[@DoctorFlute]

It is!

[@musician-florian]

Yeah, tone and embouchure, it makes me crazy. Since I've changed to another teacher 8 months ago, we've been changing my whole embouchure since I was smiling with my right corner like crazy. Just yesterday I told her that my tone is getting worse instead of better. It then turned out that my area above the upper lip was not "tight", close to my teath and long/wide enough. But the difficulty here is to not use the nose area instead. :) The thing that helps me a lot is the imagination of having 4 points which I always have to control. 2 points under my bottom lip and two points above the upper lip, this really helps the embouchure to be flexible. And if the low register just doesn't want to come out, I'm most likely to either lose those 2 points above the upper lip as they're not low and not to the sides enough, or I keep the points in a position for like middle or high register. But if everything is really under control, it doesn't really matter how long I play for the low register to work any time. But of course, the stability in the middle under the bottom lip and also not tightening the corners is a hard thing on it's own 😅

[@DoctorFlute]

Hey if this plan is working for you fantastic! Remember that for the lowest register one of the biggest problems is blowing too much air.

[@bruhokpp]

ty for this wonderful video miss! and I have a question because there is a problem on my mouthpiece. I can't seem to play my mouthpiece very well even though the placement of my lips or embouchure is correct. Like whenever I blow harder to make the tone higher it makes an airy sound which I am concerned about. Then, when I put moisture on my mouthpiece and try to blow harder, it works. But when the mouthpiece is dried out, it will be harder to play again Do you know what causes of this and how to fix it? I want to get it fix immediately because it makes me harder to play 😭 (Sorry if my English is bad, I hope you reply!)

[@DoctorFlute]

Is there any flute player around you that you can have them see what you are doing? Also I think you should go to a repair man and make sure that the flute is in good working order. How about trying to play on the head joint only. Does that work?

[@Kndnsssrlgn]

How come every time I watch one of your videos I have to go practice...

[@DoctorFlute]

😆

[@christianpower4935]

Hello ,can you help me,sometimes i feel that my embouchure and also my flute become easy in position and very unstable, lost. Even if I support it with my body. And if I want to sing a scale, the sound is very lost, very 'dull'. What could I do?And also has no weight when is happens

[@DoctorFlute]

Are you talking about posture and how you hold the flute? It sounds like the flute is out of balance. I have some videos on proper playing positions one being the 4 balance points. Watch that and see if it answers your questions.