I purchased my first alto and bass flutes in the early 1980s and now have three altos, three bass flutes, a contrabass and an Eb flute. I use each of them every week at lessons, flute choir rehearsals, and in recitals. They are played by everyone – flutists of all ages and levels. They are kept scrupulously clean with a spray meant for sterilizing brass mouthpieces, and I shift personnel and instruments frequently.

Getting Started
    Teachers can safely introduce the alto flute into lessons when students’ arms are long enough for a curved head alto, their physical balance is secure holding a C flute, and they have the breath support to hold a steady pitch for longer than 15 seconds. Bass flutes need slightly longer arms (or stronger arms) and controlled finger action, but they too can be introduced to flutists as young as 9 or 10 years old.
    As you place a big flute into a student’s hands, position the left hand first. Be sure to hold the weight of the flute yourself and use your free hand to gently curve the student’s first finger knuckle into its support position. Then place the left and right thumbs and curve the left fingers onto the B, A, G, and G# keys. Still keeping the weight in your control, reposition the right-hand thumb first and then place the pinky on the D# key, followed by the D, E, and F keys. Younger students do very well with the newer, light-weight basses and altos, made from a composite plastic. Heavier, all silver models are quite hefty and can lead to injuries such as tendonitis.

Alignment of Big Flutes
    There are two basic schools of thought on this subject. Some players like the 90-degree angle (vertical or horizontal) but I prefer a 45-75-degree angle, towards the chin. It distributes the weight more evenly (better fulcrum) and allows the hands more freedom of movement. Make sure the footjoint is placed for easy reach of the C and C# keys.

First Sounds – Less is More
    I caution students who are new to playing the big flutes that their first sounds should be gentle and relaxing. The lower frequency of the alto and bass tones do not need a fast air stream. It helps to tell students to exhale gently, instead of blowing or to calmly allow warm air to pass over the embouchure hole. Tweak the sound by adjusting the embouchure plate. Encourage students to roll out and place the embouchure plate low on the chin, keeping the jaw open and relaxed.
    I use a low G as a first note, but any left-hand note will do. Have a treble clef staff handy to show them where the tone they are making appears on the staff. Once students make a sound,  allow them to explore other fingerings and even other octaves. Keep your own hands free to assist in supporting the instrument if the student tires or bobbles. Begin with long tones, then progress to quarter notes up and down a short scale in one breath. Stay in the lower register until the students becomes comfortable, then attempt the middle range. Check the chin to make sure there is suppleness and looseness. Jamming the headjoint into the chin will severely limit range and even prevent high notes from speaking.

Flute Pegs
    There are many companies producing multiple flute pegs. Make sure your flutes have a secure place to rest when not in use. If possible, make big flutes available for practice before and after students’ lessons or flute choir rehearsals. If students show interest and affinity for playing alto or bass  flute, assign them scales, etudes, and solos at their lessons. Many high school flute choir competitions are asking students to record on bass or alto flute as well as on C flute.
    Adding big flutes to your studio and flute choirs broadens the opportunities for artistic expression. The lower colors balance the piccolo and C flutes in the flute choir repertoire. Lower flutes give flutists experience on an inner part or bass line, and this develops the ear and musical awareness.       

Low Flute Resources
    The National Flute Association has an active Low Flutes Committee that is dedicated to promoting the playing, teaching, repertoire, commissions and appreciation of the big flutes.

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    On Friday morning, I attended a flute choir concert dedicated to pedagogy using students at the Maurice Ravel Conservatory. The personnel of the flute choir rotated between flutists of various ages and levels of performance. The program included works by Bizet, John Williams, Guiot, Chris-topher Caliendo and more. My friend Sophie Dufeutrelle’s composition Concerto Aurore for alto flute and flute choir was also performed with Jeanne Marie Savouret playing alto flute. This work was premiered at La Côte Flute Festival in Geneva in 2014 where Matthias Ziegler played the solo (Contrabass and quatertone flute) with Phillipe Bernold conducting the Geneva Chamber Orchestra. 
    The next concert I heard was Korean flutist Jasmine Choi playing Telemann’s Fantaisie No. 1 in A Major and Ian Clarke’s Great Train Race. She then collaborated with guitarist Benjamin Biers to perform Henri Sauguet’s Six Easy Pieces, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s Sonatine, Op. 205, and Astor Piazzola’s Histoire du Tango. Choi performed with her usual aplomb, beautiful sound, and impressive technique. The ensemble playing with guitar was excellent. 
    The Friday evening concert featured the Ensemble Antara of Santiago, Chile. On entering the hall, the eye was immediately drawn to the half-human size pan pipes (zampoñas) and the trutruca which looks like a very skinny Alpenhorn. For me the music was disappointing as I had hoped to hear indigenous sounds but instead this concert was all contemporary compositions and sounds. Alex Sorba followed in a beat box extravaganza.
    On Saturday morning Sophie Dufeutrelle presented a pedagogy lecture Profs-Agiles (Agile Teachers). It is difficult to report on a French lecture of which one has understood about half, but the gist of it focused on how the conditions of life influence learning. Later in the day Patrick Gallois, flute; Pierre-Henri Xuereb, viola; and Fabrice Pierre, harp collaborated brilliantly on the Claude Debussy Sonata for flute, viola, and harp. The tempos were ferocious, the melodic shaping exquisite, and the colors radiant.
    If you look at the program online (), you can see how many concerts and presentations I missed. Colleagues commented that the closing concert by the Universal Flute Orchestra Japan was the best flute choir they had ever heard. Their program included a transcription of Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloe and Mozart’s Concerto in G, K. 313 with Maxence Larrieu as soloist. Unfortunately, I had been lured away by the siren song of Impressionist paintings at the Fondation Louis Vuitton.

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    Donald E. McGinnis passed away on October 28 in his home in Hilliard, Ohio. He was a graduate of Oberlin Conservatory of Music with degrees in music education and clarinet performance followed by MA and PhD degrees in music theory and composition from the University of Iowa.  In 1941 he was hired at The Ohio State University where he taught woodwinds, assisted with both the concert and marching bands, and conducted the regimental bands. During WWII, he was the Communication Officer on the USS Lucidor in the South Pacific. 
    After the war, he returned to The Ohio State University  where he became conductor of the concert band. Under his leadership, the band gained national and international recognition through recordings and performances in venues like Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center. He was principal clarinet of the Columbus Symphony for two years and principal flute for ten years. 
    During his retirement, he was the interim conductor of the Capital University Wind Ensemble, Columbus Youth Wind Ensemble, and Indiana University of Pennsylvania. He also conducted the Southwestern Sym-phony Orchestra from 1979-1987. 
    McGinnis was a member of the American Bandmasters Association and served as president of the organization. Memorial contributions may be made to the Dr. Donald E. McGinnis SOM New Day Fund (#314212) and sent to The Ohio State University Foundation, Attn. John Swartz, Director of Development, College of Arts and Sciences, The Ohio State University, 1501 Neil Avenue, Suite 020, Columbus, OH 43210. 
    Katherine Borst Jones has compiled a timeline of his life and achievements that may be found at: 

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    Marcel Moyse (1889-1984) was a French flutist and pedagogue. He was born in St. Amour, France, but in 1904 he moved to Paris where he lived with his uncle, Joseph Moyse, who was a professional cellist. Joseph Moyse played in the Lamourreux Orchestra and often took young Marcel to orchestra rehearsals and concerts. He also arranged flute lessons for the boy with Adolphe Hennebains. Marcel progressed rapidly and was invited to audit Paul Taffanel’s class at the Paris Conservatoire. 
    The next year Marcel auditioned and was accepted as a student at the Paris Conservatoire. At the age of 17, after one year of instruction, he won the first prize playing Philippe Gaubert’s Nocturne et Allegro scherzando. Although this was a remarkable achievement, Moyse felt he needed more than just one year of serious study. He approached Gaubert about lessons and was accepted as a private student. He studied with Gaubert for four years. He expanded his musical knowledge by studying and practicing the solo violin and cello repertoire. Eventually he would transcribe the violin etudes by Kreutzer and Wieniawski for flute as well as piano etudes by Chopin, Cramer, and Czerny.  
    In 1913, Moyse toured the United States with Australian operatic soprano Nellie Melba. (Melba toast and peach melba were two iconic recipes named in her honor.) During this time Moyse was in ill health and suffered from recurring pneumonia. He was appointed solo flute in L’Opéra Comique and also applied for the solo flute position in the Paris Opera, a position he was granted but eventually turned down. 
    Moyse became first flutist with the prestigious orchestra of the Société des Concerts. The Jacque Ibert Flute Concerto, which was written for him, was premiered with the Société des Concerts. In 1931 Moyse, Blanche Honegger (violin), and his son Louis (piano) formed the Trio Moyse. The group performed and recorded together for the next 20 years. 
    Moyse was appointed flute professor at the Paris Conservatoire in 1932, a position he held until 1940. At the same time, he was professor of flute at the Geneva Conservatoire. Once a week he took the train from Paris to Geneva stopping on the way to visit his adoptive mother in St. Amour. In 1936, he became a Chevalier of the Légion D’Honneur for his artistic contributions as a musician. He performed as a soloist with all of the major European orchestras and toured widely including performances at Tanglewood and on NBC radio in New York City. He was one of the first flutists to record, and he won several Grand prix du Disques for his efforts. 

Moyse in Boswil, Switzerland around 1969

    He left his position at the Conservatoire during WWII and returned to St. Amour. After the war, he applied for his former position at the Paris Conservatoire, but at first, the request was denied. Eventually an appointment came, but by that time Moyse had already decided to move to Brattleboro, Vermont. In 1951 he co-founded the Marlboro Music School and Festival with Rudolf Serkin and Adolf Busch in nearby Marlboro, Vermont. Students from his classes include Robert Aitken, William Bennett, Julia Bogorad, Michel Debost, James Galway, Bernard Goldberg, Wendy Webb Kumer, Paula Robison, Carol Wincenc, and Trevor Wye.  
    Besides playing under the batons of Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Strauss, Koussevitsky, and Toscanini, he played the premieres of Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloe and Stravinsky’s Petrushka and Rite of Spring. As a teacher, he published a number of volumes of which the De La Sonorite and Tone Development Through Interpretation are the most famous and still used by flutists around the world.
    Moyse was an exacting teacher. It was said that he expected students to interpret the music just as he did and would be upset if they did not comply. His pedagogical publications outline the basic concepts of musicianship and flute playing.    
    Ardal Powell writes in his book The Flute, “He strove to imitate the range of sonority other instrumentalists and singers such as Pablo Casals (cello), Georges Enesco, Jacques Thibaud, and Fritz Kreisler (violin) and Enrico Caruso (tenor) could achieve. All these artists used a continuous vibrato to produce tones of lightness, sweetness, and brilliance rather than emphasis or strength. Moyse later wrote that his teachers and colleagues warned him to reduce a type of vibrato they considered ‘excessive,’ but on another occasion, he claimed to have invented the technique on purpose at an early recording session.” 
    The Marcel Moyse Society was created by his students to preserve his contributions as an artist and master teacher. A collection of memorabilia is housed at the Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts in New York City.

Publications of Marcel Moyse
Flute Pedagogy
Études et éxercises technique (1921)
Exercises Journaliers (1922)
Mécanisme-chromatisme pour flûte (1927)
École de l’articulation (1927)
25 Études mélodique (Var) (1928)
24 Petites études mélodique (Var) (1928)
De la Sonorité (1934)
Gammes et Arpèges (Scales and Arpeggios)
Le Débutant flûtiste (1935)
Tone Development Through Interpretation
20 Exercises et études sur les Grandes Liaisons
48 Studies of Virtuosity; 2 volumes
How I Stayed in Shape

Flute Transcriptions/Editions
50 Variations on a Theme by Bach
Grandes Etudes de Berbiguier
12 Etudes de Boehm
24 Caprices-études, Boehm Op. 26 (1938)
12 Études de grande virtuosité d’après Chopin (1928)
100 Études faciles et progressives d’après Cramer (1928); 2 volumes
24 Études de virtuosité d’après Czerny (1927)
50 Etudes Melodique de Demersseman; 2 volumes
Bouquet de Tons (Furstenau)
10 Etudes after Kessler
20 Études d’après Kreutzer (1928)
24 Etudes de Soussman, Op. 50
10 Etudes after Wieniawsky

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Create Reasons to Attend
    Research conducted by Hopkins Center for the Arts at Dartmouth and the National Endowment for the Art’s (NEA) 2015 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, was used to identify strategies designed to attract a more diverse, less classically trained audience. According to the survey, the primary motivation to attend concerts in the arts among Americans is to socialize with friends or family. This implies that performers should look for ways to incorporate an aspect of socializing without compromising artistry.  
    Social fulfillment involves making people feel connected and part of a group. This can occur in multiple ways. Allotting more time and resources to the social events that surround a performance is a place to start. A pre-concert setting that allows the concert attendees to meet each other can also serve as an educational window. Receptions after performances allow time for groups to debrief, discuss thoughts about the concert and meet others in the audience. Food and drink are usually a good addition. 
    During the concert, consider seating configurations that allow for conversation between pieces or sets. Instead of a dark concert hall, try brighter lighting that allows audience members to read accompanying materials. It also can help performers gauge the atmosphere in the audience. Young adults tend to enjoy time to connect with each other. Incorporating these opportunities before, during, or after concerts may draw a new demographic of audience members. 

Consider Time 
    Conversely, in the same survey, the primary barrier for Americans attending a concert or performance is a lack of time. Typically, a recital is ninety minutes long with a ten to fifteen minute intermission. An hour and a half of sitting quietly in a darkened room may seem daunting. Consider programming three different thirty-minute concerts or some other alternative. Another option is to offer less formal concerts in unconventional spaces. Classical Revolution is a chamber music organization that performs in unconventional, informal settings. The musicians bring the music to the people instead of the people coming to hear the music. Founded in 2006 by violist Charith Premawardhana, Classical Revolution’s mission is to enrich communities with chamber music and to create a support network for local musicians. Since 2006 over thirty chapters have been created across the United States, Canada, and Europe. 
    Starting in 2010, the New World Symphony, an orchestral academy that prepares young professionals for careers in symphony orchestras, began experimenting with four different concert formats in an effort to appeal to younger, less experienced audience members. The most effective format for attracting first-time attenders was the Mini-Concert. The abbreviated concerts were thirty minutes long and cost $2.50 to attend. With conductors or musicians providing spoken introductions, these short concerts had the greatest impact on increasing attendance among those who had not previously attended classical concerts. 

Get the Audience Involved
    Involving the audience so that they are active participants rather than bystanders is another important aspect of attracting a broader audience base. Some situations might allow for a call and response activity during a performance. Recently, I visited an elementary school and gave students a thirty-second tutorial on beatboxing. While they gave me a beat with their collective, “Boots-and-Cats” I acknowledged a young boy’s birthday with a rousing rendition of Happy Birthday. It was a huge success and enjoyed by all. 
    Obviously, performances are not always in a gymnasium filled with fifty sixth graders, but there are usually ways to adapt a presentation to the audience. Perhaps consider bringing the audience onstage with the performers or vice versa. Expanding the stage to the entire hall has acoustical benefits as well as theatrical benefits, and audience members become immersed in the music experience. In a small setting, it can be very effective to ask questions of the audience before and after introducing a piece of music. 
    To engage audience members, performers should develop additional skills. Offering a smile and a bow before and after each piece is not enough. Performers are educators who introduce and explain new and differing styles of music, orators who challenge listeners to develop their own accompanying videos, storytellers who tell the tales of other cultures and previous times, and vocal advocates of classical music who invite others to understand and appreciate its breathtaking beauty. Talk about what the audience should listen for in the music. Explain why you programmed the music you are about to perform. Think about how you can make the music and the context in which it was written feel tangible and exciting. 

Practice Presentation Skills
    Instrumentalists may be uncomfortable or unfamiliar with verbal presentations. Practice this aspect of the performance with the same fervor that you approach the delivery of a musical phrase. Make sure your voice projects well and that you are using clear and deliberate articulation so that every word is heard in the back of the hall. I usually find that this verbal connection helps me as well. I see faces that are engaged and am reminded that the performance is not about me. It is about sharing the music with the audience. 
    Unless you are performing for an audience completely filled with musicians, there will be people experiencing the recital from many different perspectives and levels of musical knowledge. I come from a family of non-musicians. They have helped me to understand the variety of ways people experience classical music. Often, I find myself generating analogies for my brothers in order to draw parallels between my vocation and theirs. For example, I might say to my ophthalmologist brother, “This piece is like a routine cataract surgery. It is a staple in our repertoire because of how well it was written for the flute.” This type of analogy can create an entry point into the musical language and repertoire for a non-musician. 

Add Other Elements
    Another way to do this is to align  music with dance, visual art, and spoken word. This not only gives audience members new ways to experience the music, but also gives performers the chance to work with other artists. Collaborations with other types of artists forces us to stretch beyond the comfortable musical jargon. Finding a common language, one that is understood across disciplines, to explain the inner workings of the musical language is a great exercise in expanding our capacity to interpret music. 
    The following questions offer some ideas for incorporating other art forms into a flute recital: 
•    What other forms of art were produced during the same time and place as the music? Are there similarities? Consider including images or projecting the art during the performance. 
•    What poetry best depicts the musical affect of the piece? 
•    Are there short stories or other written accounts that help to immerse the listener into the context in which the piece was written? 
•    Are there any significant musical connotations in the music? How might you depict those with words, movement or imagery? 
•    Was the piece inspired by a person, place or object? How might you incorporate that into the performance? 
•    How might the music be reflected in movement? 
•    Is the music connected to a style of dance? 

Plan Your Next Performance
    Consider the following for your next recital or concert. Start with a targeted audience before choosing repertoire. Think about why this group of people might come to see your performance. Perhaps the theme of the concert resonates with a particular age demographic, or the location of the performance space is convenient for a certain neighborhood. Don’t limit yourself to recital halls. Consider unconventional spaces to hold your concert. Private homes, art galleries, backyards, bookstores, hospitals, country clubs, retirement homes, libraries, wineries, restaurants, and radio stations are possible examples. 
    Take great care in programming. Start with a theme and try to create a thread throughout the program. It might involve particular composers, time periods, instrumentation or historic events. Opposites can also provide a theme. For instance, when I program Debussy’s Syrinx, I like to perform Edgard Varese’s Density 21.5 immediately following to provide contrast. It helps to incorporate a difference in lighting and stage placement; Debussy on the left and Varese on the right. Whatever thread you have established, consider the many ways of illuminating the topic. Finally, talk about your ideas with others outside your field and get their thoughts and suggestions. Maybe they can provide you with an idea of how it connects to a topic in their field. 

    Going forward, musicians need to be inclusive. The audience and their experience should be a priority. Excellence and mastery of the instrument are necessary but are only part of the equation. Experiences that are multisensory and provide increased interaction will help bring younger and more diverse audiences to performances.

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Core
    How much core there is in the sound is controlled by the angle and speed of the air stream as it hits the blowing edge of the embouchure hole. Blowing lower on the wall creates more core or edge. Blowing higher on the wall creates less edge. To change the angle of the air, a flutist uses the lips, tongue and perhaps a very small movement of the jaw. 
    When playing early music on a modern flute, the results are better if there is less core, while Romantic era and some contemporary music sounds better with more core. Most theoretical technical exercises and etudes sound the best someplace in the middle. Practicing pitch bends and slurring the harmonic series offers opportunities for flutists to learn to vary the angle of air on the wall. 

Harmonics
    The color or timbre of the sound is controlled by which harmonic partials are the most present. This too is controlled by the angle of the air stream plus the openness of the throat, the dropping of the jaw, the position of the tongue, and the pursing of the lips. Practicing the harmonic series slurred not only promotes embouchure flexibility, but it also shows flutists how far forward the lips should be to get each harmonic partial. I prefer playing most notes throughout the range with my lips set at the third harmonic partial. An oscilloscope, which often can be borrowed from the physics department at a university, will show the harmonic partials. 

Containment
    Containment of the sound occurs when the air stream is even throughout the note. If the air slows or is uneven when exiting the lips, the tone will spread and there is no containment. An air stream that is too highly placed produces an airy sound without containment. Practicing even air exercises helps shape the tone. 

Even Air Without the Flute
    The first step in helping students with tone is to develop the skill of playing with even air. This means that there are no deviations in the air speed from the attack of the sound through the release. Flutists should be able to play with even air at any speed. It may be slower for the pp dynamic and faster for a ff dynamic. It may be faster for certain articulation marks and faster or slower for high notes versus low notes. No matter what the air speed is, the flutist should learn to blow the air out at an even speed. The following are some exercises to try with students.
•    A challenging exercise to explore involves taking a cigarette paper and placing it on a smooth surface such as a wall, window, or mirror. Have students blow against the paper and try to keep it in place on the surface. If the air speed is not even or strong enough, the paper will fall to the floor. This is an inexpensive exercise to practice and is also fun to do in a group masterclass. 
•    Another good exercise is to blow slow, even air at the flame of a candle. If the air speed increases or wavers, the flame will immediately react. 
•    A child’s pinwheel (50¢ at a dollar store) can be used to chart the flow of air at different speeds from slow, even air to fast, even air. 

•    A slightly more expensive exercise involves a spirometer ($5-10 each, but may be purchased in bulk at a reduced price.) A spirometer is an instrument that measures the air capacity of the lungs. Wind players can use one to practice playing with even air or with vibrato. With a spirometer, ask a student to blow into the hose with a preformed mouthpiece and try to keep a ping pong ball in a stationary place.

Each flutist should have their own mouthpiece and hose for sanitary reasons. When I was teaching at a university, the respiratory therapy department at the hospital was throwing away some unused spirometers, so each flutist in my studio was able to have one. Check with local health care professionals to see if they might be have extra devices for your students.

Even Air with the Flute
    Before you begin, be sure that the student has good posture and that the aperture in the lips is in alignment with the embouchure hole on the headjoint. Using a tuner, have the student blow a middle D where the sole objective is to keep the needle still. It may take several tries. Do not worry whether the note is flat or sharp at this stage as the flutist is working on the basic concept of moving the air at an even speed. Control of the pitch will come later.
    Practice this concept on whole-note scales (major or minor, one octave, ascending, with no vibrato), keeping the tuner’s needle still. This exercise is useful for every flutist because even a few days off from practice will diminish the ability to play with even air. Once a student is successful at keeping the needle still, repeat the process but fix the intonation. I prefer doing this exercise with a tuner set at A=440, although students should be aware that in Europe the tuner is usually set at A=442. For additional work on playing with even air, practice one-octave scales in thirds plus the one-octave major, minor, diminished and augmented arpeggios. 

Speed of the Air 
    Generally, when a flutist has tone problems, the air speed is not fast enough no matter the dynamic or placement of the note in the range. In  4/4 meter, have a student play a dotted half note at a mf dynamic followed by a rest. In the rest both you and the student say the word blow. The student  should take a sip breath after saying the word. Repeat several times so the student begins to put more air through the flute and is playing on the exhale. Repeat throughout the range. I like to think of this type of blowing as playing on the edge. I put as much air through the instrument as I can without losing control of the sound. Having students aim the sound to an imaginary target across the room while doing this exercise will improve projection of the sound. 

Angle of the Air
    If the tone is too airy, the air stream is directed to high. Ask students to direct the air to the left elbow. When you give this instruction for the first time, they will more than likely lift their left elbows to meet the air stream. For this to produce the best results, the left elbow should point to the floor with the left arm rather close to the body but not against the ribs. If the tone is too edgy and metallic, they should lift the air stream slightly. To change the angle of the air, flutists use the lips, tongue and perhaps a very small movement of the jaw. 

Reflected Sound
    Sometimes students do not know what a good tone sounds like and so have difficulty producing one. Listening to live concerts, recordings, or YouTube videos with students is helpful in teaching them what to listen for. Flutists today blow differently than they did 50 years ago because most concert halls are much larger than they once were. Tastes also change as do musical styles, so other tone colors are demanded of artists. 
    Joseph Mariano, the legendary flutist, often warmed up standing very close to the large glass window in his studio. I heard him practice this way day after day and wondered why he was doing this. Since I had a similarly large window in my practice room in the annex at the Eastman School of Music, I decided to give it a try. I quickly realized that he was warming up this way because the hard surface of the window’s glass reflected the sound back to him immediately, and he knew what he needed to do to play with the sound he wanted. 
    I like to practice at the piano with the right pedal depressed. I play a note and let the piano sing it back to me. The better tone I produce, the louder the piano rings back to me. This is also a good exercise to practice when getting ready to play with piano accompaniment because you will learn where the pitch is on each note in the range. 

Projection and the Cushion of Air
    With today’s larger concert halls, flutists need to play louder than they did when playing in salons and smaller concert venues. William Kincaid suggested putting a cushion of air (making the tone slightly on the airy side, but still with a core) so that the tone would project to the back of the hall. By the time the tone leaves the stage, the orchestral performers sitting in front of him had absorbed the air in the tone with their sheer presence. However, if the tone was very clear where he was sitting, it continued to get smaller and clearer as it floated out to the audience. He always told us to play to the back of the hall where the real musicians were – in the cheap seats. 

Homogeneity of Sound 
    Each of the flute’s 39 most used notes has a specific blowing place on the wall of the embouchure hole. As a flutist moves from one to the next, whether it is stepwise or a larger interval, the tone color throughout the range should be homogeneous. Recording scale and arpeggio practice helps identify places where there are deviations. Marcel Moyse’s first exercise in the De La Sonorite was written to help flutists explore this concept. However, any theoretical technical material played slowly enough can be used to practice the concept.

Vibrato
    Generally, vibrato is not something you add onto the tone, but it is part of the tone. Once the basic concepts above have been explored, then incorporate them using vibrato.   

Breathing 
    While this article could have started with a discussion of posture and good breathing habits, sometimes it is better to practice exercises without a lengthy discussion about the anatomy of breathing. I have found that once students can do the exercises, their brains have already figured out how they should breathe to accomplish the goal. 

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Adding Vibrato
    Practice playing softly with varying speeds of vibrato and with no vibrato at all. Players often take out all of their vibrato in soft playing. Experiment with the opposite because sometimes a fast shimmering vibrato in the high register is more beautiful. Vibrato is a controversial subject in the flute community, but I believe a good rule is to be comfortable playing with all kinds of vibrato shapes and speeds at every dynamic level. Often a conductor will ask for more or less vibrato, and if you are not able to comfortably switch between a wide range of speeds and depths of vibratos, you will stick out for the wrong reason. 
    When I play with a group of winds, I find it best to use minimal vibrato. Other wind players use vibrato very differently than flutists do, and I think a wide vibrato sticks out in this texture and creates balance and pitch complications. When I play with strings, I use vibrato more freely, sometimes wide and slow and sometimes a faster more shimmery vibrato, depending on the context. If you are playing a solo passage in the orchestra, experiment with different kinds of vibrato at home before the rehearsal. Decide what you believe will work and stick to the plan in rehearsal. Feel free to take risks and make musical statements, but practice them at home many times first to make sure they will work under pressure. Then you can make small adjustments in rehearsal when you can hear the context.  
    There is no right or wrong way to play with vibrato. There are great flute players who use vibrato in many different ways. Listen to a favorite flutist and try to copy what he or she is doing with the vibrato at all different dynamic levels. Record yourself and decide whether what you hear on the recording is the same as what you intended. Make adjustments accordingly. Record yourself many times until what you hear on the recording matches what you hear in your head. Once you have mastered this, pick another flute player to copy and do the same thing. Do this with as many different great players as you can. Once you have mastered the different types of vibrato, you will be more qualified to make a decision on what you think is the best sound instead of just using whatever vibrato comes naturally to you. I believe the trend now is towards a more sparing use of vibrato. Be sure you can play this way in a soft dynamic to avoid a tough situation in which a conductor asks for less vibrato and you cannot execute what he asks.  

Embouchure Hole
    The direction in which the air is aimed on the blowing edge of the embouchure hole is also important. Many flutists roll the embouchure hole in quite a bit when playing softly. This creates resistance and makes it easier to play softly; however, it makes it impossible to play in tune. If your headjoint is rolled in too much, it will squash the overtones and create a soft but dead sound. This dead sound occurs because of the lack of overtones and makes it more challenging for other instruments to tune to you. 
    I line my headjoint up so that the blow hole is exactly in line with the keys. Sometimes I will make slight adjustments and cover more or less of the hole. These changes are very small and are used primarily for color choices rather than volume. Instead of rolling the headjoint in and out to create resistance, try instead to raise and lower your soft palate. I try to keep my mouth as closed as possible in all registers because I find it lets me use my air more efficiently and have more control over where it is going. If your mouth is too open in a soft dynamic, the sound becomes less focused and refined and can lack core.  
If you master the art of soft playing, it will do wonders for your career. You may even come to enjoy it more than playing loudly. As you improve your versatility as a flutist, you will also notice how you can make the entire wind section sound better and not just focus on how you sound individually.

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Julia Bogorad-Kogan became principal flute of The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra at the age of 22. A frequent performer, she currently teaches at the University of Minnesota School of Music and gives masterclasses and recitals at colleges across the country.

How did you win the principal flute position with The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra? 
    I really appreciated the fact that the audition consisted of more than just the ten most technical measures of Prokofiev’s Classical Symphony. In addition to the standard excerpts, I played a piece of my choice, Georges Enesco’s Cantabile et Presto, part of Hindemith’s Acht Stücke, a Reicha wind quintet with SPCO members, and a flute duet with my predecessor, Carol Wincenc. This allowed me to express my musical personality. So many auditions these days heavily favor technical excerpts and as a result reward those with the most bionic technique, even though they may not have anything to say musically when they get into the orchestra.

The SPCO is the only full-time chamber orchestra in the US. What is the difference between a chamber orchestra and a symphony orchestra?
    A chamber orchestra is a small orchestra and can be anywhere from 18 to 50 or so musicians. It has a different core repertoire from a symphony orchestra, consisting generally of Baroque, Classical, twentieth-century and contemporary works with a few Romantic ones as well. There is often room for more individual expression in a chamber orchestra.
    The SPCO has recently been including unconducted concerts in their season. When there is no conductor, the musicians have to come to the first rehearsal with a familiarity of the score and how their parts fit in. It requires a lot more preparation. The first rehearsal is often chaotic. We have to painstakingly work out who leads in each section of a piece. At one point, I may watch the concertmaster, then listen to the second violins, then act as a leader in cueing the wind section for a tutti wind choir. Usually, one of the two concertmasters is the overall leader of the rehearsals, but anyone is free to put in his or her two cents, and they frequently do. It takes time, but we gradually hash out a unified concept of the piece. Concerts can sometimes be disastrous but also electrifying because everyone is on edge. It is quite a high-wire act.

What are your favorite pre-concert rituals?
    I always nap in the afternoon before a concert. For me, the quality of the nap predicts the quality of the concert. I also make sure to eat dinner, as I get weak if I have not eaten. I like to get to the hall really early (much earlier than my string-playing colleagues) and warmup for the good part of an hour before the concert.

Performing with the SPCO and Jeremy Denk

What do you listen for while sitting on an audition committee? 
    A good 90 percent or more of auditioners on any instrument are eliminated on the basis of pitch and rhythm. If you want to be successful at auditions, you must go through the painstaking process of eliminating all of these problems by recording yourself, using the metronome, and having a really good teacher. Next, you should understand the musical context, emotional state, and musical style of each excerpt by listening to many recordings of the entire piece and not just of the excerpt. The emotional impact, for example, of the flute solo in the last movement of Brahms’s Fourth Symphony is much more profound if you have just experienced the entire symphony up to that point. Finally, I listen for compelling and beautiful playing.
    So often you hear a discouraged auditioner say “I don’t know why I didn’t advance. I didn’t do anything wrong.” It is not enough to avoid mistakes. Great players draw the listener in with the ravishing beauty of their playing. For example, if you heard fifty random flutists playing behind a screen, and one of them was Emmanuel Pahud or another great flutist, there would be no indecision over who stood out as sounding great.
    As you prepare for an audition, play for many people before the audition – teachers, friends, fellow students, other instrumentalists. You will begin to see a pattern in their comments that will tell you how to improve. You will also become accustomed to playing under pressure.

Why did you choose to play the flute?
    My parents, although not musicians themselves, took me to concerts and ballets from a young age. (I started ballet lessons when I was five and continue them to this day.) My father was from an immigrant family and grew up in Brooklyn, New York where his best friend encouraged him to listen to the Saturday Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts. Dubious at first, my father came to love opera and all classical music. Although he became a trademark lawyer, he had a beautiful tenor voice and a melodramatic personality. I remember him rehearsing the role of Henry Higgins for an amateur theatre company in our basement. When I was three or four, I heard the sound of the flute and was drawn to it. I knew I wanted to play that instrument, even though I did not know what it looked like.

When did you decide to become a professional musician?
    I attended Sewanee Summer Music Festival in Tennessee starting in sixth grade. The first time I got to play principal flute in a symphony was Beetho-ven’s 8th with Louis Lane conducting. I was euphoric. The way the flute soars above the orchestra felt like flying. The thrill of performance – of alternately blending, acting as chamber musician, and as a soloist in the orchestra – has never faded for me.

What were your first experiences as a professional musician? 
    My first experience working with professional musicians was at the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont. This extraordinary festival has a mix of aspiring young professionals and seasoned great masters, including at the time, Rudolf Serkin, Alexander Schneider, and my teacher, Marcel Moyse. The aspiration at this festival is to take the time to rehearse intensively and to delve deeper into each work than there is generally time for in a busy concert season. Rehearsals can be fraught, with various strong personalities vying to promote their own interpretations, but it is an illuminating experience.

Who are your musical heroes?
    When I met Marcel Moyse, I felt that I was in the presence of the greatest musician I had ever experienced who played the flute. Since then, I have been extremely lucky to have played with many amazing soloists with The St. Paul Chamber Orchestra such as our former music director, Pinchas Zukerman, as well as Jessye Norman, Kathleen Battle, Emanuel Ax, Mstislav Rostropovich and many others.

What is your philosophy on sound production?
    When I was in high school, I heard an LP recording of Julius Baker and I felt that he had the most round, glowing sound with inner life and buoyancy to it. Ever since then, I have tried to combine the Baker sound with the Moyse musicality. In achieving that type of sound, I think of these basic concepts:

1.    The shape of the aperture mirrors the shape of the sound that you create. A skinny, wide and flat smile aperture will create more of an ee sound. A rounder aperture will create more of a round sound. I favor generally more of a kissing motion, lips forward kind of embouchure. I also like to experiment with frowning to get an ooey sound and raising the upper lip for more upper overtones in the sound. I love the flute’s potential for changing the tone color which is especially useful in the French repertoire. I think of the upper lip as a control for color – the higher the upper lip, the paler the sound, the lower the upper lip, the darker the sound. Bringing your lips far forward also creates a pale sound, as does using less air pressure. There are so many factors to play with. It’s like making soup. Try a little oregano, a little pepper.

2.    The inside of your mouth is part of your instrument. You can utilize this interior shape to affect the sound. I often think of dropping my jaw for a deeper sound, dropping the vocal folds in the back of my throat and putting air in my cheeks. This last technique, which is highly controversial, prevents you from pulling back the corners of your mouth and really works to expand and enhance the sound and give buoyancy and ease in playing intervals.

In addition to your studies with Moyse, you also studied with Robert Willoughby, James Pellerite and Thomas Nyfenger. What did you learn from each that affects your playing and teaching?
    Willoughby helped me change my embouchure from tight to more flexible and introduced historical performance practice to me. Pellerite had a wonderful excerpt class every week, for which we had to memorize several excerpts for each class, plus be responsible for knowing all of them from previous weeks. If you can get through that, you can get through an audition. Nyfenger was an all-around brilliant musician who could improvise a piano accompaniment or play a woodwind quintet score by ear at the piano. I learned by listening to his gorgeous, mercurial, intelligent playing.

How do you teach your students to develop technique, especially technique as it relates to musicality?
    In addition to the daily exercise books such as the Taffanel et Gaubert, the Moyse, Baker, or Geoffrey Gilbert books, I always have my students work on an etude. I like to start with Joachim Andersen Opus 15 because it is such strong medicine for any flutist. The etudes often require the ability to bring out low notes as the bottom voice, strong beat, or root of the chord which is unnatural on the flute. Conversely, they require flutists to play high notes softly when they are not on the strong beats. These etudes also teach students to bring out and shape a melody over the accompaniment and voice various polyphonic lines as in a Bach partita. There is a lot of musical value in them. According to Moyse, when Georges Laurent played Andersen Etude Opus 15 No. 3 for Andersen, the composer replied, “I never knew I wrote such beautiful music.” 

How do you create a sound that projects?
    I like to think that there are two elements to a well-balanced sound that are combined in a pleasing way: the core, edge, or center (with only this element, the sound would be very hard) and the shape, roundness or fullness (with only this element, the sound would be very empty or airy). Combining the two is like taking a daub of paint and spreading it on a canvas. It starts out very concentrated, but when you spread it out, it has a nice shape or consistency. Of course, if you spread it out too far, it becomes too airy or dilute. I think of creating the color on the flute by finding a compact aperture with the lips forward. I create the fullness with the space in the inside of my mouth, including air in the cheeks. Another factor in projection is using the right level of air pressure to spin the sound. Part of each flutist’s unique sound is the degree of air pressure used, something that is not often discussed. Of course, this is something flutists can vary for different affects.

How do you structure lessons with students?
    Besides the etudes and exercise books, I have every student work on at least one Mozart concerto to study his use of structure versus ornamentation. Mozart’s Classical era musical language can illuminate every genre of music since then. I also have students learn Baroque ornamentation because this is viewing the structure from the other side. It starts with the bare bones and the player adds the ornamental notes (as opposed to Mozart and later composers who wanted to control the ornamentation.) Either way, a knowledge of which notes are structural and which ones are added lets flutists play very differently, as though they are improvising. It also is very informative in terms of appropriate tempo choice. (Many early to mid-twentieth-century interpretations of Baroque music are now considered too slow because the tempo makes the ornamental notes sound too important.)
    All of my students from junior high to doctoral level work on a melody from Moyse’s Tone Development Through Interpretation each week. These opera melodies, which Moyse heard the great early twentieth-century singers perform, are great for studying various phrase shapes, developing color, nuance and expression, and also working on the technical aspects of embouchure work, tone quality and keeping the pitch constant while making crescendos and diminuendos to make a phrase shape. Making a beautiful phrase is the essence of what we all do. After covering musical language, tone and phrasing, students work on the entire body of repertoire for the flute, including all periods up to the contemporary. I think performers have a responsibility to identify the great composers of our own era who will still be important and heard in fifty or one hundred years. In order to do that, musicians have to explore a lot of the music of our time. Finally, I love to teach orchestral excerpts.

Lessons with Moyse

What are your thoughts about vibrato?
    Vibrato should be varied and within the sound. It should help to spin the sound forward, rather than being so wide and slow as to engulf the sound. Moyse said that in the latter case it would be like looking in the mirror, and the mirror is shaking wildly back and forth. I like what Geoffrey Gilbert said, “Vibrato should grow (and diminish) with the phrase shape.” My teacher Thomas Nyfenger opined that most people with a pleasing vibrato are actually using a combination of throat and abdominal vibrato so that there is sympathetic vibration throughout the body.

How do you teach musical language?
    Moyse talked about les règles immuables de la musique or the unchanging laws of music. Music is like a language, with rules of grammar. Moyse likened articles (a, an, the) to pickups in music; nouns to downbeats, prepositions to passing tones, and so forth. It is important in reading aloud and interpreting Shakespeare, for example, to first understand the English language. There are many possible and correct ways to inflect the sentence “To be or not to be – that is the question.” One could say, “To be or NOT to be – that is the question” or “To be or not to be – THAT is the question.” Each is correct but has a slightly different meaning. However, you would not say “TO be OR not TO be, that is THE question.” Said in that way, it would be evident that the speaker does not understand English. In the same way, there are infinitely many ways to interpret a phrase in music, and yet some of them are just wrong. There is clearly an art to interpretation. It is not just reading the notes and markings on the page accurately, as important as that is. These are just a blueprint, just as the written words in Shakespeare are the starting point for an actor’s rendition which adds meaning, emotion and clarity to the dry text.

What were lessons like with Marcel Moyse?
    The great French flutist, Marcel Moyse (1889-1984), introduced me to the French school of flute playing as it developed at the Paris Conservatory during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Gesturing and smiling, Moyse could conjure up a mood that seemed to electrify the room. The setting was a shed in West Brattleboro, Vermont where, for many years Moyse projected late 19th-century performance style and tradition to a new generation of late 20th- century flutists. I was 19 years old, and Moyse was 85 in summer of 1974 when he introduced me to a musical world of color, suppleness, fluidity, elegance and nobility of expression that I had not known existed. His sound was vocal, operatic, full of life, sustained, colorful, dramatic, nostalgic; it has even been called devilish. Luckily, we still have his recordings.
    Several days after I played for Monsieur Moyse in a masterclass, he looked for me in the audience. “You!” he said to me. “You will come to Switzerland to study with me. I will pay for everything but cigarettes – do you smoke?” “No,” I stammered, “I don’t smoke.” What followed was a life-changing sojourn at the Moyse seminar in Boswil, Switzerland. My room was adjacent to Moyse’s so that he could listen to me practice. There were six hours of masterclass daily, in addition to my daily private lesson. In the evenings, we listened to recordings of the French and Italian opera that so influenced Moyse’s style. I sat next to him at meals – long European meals that included the soup, the pipe, the Pernod. Between courses I heard stories of renowned figures he had known in early twentieth-century Paris: masterful singers such as Enrico Caruso, Luisa Tetrazzini, (as in Turkey Tetrazzini), Nellie Melba (as in Peach Melba and Melba Toast), and Amelita Galli-Curci; great conductors such as Bruno Walter and Arturo Toscanini, and composers such as Debussy, Ravel and Stravinsky, whose works Moyse premiered. In addition, he knew and vividly recalled the great composers of flute music of his time such as Taffanel, Gaubert, Enesco, Roussel and Saint-Saëns.

What led you to focus on the music of Handel in one of your CDs?
    My two solo CDs focus on two golden ages for the flute: the Baroque era and the twentieth-century French school. I focused on the Handel sonatas because I find that Handel’s creative genius transcends the era in which he was writing; I find his music extremely moving. He was able to synthesize the best features of all the musical styles he encountered: German, Italian and English.

How do you teach students to add Baroque ornamentation?
    I have each of my students study a slow movement from the Telemann Methodische Sonaten (Teaching Sonatas) in which Telemann writes a bare-bones melodic line and then pairs it with a highly ornamented version of the same line from a performer of the time. I have students make a list of the kinds of ornaments that appear in the ornamented version (appoggiaturas, trills, passing tones, neighbor notes, moving to other chord tones, diminution, etc.) Then I have them try to apply these ornaments to an unornamented slow movement from a Handel sonata in the appropriate places. As a side note, musicians should be aware that J.S. Bach was an exception to the usual Baroque practices. A micro-manager, he tended to write his own very elaborate ornamentation.
    I am currently working on a sheet music version of the Handel flute sonatas with ornaments as they are played on my CD. The purpose of this is twofold: to allow students to study the plain line of music as it compares to the ornamented version, just as they would with the Telemann Methodical Sonatas, and to give students who may not be well-versed in creating their own ornaments a performable ornamented version of the Handel Sonatas. When the sheet music comes out, it will be available at (where my two CDs are currently available.)    

Julia Bogorad-Kogan has performed around the world, including at New York’s Merkin Concert Hall, the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., the Schubertsaal of the Vienna Konzerthaus, San Jose, Costa Rica and Xiamen, China. A frequent concerto soloist with The The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, she also has served as guest principal flutist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Milwaukee Symphony, the National Symphony, and the Minnesota Orchestra. She currently teaches at the University of Minnesota School of Music and was Visiting Associate Professor at the Oberlin Conservatory, as well as visiting faculty at the University of Michigan. Bogorad-Kogan studied at Oberlin Conservatory and Indiana University, where she earned the degree of Bachelor of Music and a Performer’s Certificate, and did graduate work at Yale University School of Music. Her teachers included Marcel Moyse, Thomas Nyfenger, James Pellerite, Robert Willoughby, and Britton Johnson.

Favorite Moyse Quotes

Sound like light shining through the leaves. 

Sound cool, sound blue like water. 

Elegant – like a fencer, not a boxer. 

If you don’t build the (musical) foundation well, the house will come down – boom – on your head. 

When playing a melody, as the melody is expressive by the words, so you must be expressive by the color.* 

Vibrato? You need luminosity on a note – like sugar on strawberries, or dew on a leaf.*

When you play melody, think exercise.  When you play an exercise, think melody. I prefer a beautiful melody to a fantastic technique.*

I detest the flutist who tells his pupil, play this note softer. The pupil will play it softer, but will not understand why.* 

Some players rush when they have nothing to say. On the contrary, I wish to say more when the music is beautiful.* 

98 out of 100 players don’t play music; they play flute.*

If you do not kiss your audience, they will not kiss you.* 

You try to make an effect. No – you must feel. 

Do not show your own temperament, but that of the music.*

Play the phrase like climbing the mountains. You go, you come back. You go, you come back. You go, you don’t come back because you have reached the top.*

Play like a pilgrim saying to the Pope, “Forgive us we are sinners.” Not “If you don’t give us what we want, we’ll break your neck.”*

Why did the composer put an appoggiatura? Because he especially loved the note – like putting a flower in the window.*

Music is joy, not suicide.*

*Some of these quotes were collected by Trevor Wye in Marcel Moyse: An Extraordinary Man: A Musical Biography, Winzer Press, 1993, $22.95

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Answer: Your question is a very common concern. Flutter tonguing is a technique used by many brass and woodwind instruments that creates a trilling effect in the sound. Tchaikovsky was the first prominent composer to use this sound effect for flute in his ballet The Nutcracker. It is important to note that there are two different ways to create this effect. The standard method is to use the tongue to trill the r like you are speaking Italian. There is also a more guttural approach that uses the glottis to alter the sound. There is a big difference in the quality of sound between the two, and in my experience, the method using the tongue is preferred by most professional players.
    There are some genetic conditions that can restrict the movement of the tongue. The most common being ankyloglossia, better known as a tongue-tie. A tongue-tie is a condition present at birth where the lingual frenulum is unusually thick and short. This restricts the movement of the tongue and in severe cases might make it difficult for people to even stick out their tongues. Usually solved by a simple surgery, not all tongue-ties are equal in severity, and some go unnoticed until later in life. 
    I frequently hear students declare that their mother tongue limits them to a guttural flutter. The “I don’t speak Spanish” defense is another common reaction from students when we start to work on this aspect of articulation in lessons. The good news is that there are some excellent ways to stimulate what is commonly known as an alveolar trill. Through the simple exercise below that was recommended to me by a speech therapist, I have had tremendous success helping students conquer this hurdle. The exercise is by no means a quick fix, but rather a starting point to release the tongue from the dreaded TLLLLL result.
    I usually see three ability levels of trilling r’s in students. Some experience no problem at all producing a resonant tone with the alveolar trill. A second group of students can start the flutter but have difficulty sustaining the effect. The last group cannot produce an alveolar trill at all.
    If you fall into the second category, my recommendation would be to ensure that the source of the sound comes from a place of warmth and moisture. You have probably heard the analogy of fogging up a mirror with your breath when you produce sound on the flute. I find this to hold true for a successful flutter effect as well.
    Players in category two have difficulty sustaining the sound because the throat closes off, the embouchure tightens, and sustaining the alveolar trill becomes close to impossible because the embouchure cannot accommodate the amount of pressure. The muscles simply are not strong enough.
    I am fortunate to speak Afrikaans as my mother tongue because it requires me to trill all my r’s. After encountering numerous students with this question, I investigated how I trill my r’s when speaking Afrikaans. I realized that I treat the vowels surrounding the r very differently and place them further back in the mouth than a native English speaker from the United States would. An easy way to explain this is with the word can’t. Pronounce this word with your most convincing American and British accents and notice how the vowel is placed in different locations.
    I use the following tongue-twister with my students in lessons to gently guide them away from the guttural flutter. I have had enormous success initiating a healthy flutter in students through carefully working with this exercise. The exercise succeeds because it deals with the onset of the syllables and how the tongue should react right after that.

    Lescued Looster Luffles Lesidents
   Plescued Plooster Pluffles Plesidents
   Blescued Blooster Bluffles Blesidents
   Tlescued Tlooster Tluffles Tlesidents
   Dlescued Dlooster Dluffles Dlessidents
   Rescued Rooster Ruffles Residents 

    An alveolar trill is apical in nature, meaning the sound is sustained with the tip of the tongue.  Often the placement of the tip of the tongue is too far forward in the mouth, causing  unwanted jaw tension and an airstream that is aimed much too high. This will result in a flutter tone that is very airy. With every new line of the tongue-twister, the tip of the tongue is guided closer to the alveolar ridge, the area between the upper teeth and hard palate in the mouth.
    The first line of the tongue-twister makes you aware of the dental consonant area of your hard palate, a placement too forward to be successful for an alveolar trill. Lines two and three move on to the labial sounds, where the sound is created with the lips. The goal here is to promote relaxation of the tongue. With an alveolar trill the back of tongue is completely relaxed and down so the tip of the tongue trills freely. The words beginning with a P or B sound make the flutist aware of the small difference in jaw placement between the two, with B being optimal for flutter tonguing. The lines beginning with the Tl and Dl sounds start to show the tongue how to react once the onset of the sound has been created inside the mouth. The words beginning with Dl place the tip of the tongue further back in the mouth compared to Tl, making for a more successful alveolar trill.
    The last step of the exercise is to joyfully speak the final line of the tongue-twister with flutter tongue, exaggerating the alveolar trills. Go about this with confidence, not only exploring the onset of the sound, but also air pressure, support and continuous flow of air. One of my students started to flutter spontaneously after working on the line that starts with the Bl sound. For her it was placement of the jaw that needed to be adjusted. Once this was taken care of, the flutter tonguing happened by itself.
    Although this journey can be frustrating at times, keep your sense of exploration alive while working on this issue. Even though the final goal is to successfully flutter tongue, you might improve many other aspects of your playing if you are open to noticing small subtleties in your sound. This is difficult to achieve if you are working through a lens of frustration.

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