Embouchure
    A good embouchure is one that directs the airstream in an efficient way to the headjoint. Remember that the piccolo is much smaller than the flute, but the embouchure does not have to be tighter. Place the piccolo slightly higher on the lower lip than you would the flute (on the pink part of the lip) to compensate for the smaller size of the embouchure hole. Make sure that the corners of the lips are not overly tight. Think of the center of the lips coming forward slightly as if you are blowing a kiss to someone across the room. The upper lip is not held tightly to the top teeth as this forward positioning fosters a magic cushion of space between the upper lip and front teeth.

Free Flowing Airstream
    In order to cultivate resonance in the sound, the airstream must be free flowing. Make sure that the tongue, throat, and lips are not an impediment to the airstream. Remember that the throat is only a conduit for the air to get from the lungs to the instrument where the vibration is produced at the striking edge of the headjoint (backwall). Think of separating the vocal folds, much like panting, to keep a relaxed and open feeling in the throat. This is critical for good vibrato production. Another image that works well is thinking of blowing warm air. Blow into your hands as if warming them on a chilly day by naturally using an open HAH syllable. This keeps the throat relaxed and open. Keep the tongue muscles relaxed and in the syllable formation of de, gee, ta, or ga. Any of these choices will keep the tongue from riding too high in the mouth and impeding the airstream.
    A teacher once said that a moving airstream is supported. This is true. The diaphragm, which is an involuntary muscle, is an integral part of breathing. It assists in inhalation provided the piccolo player takes a full body breath, and does not just fill the upper chest area. This support is necessary for the maximum efficiency of the airstream.
    Make sure to not squeeze the lips together in order to create air speed as this produces the kind of tone that is usually thin, and the pitch can be quite sharp. The lips direct the air only. They do not make the tone; they shape the tone. The air is actually the medium that makes the tone.
    I remind students of a garden hose analogy. The nozzle places the water on a certain plant just as the lips change direction for certain registers. The hose nozzle does not make the water come out, it only releases the water. The flow of water is created by the water pressure at the faucet (the faucet being analogous to breathing anatomy).
    Think of directing the air forward to the bridge of the nose; this can result in a faster air speed (try this on lower notes). Likewise, to create a more resonant and mellow tone in the top octave, feel like the resonance is coming from the chest or even from the back of the head. This can give a more open sound which works especially well on high third octave sustained passages that require blend. 

Physical Alignment
    Strive for good upper body posture. Due to the piccolo’s small size, there is a tendency for players to hunch over when playing. Sit up tall and keep the head balanced on the spine. Be sure the chin does not jut forward like a turtle. Open the shoulder girdle and keep an expansive feeling between the shoulder blades. Without arching the lower back, keep the collarbone lifted naturally. Make sure there is no undue tension in the arms or hands. Tension anywhere in the upper body can translate into tongue or facial tension. I often think of my body as being rather like the case that holds a stereo speaker. It is the resonating chamber for the sound. (This may be an image younger players are not familiar with since ear buds are the most popular speaker today.)

Vibrato
    Once these basics are in place, you are optimally positioned to hone in on vibrato. On the piccolo vibrato is produced the same way as on the flute. It is an oscillation created in the larynx. The artistic application of vibrato will be slightly different than on the flute. Your body knows how to create this oscillation since the sounds made in coughing, crying, laughing and singing are all created there as well. I have always loved to teach vibrato as a connected ha, ha, ha sound. First speak the syllables, and then connect them as you would in singing. Then take the consonant h sound out and continue singing and then try all of this through the instrument. Make sure that you understand the difference between vibrato speed vs. vibrato width. Speed refers to how many pulses of vibrato  per beat. For example, most flutists and piccolo players work on counted vibrato exercises with a metronome, setting the metronome at quarter note = 60 and vibrating with groups of 3, then 4, then 5, and then 6 per click. Make sure to connect the pulses evenly without a bump or pulse that is jarring. Faster vibrato can give more intensity to the sound. Listen to the evolution of vibrato speeds through different recordings. Historically we seem to favor generally slower vibrato than what was in vogue at the turn of the 20th century. (This seems to be true of singers, violinists and flutists).
    Vibrato width refers to the depth of the vibrato. For instance, I think it is very helpful to cultivate a very shallow vibrato, (just a hint of shimmer), a normal depth of vibrato, and a wider vibrato. All three styles are useful on a daily basis. A deep vibrato can add volume to the tone. Even though vibrato is thought to be a fluctuation of pitch both on the high side and the low side, I try to keep it on the lower side so as to not raise the pitch unintentionally. It helps to end notes, or release, on the high side of the vibrato so that the pitch does not sag.
    In general, for piccolo, strive for a vibrato that is not intrusive on tutti passages (especially as the top voice on sustained chords, for example). I sometimes use very little vibrato on chords, which helps the blend, or a slower, deeper vibrato for adding just a little sonic interest. If playing a passage with an instrument that does not use vibrato, such as the clarinet, make sure not to vibrate too fast or you will not achieve a good blend.
    Use your more creative speeds and widths on solo passages. Vibrato is not used on busy passages with many sixteenth notes as this will distort the tone and hurt projection. Dynamic levels and the resultant changes in both embouchure size and air pressure will affect vibrato speed as well. When playing very softly, the vibrato should not be too wide or it will place the “heart of an elephant in a mouse” as Trevor Wye said. Vibrato is a flexible artistic device that should constantly change depending on the requirements of the music.
  Practice starting and stopping vibrato on a dime to achieve ultimate control. With a metronome set at  quarter=60, alternate playing two beats of straight tone with two beats with vibrato (at varying speeds, 4 pulses, 5 pulses, 6 pulses per click) then back to two beats without vibrato. Check periodically that the other elements of good tone production are in place. Some students substitute a wide vibrato in place of a fast moving airstream, so it helps to work on long tones senza (without) vibrato to make sure these two concepts are indeed complimentary but separate.
Record practice sessions and listen to musicians other than flutists or piccolo players to expand your imagination for tonal possibilities of vibrato. I especially enjoy listening to violinists and sopranos since they are in the same tessitura as the piccolo. Stay flexible and ready to adjust, as a conductor may request a different vibrato style that what you have prepared.        Œ.

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A Good Position
    When playing the flute with a good position, there will be no blockage of the air column so breathing is quiet. When playing the flute, driving a car, or working on a computer, the head should balance on the spine. Slowly nod your head up and down to explore and discover this balanced position. Many flutists describe the place of balance as being at the bottom of a very small nod as if nodding okay in agreement with someone.
    If the head is held too high, as if looking at the top row of a balcony, the weight of the head is placed too far back on the spine and it is not balanced on the spine. This position often develops after a flutist has participated in a lengthy marching band season. Teachers should regularly review the differences between performing on a football field and in a concert hall. 
    Likewise if the head is placed too far forward or down, as in a large nod, the head again is not balanced on the spine. Flutists often develop this position when practicing with a music stand adjusted too low or practicing with music propped up with a pillow on a bed.
    Explore these two incorrect positions with students to demonstrate  that the correct placement of the head is someplace in between the forward and back positions.

Doing the Turtle
    When a flutist juts the jaw forward (like a turtle coming out of his shell -see picture on right) to make contact with the flute, the spine in the neck comes forward and presses against the vocal folds. Then when the flutist takes a breath, the vocal folds are hampered, and the breathing is noisy.
    To correct this bad habit of moving the jaw to the flute rather than the flute coming to the flutist, have students recline on the floor. You may wish to put several small paperback books under the head for comfort. Then with the headjoint only, have students bring the headjoint into the chin and play a few notes. Once they realize where the head must be, the turtle movement is corrected (picture on left).

Tongue Placement
    When playing, the tip of the tongue may touch in the aperture, top lip, bottom of the teeth, or the roof of the mouth. However, if left in this position when taking a breath, the breathing is noisy. Flutists should remove the tongue from the pathway of the air. Remember the goal is to have a clear passageway from the lungs to the aperture. Simply saying “keep your tongue down when breathing” produces good results with most students. 

Nose and/or Mouth Breathing
    In daily life we breathe through the nose. However, if physical activity becomes strenuous, the need for greater oxygen requires breathing through the mouth and nose. One type of breathing is not appropriate for all occasions. The same is true when playing the flute. Depending on the music and phrasing, different kinds of breaths are necessary.
    Generally when playing the flute, breath is taken through the mouth. To do this, a flutist drops his jaw, which separates the lips, and the breath is taken. The flute remains firmly in the chin, and the head remains still.
    Some flutists do the opposite. They keep the flute firmly in the chin with the embouchure in place and lift the head backwards which opens the aperture for the breath. I personally think that the jaw down approach is better than the head back system because the flutist has better control of the pitch. If the head is lifted too high and does not assume the exact position again, the pitch will be sharp. 
    Some students open the mouth too wide while others do not open the mouth enough. Observe students or have them practice breathing while looking in a mirror to judge the appropriate distance the mouth should open.
    James Pellerite, the former professor of flute at Indiana University, taught students conversational breaths. These are excellent when playing single notes followed by a rest or in repeated measures of accompaniment off-beats. He counted the pulse 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,6,7,8 on up to 16 and on the “ands” students were instructed to say the word “thoo.” After doing this for a minute, he asked, “When did you breathe?” This was when the flutist realized that he had taken a very small breath before each “thoo,” and the breath was taken without moving the jaw or changing the size of the aperture in the embouchure. In conversation, this is similar to someone calling your name and you answering “yes.” Exactly when did you breathe to say yes? This is conversational breathing. Most professional flutists use conversational breathing in places where there are only a few notes to play and these notes are surrounded by rests. Legendary oboist James Caldwell remarked that he thought the best sounds were produced on the conversational breath because it was a quick turn-around of the air.
    Jean-Pierre Rampal remarked that he found playing the flute easier to control when he took many short breaths rather than one large breath. The problem with one large breath is that at the moment of the first attack, there is too much air in the body so there is little control of what happens on the first note. To remedy this problem, some flutists inhale a large breath and then just before starting to play, release a small amount of air through the nose and then play as normal.

Breath Marks
    Just as string players mark bowings (up or down bow) in the music, flutists should mark breathing places. There are a few easy rules to follow: breathe at the end of a phrase, breathe in a rest, breathe after a long note, breathe before a wide intervallic skip, breathe between repeated notes or in syncopated passages, breathe in articulatory silence places, breathe after a 1 (as in grouping notes 2,3,4,1), and where the conductor or composer requests. Deciding where to breathe may mean consulting the piano part or the full score so the breaths are musically appropriate.

Breathing in Time
    Notes that are tied offer problems to all musicians. In an effort to count precisely, flutists hold the tied note too long. Many conductors repeatedly advise, “Don’t play the tie. Get off the tie as if the tied note is a rest.” This is excellent advice. If you treat the tied note as a rest, you can breathe on the tied note comfortably and proceed in time. Have students practice this with a metronome to develop the skill. 
    In order to breathe in time, shorten the note before the breath so there is time for an efficient breath. Holding notes full value puts the performer behind time wise. Some conductors will suggest leaving out a note so the breath may be taken comfortably, and the performer is not late for the next note.

Final Thoughts
    Most students’ breath-taking skills will be immediately improved if they think of the breathing cycle as being OUT and IN rather than IN and OUT. The goal is not to take a big breath, but to have a breath that is organized and useful. Recording lessons and practice sessions offers a clear review of the skill of breathing quietly.         

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    My favorite tempo marking from the Baroque period (if a person should even admit to having such a thing) is printed at the top of a Telemann trio sonata: Largo e vivace. It is a marking I especially enjoy showing to students after they have just defined largo as really, really slow, or vivace as very fast. Telemann’s marking makes more sense when we realize that the affekt, or feeling, described by these words would more accurately be translated not as slow and fast, but as broad and lively.
    It is not uncommon for a word’s meaning to change over time. When a woman asks to be directed to the ladies’ room, for example, she is surely not seeking a room reserved for women of noble birth. It should come as no surprise then that musical terminology has also changed somewhat over the last 200 years. Because the Baroque period predates the invention of the metronome, the choice of tempo can require particular thought and consideration. There is always plenty of information available to us in the score, however, and tempo choices can be guided by an understanding of historically-informed style and expression, including such factors as meter, harmony, articulation and dance forms.

Baroque Notation
    When we talk about the Baroque period in music, we generally mean the years from around 1600 to around 1750. Baroque composers who are especially well known to flutists include François Couperin (1668-1733), Jacques-Martin Hotteterre (1674-1763), Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741), Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767), George Frederick Handel (1685-1759), Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) and Johann Joachim Quantz (1697-1773).
    Musical notation has evolved since the Baroque to become more specific, and composers today tend to provide a good deal more information on the page than Baroque composers did. Performers have become accustomed to composers spelling out most of the specifics of time, articulation and dynamics. The absences of some of this information in a 17th- or 18th-century score both allows and requires musicians to make informed musical decisions.
    An urtext edition is a modern printing with no editorial changes made to the original manuscript. Many non-urtext modern editions of Baroque music offer extensive editorial suggestions, including dynamic shapes, articulations and metronome markings, to help fill in the gaps for modern players. Some of these editorial suggestions can be helpful and insightful, but some may be anachronistic or inappropriate. It is often difficult to differentiate between what was written by the composer and what additional markings were added by the editor. (In more recent years, publishers have made an effort to make these distinctions clearer through the use of parentheses, dashed slurs, or grayscale.)
    A tempo term in a non-urtext edition of a Baroque piece may come from the composer, but a metronome marking is definitely an editor’s suggestion, and not something the composer would or could have written. It was only after Maelzel’s invention of the metronome in 1815 that composers began prescribing metronome markings in their music (although if you listen to 20th-century composers’ recordings of their own works, you will notice how often they later reject their own metronome markings). A marking added by someone other than the composer does not necessarily represent bad advice. However, knowing who wrote what simply helps in making decisions.

Tempo Markings
    Tempo words are important indicators of both mood and speed, but can often be ambiguous or insufficient, and often refer only secondarily to tempo. As Robert Donington wrote, “Time words like allegro (cheerful), adagio (at ease) or grave (serious) specify a mood in order to suggest a tempo” (Donington 11). Additionally, descriptions of musical practices outlined by authors of 17th- and 18th-century treatises tended to apply mainly to their own particular time and place, so there is considerable variation and even disagreement among them, often with a lack of clear consensus about what is correct.
    To illustrate some of the limitations of these markings, look at the example of largo. In modern music largo is widely thought of as either very slow or the slowest tempo, and metronomes that include tempo markings often use it to label the range between 40-60 beats per minute (placing it slower than larghetto, adagio and andante). In the Baroque period, however, largo was often defined as faster than adagio. Purcell, writing in 1683, characterized largo as faster than adagio and grave; Brossard (1703) described it as very slow; Malcolm (1721) places the tempi in order from slowest to fastest as grave, adagio, largo, vivace, allegro, presto; Grassineau (1740) calls largo “one degree quicker than grave, and two than adagio;” and Leopold Mozart, in 1756, wrote that largo was faster than grave, and slower than adagio (Donington 16). Quantz, using his own pulse as a frame of reference, assigns to adagio assai, lento, largo assai, mesto and grave the speed of quarter=20, which flutist Rachel Brown assesses as “achingly slow” (Brown 81).
    One way to think more critically about tempo terminology is to look up the definition of each word in an unabridged music dictionary, even when you are certain that you already know what it means. This can clarify any other meanings or senses of the word. Dolmetsch Online () is a free and extremely thorough online resource. While any dictionary definition will represent only a streamlined version of all of the available information, it will still provide some clearer sense of the literal derivation of the term and of its historical evolution.
    All of this means that the familiar terminology is of only limited usefulness in pinpointing a tempo in Baroque music. Quantz suggested, “The intention of the composer must be discovered instead from the content of the piece.” (Quantz 129)

Meter
    The main way that a Baroque composer would indicate tempo was through the choice of meter. Time signatures with smaller note-values (a higher number) for the denominator indicated a faster speed than those with larger note values. Rachel Brown points out, for example, that J.S. Bach’s “unusual 12/16 in [the gigue of] his B minor sonata implied an extremely fast speed.” (Brown 81)
    Composers like Bach used tempo words only as modifiers of the tempo indicated by the meter. Taking the 6/8 Largo e dolce of the same sonata as an example (labeled explicitly as a Siciliano dance movement in its earlier G minor version), Jed Wentz writes, “To choose a tempo based purely on the words Largo e dolce is 19th- and 20th-century performance practice. The standard practice throughout Europe in the eighteenth century was to use meter signs as tempo markings. This explains the astonishing number of meter signs in use in this period, as many as thirty-two in all, each of which had its own standard tempo and expression.” (Wentz 1) So Bach’s choice of the 6/8 meter (as opposed to 6/4 or 6/2) tells us that the movement is mostly definitely in 2, and not in a slow 6. The marking of Largo e dolce acts as a modifier of that tempo, broadening it somewhat.

Harmony
    Another important tempo clue is harmonic rhythm – the rate of harmonic change, or how frequently the chords change. Generally speaking, if the harmony changes only once every measure, then the tempo should be considerably faster than if it changes every beat. In addition to harmonic rhythm, it is also good to be aware of and consider the presence of ornaments whose expressive quality is chiefly harmonic in nature (appoggiaturas, suspensions, etc.), so that the effect of their dissonance and resolution is not lost within a too-fast tempo.

Articulation and Oration
    All music is expressive, but different styles and periods of music valued different kinds of expressivity and set about achieving it in different ways. Baroque composers wrote music designed to communicate feelings and to move the emotions. They wrote at great length about the similarities between music and oration. Imagine a great speech, such as John F. Kennedy’s exhortation to “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country.” Would it have been more effective if he had said it much faster or twice as slow?
    Because Baroque woodwind players saw a link between musical expression and oration, they used a variety of note lengths and articulation syllables within, for example, a passage of sixteenth notes. This approach creates a manner of musical expression that is closely related to speech and results in greater variety and nuance, unlike a simpler black or white choice between tonguing and slurring. Many modern editions of Baroque music add copious slurs, which obscure or eliminate this kind of expression. Excessive slurring of 16th notes tends to encourage faster tempos, and overly fast tempos in turn encourage more slurring.

Dance Forms
    Basic dance skills were an important part of 17th and 18th-century social life, and it could be safely assumed at that time that anyone reading a musical manuscript would have understood the meaning of a dance title. Even in a piece intended solely for concert performance, a dance-related title would convey more information than the time signature plus Italian term. In some cases, a dance movement also has a companion mood marking, but often the dance title stands alone, with the assumption that this provided sufficient information.
    The widely used Beauchamp-Feuillet system of dance notation is explained in John Weaver’s 1706 book, A Small Treatise of Time and Cadence in Dancing (see Bibliography). This notation is both visually beautiful and relatively easy to read and interpret for the purposes of obtaining musical information. Once you are acquainted with the basics of the notation, it is possible to assess such things as how many steps there are per measure, and whether the dance contains lots of turning, jumping or sliding. It is tremendously helpful to have some idea of what each dance typically looks or feels like. Sarabandes, for example, tend to feature steps where the dancer balances on the ball of one foot while tracing a loop with the other foot, over the course of two beats. An overly slow tempo can make this motion awkward and ungainly. There are instructional DVDs available, such as the ones produced by Paige Whitley-Bauguess (see Bibliography), that feature excellent professional demonstrations of common dance types.

Other Factors
    There is ample evidence that Baroque musicians addressed problems of musical performance in highly practical ways. Several sources suggest taking the acoustic of the performing space into consideration, a larger or more live room requiring more time than a smaller or drier one. Similarly, we should bear in mind today that recordings reflect a very different set of circumstances from a live performance, including close positioning of the microphone[s], and often a comparatively dry acoustic. The fast tempo that sounds wonderful when listening to a recording on headphones may not work at all in an auditorium, in a room with some ring, or with an audience spaced throughout a larger room. C.P.E. Bach further advised that we pay particular attention to busy technical passages: “The pace of a composition, which is usually indicated by several well-known Italian expressions, is based on its general content as well as on the fastest notes and passages contained in it. Due consideration of these factors will prevent an allegro from being rushed and an adagio from being dragged” (C.P.E. Bach 151).
    While there may not be a standard set of simple answers to questions of tempo, asking the right kinds of questions can lead to a fine, expressive and well thought-out performance. It is most important to engage cheerfully with the complexity, and to know that there is leeway and artistic license to find tempos that truly work for you, the music, and the audience.

Bibliography
Bach, Carl Philipp Emanuel. Essay on the True Art of Playing Keyboard Instruments. Translated by William J. Mitchell. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1949.
Brown, Rachel. The Early Flute: A Practical Guide. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
Donington, Robert. Baroque Music Style and Performance: A Handbook. London: W. W. Norton & Company, 1982.
Hilton, Wendy. Dance and Music of Court and Theater: Selected Writings of Wendy Hilton. Stuyvesant, New York: Pendragon Press, 1997.
Hotteterre, Jacques-Martin. Principles of the Flute, Recorder and Oboe. Translated by Paul Marshall Douglas. New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1968.
Mather, Betty Bang, and Dean M. Karns. Dance Rhythms of the French Baroque. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987.
Powell, Ardal, ed. TRAVERSO Historical Flute Newsletter: The Second Decade, 1999-2008. Hillsdale, New York: Pendragon Press, 2009. (Newsletter subscriptions available through www.traversonewsletter.org)
Quantz, Johann Joachim. On Playing the Flute. Translated by Edward R. Reilly. New York: Schirmer Books, 1985.
Weaver, John. A Small Treatise of Time and Cadence in Dancing. Translated from the French of Feuillet. London: Gregg International Publishers Limited, 1971. (Out of print, but available in many university libraries, or through inter-library loan.)
Wentz, Jed. “Bach: Quick Tempi and Passionate Expression” TRAVERSO 5/3 (July 1993), 1-3.
Whitley-Bauguess, Paige. Introduction to Baroque Dance (DVD). (Available through www.baroquedance.com)
– Searchable database with high-resolution digital images of J. S. Bach original manuscripts.

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How did you get started on Baroque flute?
    I have always loved the sounds of flutes from around the world, from the first time I heard a those in a Javanese Gamelan in junior high school to Japanese Gagaku court music. When I was a senior in high school, I played in a Baroque chamber music ensemble in a nearby town, directed by Robert Koff, one of the founding violinists of the Juilliard String Quartet.
Koff also introduced me to Baroque performance practice through Quantz’s On Playing the Flute and other sources. During a first year January Winter Term break at Oberlin, I went to Holland to study Baroque repertoire on modern flute with Frans Brüggen and recorder with Kees Boeke in Amsterdam. Brüggen was eloquent on the importance of playing the repertoire on traverso, so I took a Baroque flute intro class at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, taught by Nancy Roth. Bob Willoughby had devoted a sabbatical year to studying traverso, so I was able to continue with him at Oberlin.
    A rewarding aspect of playing traverso is that the instrument teaches us a lot about the music. Unlike the more homogenized sound of the notes on a modern Boehm flute, each note on a Baroque flute has its own quality. As Ardall Powell writes in his book on flutist and flute-maker Tromlitz, the unique color of each note was prized by players and listeners. Composers would choose to write in different keys; they might use the key of D Major if they wanted to project a strong, outgoing emotion or G minor for a sweeter or more contemplative mood.
    Since the traverso is built in the key of D, the note F# is stronger than F natural, and Bn has a different character than Bb. So if a flutist plays a movement in G minor, the instrument tells the player to moderate the air on the Bb and F natural. These notes are much more muted and will crack if the flutist uses as much air as on B natural and F#. This gives the music a sweeter and more introverted quality. When a flutist plays the J.S. Bach Sonata in G minor or the Allegros from the E minor on the traverso, the colors of the special notes in each key are much more evident than when played on a modern flute.

How do you stay in shape on so many different flutes? 
    Each flute I play, including a Baroque traverso, Classical 6 or 8-key, Romantic 8 or more key, Baroque and Classical piccolos, and my modern instrument, has different fingerings and tunings. Even my 1876 wooden Rudall Carte Boehm system’s intonation is very different from a modern flute and piccolo, so it is a continual challenge.
    Intonation is always paramount, and 99.9% of the time I practice with a tuner. The tuner can also be used as a drone for work on intervals. When playing earlier music, there are different tuning systems, so not all the intervals are the same as in equal temperament. I begin practicing with the first pages of the Marcel Moyse half-step descending and ascending long tones from L’Art de la Sonorité. Then, I often go to the exercise on page 15, choosing a difficult note that may either be awkward to finger or have intonation challenges. For instance, the G# on traverso is unstable, so practicing all possible intervals for that note helps to iron out difficulties.
    I often play through either the Taffanel & Gaubert 17 Big Daily Exercises #4 (with adjustments for the ranges) or #1 and #2 on traverso and Classical flutes. Other days, I may substitute Mathieu-André Reichert’s Daily Exercises #1 and #2, so that even on the flutes for which playing in advanced key signatures is sheer torture, I am able to get around the entire circle of fifths.
    For tone, I sing and play to stay open. Sheryl Cohen’s book, The Rampal School, has excellent descriptions of how to practice Hu and Ku which do wonders in opening up the torso, chest, and throat. In addition, I studied the Alexander Technique for four years, and that training helps me to avoid injury by staying flexible and keeping the muscles extended. I frequently give masterclasses here and in Latin America, and this training enables me to quickly spot and address posture problems in students.

How does the shape of the embouchure hole on the Baroque flute affect how you use your air?
    The embouchure holes on the older flutes tend to be a lot smaller, so the player’s airstream must be narrower. Lois Schaefer used to say that her teacher, Georges Laurent former principal flute Boston Symphony, told her in his French accent to peench the lips in order to focus the air. I think about projecting the sound through finding the resonance of each note in the instrument. If I think of the sound traveling around in all of the empty spaces in my head, of my throat and chest being cavernous, and of expanding rather than pushing the air stream, the instrument responds like a good friend.
 
What about tonguing?
    One of the basic references Baroque flutists use to learn articulation is J.J. Quantz’s, On Playing the Flute. In playing four sixteenth notes, on the first (strong) and third notes we use the ti or ri syllables and on the lighter notes, the second and fourth, di. There are a variety of syllables that may be used to play different kinds of intervals depending upon whether the interval is large or small. Baroque flutists also use a various syllables to express a variety of moods. A simple example is to think of using tu on the modern flute to play livelier music and du to play more lyrical passages. Most students have a limited number of syllables they use while playing. 
    Betty Bang Mather’s excellent volume on J.S. Bach’s Partita in A Minor for solo flute (Falls House Press) includes examples of articulations that  address many of its phrasing challenges.
The did’ll tonguing that is common in Baroque treatises is one that I have not spent the necessary time to master. I have always been able to double-tongue pretty fast, so I don’t notice a real difference in response among the flutes. I remember Rampal once demonstrated in a masterclass how important a fast air speed is to successful double-tonguing, so I encourage my students to think of expanding their rib cages and pulling the air down to get their tongues moving.

What about vibrato? 
    It is good practice to play without vibrato and add it as an ornament on certain notes to bring out a dissonance. The flattement, or finger vibrato that Jacques Hotteterre describes, is much easier on a one-key flute. On a modern flute, the keys actually get in the way. The flattement is useful in making a mezza di voce or swell on a long note. Vibrato should be used rarely in Baroque and Classical music, and even more rarely on final notes of phrases.
 
How does the distance between the holes on Baroque flutes affect hand position?
    The distance between the holes varies among  flutes. With some flutes, one has to be very careful not to strain the hand. Because I have small hands, my position is quite unorthodox. I turn the headjoint in, which rotates the body of the flute out, so that my left hand fingers are much closer to the holes. I also keep the fingers a bit above the holes; if they are too close, the intonation on certain notes can be affected. Sometimes, not keeping my right index finger right over the f hole, but moving it slightly laterally can ease strain. When playing, I think of getting length all the way from the shoulder, with a long elbow and loose wrist, and with a wide palm. I don’t play some flutes because I know they will strain my right hand as the d hole is quite far away from the e hole. It is a good idea to start out playing a traverso a little bit at a time to avoid strain.

What books did you read when you were beginning to learn the Baroque flute? 
    I read Quantz and Hotteterre. Often, how I learned was by letting the instruments teach me what would work and what would not. I listened to many traverso players and continue to learn a great deal from working with colleagues, such as Greer Ellison, Chris Krueger, Sandra Miller and Anne Briggs. I also learn from listening to harpsichordists, violinists, and singers. Listening to viola da gamba players playing bass lines helps with note lengths and the stresses of each beat. Reading the treatises by C.P.E. Bach, Leopold Mozart, and other non-flutists is helpful, too.
    Tulou is very useful for fingerings for later keyed flutes, as are Drouet and Nicholson (thanks to Jan Boland for publishing reprints or facsimiles of these). The keyed flutes are different animals, in many ways. I just had the pleasure of playing Haydn and Mendelssohn with my long-time friend and colleague, Sandra Miller. For the Haydn, I used my 8-key copy of an August Grenser flute (c. 1790, by Martin Wenner) and for the Mendelssohn, a borrowed copy of a Koch flute (c. 1820, by Boaz Berney). The key setup on each is almost the same, but the actual keys are different sizes and lengths, and the intonation on each, is of course, unique.
 
What composers do you enjoy the most when playing Baroque flute? 
    Whichever composer I am playing at the moment is my favorite. I love to play Bach, Handel, Telemann, Vivaldi. French Baroque repertoire (Rameau, Couperin, Hotteterre) is actually much more satisfying to play on the traverso because we can actually play the ornaments much more effectively without the keys in the way. I have learned a tremendous amount about the music by playing with Baroque dancers, notably the New York Baroque Dance Company. Understanding the language and rhythm of the dance gestures gave me a lot of insights.
 
Do you have to do anything special to keep the flute from not cracking?
    These flutes require some extra care. When I travel, I put the flute in a sealed plastic bag, sometimes with a small, moist sponge included. As flute maker Rod Cameron once explained, the inside of the bore (tube) is absorbing condensation while we play, so it is expanding. The outside of the tube is not expanding at the same rate, so there is tremendous outward pressure. Sometimes, I moisten the outside of the headjoint to equalize the pressure. I oil my flutes pretty regularly with almond oil. There are good explanations by flute makers on the Internet on how to do this.

What led you to study the flute?
    I always wanted to play the piccolo, but was told I must begin with the flute. I grew up in Lincoln, Massachusetts where we had the opportunity to study with music teachers at our elementary school on weekends. I began flute lessons when I was eight. My first teacher, Vincent Cavally, taught me solfeggio along with my beginning studies. I still have my first Rubank Elementary Method with some of the solfeggio syllables written in above the notes. When he moved back to New York City, I studied with Jan Smith who was an excellent teacher and stressed the basics with me. Years later I saw a photo of myself at age nine or ten and realized that I had played with a big smiley embouchure, my right thumb out of position, and so many other bad habits. By the time Smith did her magic with me, I had such a good hand position that switching to an open hole flute a few years later was a piece of cake.
    One of my favorite tunes was the duet “Little Brown Jug” in the Everybody’s Favorite Flute Series. I have warm memories of my grandfather playing it on his violin with me.  We played a lot of chamber music at home, and I remember sightreading the Brandenburg Concerto #4 with Smith at one of these musicales. Playing Telemann, Vivaldi, and Handel Trio Sonatas and the Bach Double Violin Concerto at an early age fostered my love of chamber music.
    When I was a sophomore in high school, I decided that I wanted to be a musician. I started to practice two to three hours a day. Smith moved to St. Louis where she became Assistant Principal Flute of the St. Louis Symphony, a position she held for 35 years. My next teacher was Bill Grass. He worked with me on the French repertoire. As I was preparing for college auditions, I studied with Lois Schaefer, solo piccolo of the Boston Symphony. Schaefer was fantastic at getting my sound focused, yet open. She said, “think of a pear-shaped tone, with the stem of the pear coming out between your lips, and the large part of the pear in your throat.”

Why did you decide to study at Oberlin?
    When the time came to choose a college, I realized that I wanted a broader education than was available at a conservatory. Oberlin offered both: a conservatory and a college. Robert Koff, my high school chamber music teacher, was a graduate of Oberlin and recommended the school to me. For my Oberlin audition, I prepared the J.S. Bach E-Flat Sonata, the Quantz G Major Concerto, and the Poulenc Sonata. As part of an independent study project at my high school, I presented a recital performing these pieces in preparation for my audition.
    I met Robert Willoughby (we are now allowed to call him Bob) at my audition. When I played the second movement of the Bach Sonata, the Siciliano, he sat down and accompanied me on the piano. He is a consummate musician. With Willoughby we studied Baroque music on the traverso, and avant-garde and standard flute repertoire on the modern Boehm flute. He taught us to think for ourselves and to have good reasons for interpretive choices. Although I had played in youth orchestras since the age of eight, I decided in my senior year that I would not pursue an orchestral career at that time. Instead I chose to focus on the outside edges of the repertoire, mainly Baroque and contemporary music.
Willoughby encouraged his students to form close relationships with each other. Greer Ellison and I began performing together during our Oberlin days. We went on to create an ensemble A Flute for All Seasons and had the honor of performing together at Willoughby’s 90th Birthday Tribute at Oberlin in October 2011 (see Flute Talk, December 2011). Now, I stress with my students at Berklee that their fellow flutists will be among their most important colleagues in their future careers. Upon graduation I moved to New York City to study contemporary music with Harvey Sollberger. He thought I should go to school, so I would meet other musicians in the area. I auditioned for the Manhattan School of Music that September and was Sollberger’s first flute student there.

What came next?
    After finishing my master’s degree, colleagues and I founded the Odyssey Chamber Players. The goal was to introduce audiences to contemporary music by programming it with standard repertoire. We developed a residency in Brooklyn, a concert series in Manhattan, and briefly toured for Columbia Artists. Through Odyssey, I learned a lot about the business of music and became versed in writing government, foundation and corporate grants.
    After a couple of years, I went back to Manhattan to work with Sollberger on my doctorate, as it was clear that it was necessary for a university teaching position. I taught in community music schools, and, as part of my doctoral fellowship, taught at the Manhattan School of Music Prep Division for about six years and gave masterclasses, and a lecture-recital, Journey Through Music History with the Flute, featuring flutes from the Renaissance, Baroque, Classical (including my 1818 crystal Claude Laurent flute), and contemporary periods.
    I developed several sources of income in those years and learned about the business of having a career as a musician. It is much more difficult now to pursue a career in music. The number of orchestras is shrinking, and there are a finite number of university teaching posts. When I go to conventions, it is amazing to see the many creative ways flutists craft careers with skills in music technology, music therapy, and music education.

What are your current projects?
    This fall my Oberlin classmate and long-time piano collaborator, Deborah DeWolf Emery, and I started to record our CD celebrating music written by women composers. As an evolution of my lecture-recital, Journey Through Music History with the Flute, I have been incorporating more and more pieces written by women into the program and performing on flutes from the eras in which they were written. Another project I have undertaken with several Berklee alumni and students is the founding of an independent group, the World Flutes Ensemble. With four flutes, guitar, bass and hand percussion, we are creating new repertoire that includes original compositions and arrangements of music from Argentina, Brazil, Japan, Turkey, South Africa, Native American, plus jazz and funk.
    My long-term goals include focusing on human rights work through music education, especially in developing countries. The musicians who keep returning to the International Flute Festival in Quito (see sidebar), all volunteer time and resources to support the work of colleagues in Ecuador and the flute traditions founded by flutist Maestro Luciano Carrera.
    Oddly enough, I have kind of slid into playing quite a bit of piccolo. This includes modern piccolo in the Cape Cod Symphony. Plus, I am playing Baroque 1-key and Classical 5/6 key piccolos. This spring, I will be going back to play the latter with Toronto’s Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, and with Mercury, in Houston, Texas.

What advice do you have for flutists who want to play the traverso?
    The best advice is to listen to traverso players, Baroque violinists, and singers. Be patient and let the instrument teach you about the music you are playing. You should also read Quantz, Hotteterre, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, and more. The late flutist, David Hart (in honor of whom the NFA David Hart Fund was created) said when he first began studying the traverso, he sat by a lake in Belgium and played long tones for a month. Add a tuner, and you are all set.    

* * * *

Flute Festival in Quito

By Wendy Rolfe

    Eighty flutists from around the globe came together for a week in June for the Twenty-Second Festival Internacional de Flautistas en Centro del Mundo 2012. Held in Quito, Ecuador, it was also an homage to the career of Festival Director, Luciano Carrera. Concerts, rehearsals, and masterclasses were hosted by Quito’s La Casa de la Musica concert hall and Dr. Gustavo Lovato, who does important work in music education in Ecuador. Performances were also presented at schools and universities all over the city. Each day there were masterclasses on all instruments, Coral de Flautas (Flute Choir) rehearsals, and two to three concerts.
    Carrera’s remarkable fifty years as a member of the flute section of the Orquesta Sinfonica Nacional of Ecuador were honored at the Gala Friday night concert with the Orquesta. Fittingly, he was featured that night in an outstanding performance of “Joaquim” Quantz’s Concerto in G Major. After almost fifty years of teaching, students of his first students are now teaching some of the youngest members of the Coral de Flautas. Carrera was visibly moved when speaking about Festival artist, Nury Ulate Solis, one of his first students when he was pursuing his own flute studies in Costa Rica. Another of his former students, Orquesta Sinfonica piccoloist Eugenia Aizaga, showed off her Suzuki Flute Ensemble at one of the opening concerts. Others are on the faculty at the Fondacion Orquesta Sinfonica Juvenil de Ecuador.
    While it is officially a flute festival, there were many fantastic pianists and string players in attendance who were an integral part of the event. The members of the Colombian Ensamble Conclave performed arrangements of national tunes, and included Felipe Garcia, flute professor at Universidad Nacional in Bogota, with clarinet and stringed instruments including guitar, tiplé, bass, charanga, plus percussion.
    One Ecuadorean quena flute was pitted against eighty flutists and native percussion in the “Coral Internacional de Flautas en el Centro del Mundo.” This may not seem like a fair contest, but Orquesta Sinfonica flutist and Andean flute specialist Luis Fernando Carrera brought down the house soloing on the quena in his arrangements of popular national tunes. Led by Festival Co-Director Angeleita Floyd, the Coral concert closed a week of fourteen concerts. The Coral’s repertoire ranged from Mozart’s Divertimento in D, K. 136, to Ketelby’s “In a Persian Market,” to numerous Latin American favorites. Decked out in sunglasses, the members of the Coral, who ranged in age from seven to seventy, delighted their audience with “Alley Cat”.

The post From Baroque to Modern: A Flute for Every Period, An Interview with Wendy Rolfe appeared first on The Instrumentalist.

    Things get more complicated with the third movement Toan-Yan, subtitled La Fête du Double Cinq (The Celebration of the Double Five). The footnote by the composer reads, “The Double Five is the celebration of the 5th day of the 5th month, dedicated to the commemoration of a hero who threw himself into water instead of undergoing military dishonor. This solemnity is marked with dances in turn mystical and ardent, which symbolize the contrast between peace and war.”
    Another footnote at the bottom of the second page of this movement reads, “This is an authentic Chinese theme played on the large recorder – each Chinese instrument having the monopoly of certain themes, by its shape, its fingerings or its range. It must be chanted with extreme simplicity, and with a very imprecise rhythm.” This piece is made using synthetic scales which are close relatives of the modal system. Ferroud was an admirer of Belá Bartók and may have well been inspired by the use of synthetic scales which Bartok had discovered in his folk song research. The use of modes is a familiar characteristic of music written during the first half of the 20th century. Trois pièces pour Flûte seule is a beautiful glimpse into Ferroud’s creative world.

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