Bob impressed Rampal deeply, to the extent that they would later perform together at Boston’s Symphony Hall in 1979, at Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival in 1981, and at Carnegie Hall in a duo recital in February 1984. The following year they recorded Luigi Hugues’s Grand Concert Fantasy for two flutes on Verdi’s The Masked Ball with the London Philharmonic Orchestra under Placido Domingo. Rampal recognized in Bob an artist who was able to touch others with his generosity of spirit. That spirit can be heard on his many solo and chamber music recordings for Northeastern Records, ASV, VAI Audio, and his own label, Bogner’s Café, which he launched in 2006. His personal warmth delighted audiences at numerous festivals, including the one he founded in Marblehead, Massachusetts.
    Bob Stallman was also a master teacher who enjoyed working with flutists of all ages. His passion for music and flute playing deeply inspired his many students at the New England Conservatory, the Boston Conservatory, the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College, and the Manhattan School of Music, as well as those whom he taught in master classes around the world. In the words of New York-based freelancer Joseph Trent:

    I was fortunate to have Bob Stallman as my teacher for 4 years while at NEC…Before meeting Bob I only played the notes and rhythms from the pages. But from the first lesson, studying with him and hearing him play opened up a whole new world and language of expression…He showed me how to play between the notes and rhythms, and to realize that the notation is not the music, but merely the signposts. For this I am forever grateful for it changed me not only as a musician, but it opened my heart! He was and is still the most fabulous, stunning, sublime player and more importantly a truly remarkable human being who touched the lives of so many with his artistry, grace and humility, an example for us all.

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Basic Ingredients
    A student of any level or a non-professional adult should address the following with a warm-up:
    •    good posture
    •    breath control
    •    strengthening overall muscle tone (including the embouchure)
    •    hand/eye coordination
    When you are learning, you must spend a great deal of time practicing and understanding why your teachers encourage and guide you through certain exercises, etudes and repertoire.

Getting Started
    Practicing and warm-ups are two different things, so awakening the body to deal with the day’s tasks is never a substitute for lengthy detailed practice. Most musicians try to do some stretching in the morning as it gets the muscles back into play after sleeping. Your job is to wake up and get all the functions of playing moving forward. If you rush or ignore this, chances are you will be tight, stressed and not feel comfortable. Ordering the body to be on or forcing it to play a tough passage with no warm-up, usually ends in defeat. I have found time and time again from watching others that this forcing causes tightness, lack of focus, and negative thoughts that you are not playing well.

Body and Mindfulness: 1-2 Minutes
    Body: Ease into it and calmly quiet brain activity so you can focus completely on the flute.
    Stretch and Breathe: Put your arms straight up overhead and then bend at the elbows to make a box over your head. Moving at the shoulder and a bit at the waist, stretch 4-5 inches left as you breath in for 5-6 seconds. Then move back to the top as you exhale out through the mouth for about 12-13 seconds. Once back at the top, keep your arms in that box position, but lower your shoulders and do a full inhale for 8-10 seconds. Then exhale for 14-15 seconds. Repeat on the right side. You should do it at least twice per side. Put a metronome on at 60 if you like.
    Mindfulness: You will naturally want to cram too much into this short warm-up. Do not try to run through everything on your schedule for that day. This will leave you feeling totally defeated. Instead, focus on the core objectives. Pinpoint a couple of issues, or passages you want to address. This is key, and you will get better at it in time. Stop any negative mental chatter and start looking at what you need to do and how you are going to get positive results accomplished in the remaining time.

Standing and Sitting: 10 seconds
    Make sure your posture is correct and you are able to play comfortably whether standing or sitting. I change this aspect all the time, as I perform a lot in both positions. When students say they can do some things better standing or sitting, I totally disagree. One can play well either way with practice, so practice both and pick which position to work on today.

Short Version Long Tones: 3 minutes
    I start with short long tones in the middle range, (15-20 seconds), with no vibrato, and mezzoforte. Allow the embouchure to be relaxed and accept the tone of a raw note. Keep your volume just medium. Stop the voice in your mind and just allow your embouchure to wake up. Don’t force it. As your embouchure awakens, you will hear the tone become more refined. Just Listen. Make sure to start the note with a clean attack, and if you want, add in simple dynamics. Let the air flow from the body. Check your posture, and get those shoulders down. In a variation of this, I will work on four or five notes, with no vibrato for about 20 seconds apiece.
    After a minute or so, I add vibrato. Frequently, I move from the note into a harmonic and return to the first note to develop embouchure flexibility. Variations come as you decide if these tones are to be very low, middle or very high. You can vary the dynamic levels and play with or without vibrato. At this point I select something from beginning of the De La Sonorite by Marcel Moyse.

Favorite Books: 10-12 Minutes
    Like many flutists I love etude books. My library is huge, and I welcome the challenges found in each one. I am not in any way pushing one book over another, but I have consistently used two through the years. First is Vingt Exercices et Etudes sur les Grandes Liaisons by Marcel Moyse. The large jumps and arpeggios allow you to do what he says or create your own variations. It is also harder and more challenging to play the exercise backwards – note by note. If you play a lot of contemporary music and want better control of extreme dynamics, you can use this book accordingly to conquer this issue. If this book is new to you, I suggest working on one or two lines separately, starting in the middle register.
    My second go-to book is Andre Reichert’s Seven Daily Exercises. I play numbers one through three from memory. As I progress through the keys, I play them in different ways, including tempos from very slow to very fast, loud and soft, and double- and triple-tongued or slurred. I review what I will need to play for the day in rehearsals or concerts, and then I apply these techniques to the exercises. It might be a tricky rhythm, a quick dynamic change, or a wide leap; be creative as you adapt exercises to your needs.

Technique: One note at a time: 10-12 minutes
    Select one spot in a piece of music you are playing that is really not ready and will most likely fall apart. Look at it closely to figure out where the problem lies. It might be notes, speed, articulation, breath control, or rhythm. Pick one and work solely on that one item. If it is a recurring mess, you probably played it sloppily at first, and it went into your brain incorrectly and now is stuck. It could be something simple such as rushing an interval because you don’t like the notes, sloppy finger and air coordination, or even just a predetermined mindset that these pitches or intervals or rhythms are hard.
    Break it down into small bites and digest them. This way, you are looking at the passage through new eyes. Stop thinking that you cannot play it and create positive mental messages. Demand correct notes so your ears finally hear the correct pitches. Reprogram your fingers to develop the correct pattern, and if you still feel tension as you do this, you are going too fast for your body, brain, and fingers to digest. Make sure you are not tensing up any area of your body, arms, fingers, and take the excerpt way under tempo. Breaking down a spot that has not been consistent or reliable allows it to improve quickly. When you come back to these small spots the  next day, you will find that your brain has digested more than you thought. The key here is to build from ground zero of the real problem and work outward beat by beat on each side.

More Advice
    Very complicated sections will take slow, careful work that is beyond the scope of a 30-minute warm-up, so let them go for now. Instead try to fix just a few beats of the music. Working on even a small section will make you feel more confident when you tackle the larger problem spot later.
    Avoid distractions during your practice sessions. You could have finished, but you looked at your texts. Your phone is not a practicing assistant, but a distraction. 100% of your brain needs to be on the music, so turn it off and get an old-style metronome. One final idea that I do is to sing my parts or do vocal long tones while driving to work. 

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How It Works
    The first step is to create a list of working tempos:
    1. Determine what the final tempo should be. In the Firebird excerpt, as with many others, this final tempo is provided by the composer. Here it is q.=76. Occasionally a performer, ensemble, or teacher may select a different tempo from what is indicated. In any case, it is important to have a clear, final goal tempo in mind.
    2. Figure out half of that tempo. For the Firebird Variation, half tempo is dotted quarter note = 38 – half of 76. One further consideration is that with each practice tempo, it is important to decide on the most helpful way of counting beats. Here, flutists may practice at dotted quarter note = 38, but it is at least equally useful to practice at eighth note = 114. I know that I want to do both.
    3. Fill in the intermediate tempo between half tempo and the full tempo goal. This is again a matter of simple mathematics. It will be the expected midpoint between the two tempos. With the Firebird Variation, this means the middle practice tempo is dotted quarter note = 57, or eighth note =171. As a side note, I do prefer to round to numbers on a traditional metronome. Here that would mean 56 and 172, but this is optional.
    4. Complete the list of practice tempos by including one more halfway between each of the three found thus far. This generates a list of five tempo goals. Here are five practice tempos for the Firebird Variation:

Put These Five Tempos to Work
    Musicians are accustomed to increasing metronome speed as they practice. However, the terraced metronome practice method creates a much more disciplined plan for doing so. Here is how to prepare music using the pre-determined set of five tempos:
    1. Work up to the initial half-tempo goal slowly and carefully. You may be able to sightread some parts of the piece at this speed, but other sections may be difficult enough that you have to start at one-third or even one-fourth of the final tempo. Be honest with yourself and start where it is truthfully needed to make the technique perfect. Never move beyond half tempo until you can play whole sections and then the entire piece perfectly at this speed.
    2. Once arrived at this point of flawless execution, begin moving towards the second goal tempo (dotted quarter note =48 in the case of Firebird). Remember that not only notes, but everything that should be part of the piece in its final performance version, should be fully prepared. Dynamics, correct articulation, intonation, tone, phrasing, and general expression should all be carefully put in place even at half tempo.
    When you are ready to move towards the second tempo, be careful once again not to play any faster than you can keep everything accurate. The technique should remain perfect. If some notes start to be missed, slow down and get everything in place before continuing towards the second tempo goal.
    3. Once this second tempo goal has been reached, it will become easy to see how terraced metronome practice differs from simply speeding up the metronome in a more haphazard way. When it feels easy to play a piece perfectly at the first and second goal tempos, do not simply leave those tempos behind while continuing towards the final tempo goal. Each day, begin practicing at the first half-tempo goal. Once you have played perfectly at half tempo – and assuming the goal of playing perfectly at the second tempo has already been reached in the past – move straight to that second tempo stepping stone. After the piece has been played perfectly at these two tempos, move forward carefully towards reaching the third tempo goal.
    4. Eventually, it will be possible to play perfectly not just at half tempo, or at the final tempo, but at a range of five tempos. Once perfection (or as near as we can come) is reached at the final tempo, it is crucial to continue checking in with the four slower stepping stone tempos. As familiarity with the piece grows, this does not have to happen every day. However, you should do this at least once or twice every week as you move towards a performance.

    Continuing to practice at the slower tempos will ensure that technique does not degenerate or become sloppy as fingers regularly cope with the fastest tempo. It is also much less overwhelming than starting very slowly and progressing through each metronome speed to full tempo every day. Simply be sure that these five discrete tempos can be played to perfection upon demand. When this has been done for several days and then weeks in a row, rest assured that the technique will remain solid under pressure. 

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Lip Flexibility
    Playing the flute is comparable to playing a bugle; it requires a strong, well-supported air stream, which is the foundation of playing any wind instrument. Lip flexibility and strength are equally important to the quality of sound. If you are to achieve smooth, controlled intervals and extremes of dynamics, the lips need to move. Avoid simply under- or over-blowing to make changes in sound. You should try to play with an even, focused sound throughout the range of the flute and find the best lip placement for each note while controlling the breath.

Vibrato
    Using vibrato is one of the most important aspects of making music expressive and personal. Both speed and intensity or depth and width of the vibrations should be practiced with the aid of a metronome to develop technical control of the vibrato mechanism. Begin incorporating vibrato as soon as you have developed a good tone on your flute. Pulse two, three, or four vibrations to each half note at the metronomic marking of M.M = 72 until your vibrato is under control; then play more freely by changing its speed and intensity as dictated by the style of the music. An unchanging or inflexible vibrato makes music dull and boring. Vibrato will augment the flute sound, but it has to be controlled.

Dynamics
    Dynamics are the personality of the music, and that personality can be either dull or interesting. Although this is an important musical element, flutists often fail to use a wide dynamic range. Developing variety in dynamics is as important as tone color and vibrato to the technique and sound, but most students play only forte to mezzoforte because they have not learned proper lip strength and flexibility for other dynamic levels. Common pitfalls are playing flat in piano passages that are written in the low register and playing sharp in fortissimo third register passages. If you have a tendency to play flat in piano passages, direct the airstream higher and use more breath support. If you play sharp in forte passages, try to relax both the jaw and the embouchure while aiming the air-stream lower.

Technique
    Learning facility of technique is only the first step towards developing excellence in musicianship, but it is the foundation. Using this foundation to express your own ideas and feelings will help you make beautiful music. Every good player spends hours practicing scales and arpeggios.

The Instrument
    Your flute should be in great condition, even if it is a student model, and many excellent brands are available. Not everyone can afford a top-of-the-line professional model, but you should buy the best one within your budget. Compare different headjoints when you select your flute, and check for consistency in the quality of manufacturing. No matter what instrument you buy, improper care and maintenance will waste your money.

The Teacher
    Every student should try to get the most information from his or her teacher. You should go into each lesson prepared to show your teacher that you have done your homework by practicing. In return, teachers will work hard for you, giving you their best ideas to help you improve. After each lesson think objectively about those new ideas, then practice them so that in your next lesson you can show you deserve more ideas.

Musical Influences
    Take every opportunity to hear and see other good players, not just flutists. Go to every masterclass or summer camp you can. Listen to recordings and talk about music with fellow musicians. There are many ideas waiting to be discovered; all that it takes is an open mind and a desire to develop them.

Practice
    The only way to succeed is by putting in hours of practice; there is no shortcut. Developing a good work ethic towards studying your instrument is one of the most important aspects of becoming a musician. Mastering an instrument requires discipline, but that skill will carry over into other life pursuits as well.

Have Fun
    If you are not having fun, then you are missing the point. Too often players become preoccupied with the mechanical and emotional demands of their instruments and forget to find the joy in music. Life is too short to waste precious time on something that is painful to pursue. Although practicing can be painful at times, try to keep the difficulty in perspective so that you can always have fun.

Attitude
    Attitude and drive are more important than talent. Some students are gifted but do not meet their potential because they lack the drive. Sometimes you need to fake a good attitude towards hard work, but before long you will naturally adopt it as you see the results.

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Humidity
    Wood is a very resilient material. It can last for hundreds of years and be beautiful and useful during that whole time. It is also a reactive material that changes with the climate and usage it experiences. It is possible to quickly destroy a flute or use it for a lifetime. The most critical element is humidity. A flute reacts to changes in humidity throughout the year and responds to the climate within a house as well. In addition to this basic state, when a flute is played, it is suddenly being exposed, especially on the interior, to air at virtually 100% humidity. It should also be noted that different woods react more to these changes than others. For instance, ebony might be quick to crack, while boxwood is more likely to warp. A wood like coccus, used in many 19th century flutes, is more stable than ebony or boxwood, which is one of the reasons it was so widely adopted.
    In my house in Ohio, the humidity throughout the year goes from roughly 65% down to 25% in the winter. The outside humidity is made worse by forced air heating. For the most part, high humidity does not create problems although in extreme circumstances it can foster the growth of mold. Additionally, if you have a boxwood flute, for example, that has been quite dry for a long period, and you suddenly expose it to high humidity, it could warp.
    However, the real problems are created by low humidity, which for those living in the northern half of the US, is quite low in the winter. Allowing the wood to get too dry makes cracking more likely, and this is even more likely when a player suddenly blows warm, wet air into the flute.

A Good Humidity Level
    For many years I was the instrument curator for a major music school with 250 Steinway pianos and thousands of other valuable instruments. We used the standard of 42% humidity that is recommended by Steinway. I think this is a good minimum, but for my own collection I am usually at 50-55%. In past years, before I had really cured my dry air problem, I would have at least two to three antique flutes crack each winter. Often these cracks were re-openings of old repaired wounds. This year, I had a modern ebony Baroque flute crack in the midst of a long rehearsal day in a fairly cold church. It was too dry and cool in the church compared to my warm, wet, wind. Sometimes, this just happens.
    Getting an entire house to this sort of high humidity is virtually impossible during the heating season. There are a number of possible solutions. Some people close off a smaller room and use one or two humidification units. Minimizing the temperature – within reason – in the room also helps. If you have a small number of instruments to worry about, you can make an enclosure and keep it at a higher humidity. One successful method for a small enclosed space is to use humidity packages. These are actually designed for keeping cigars (or guitars) at a constant and appropriate humidity, but they work well for flutes too. This is better than using a dampit or wet sponge of some type in your case.
    One solution which I had hoped would work – but doesn’t – is a whole house humidification system attached to the furnace. Companies offer inexpensive ones that just squirt some mist into the out-going air as well as much more costly models that involve the creation of lots of steam into the output of the furnace. I tried the cheap method, and it basically did nothing in my house. I then bought an expensive steam unit which raised the humidity by about 4%, but it was still under 30%. These might make the house more comfortable for people, but they are not going to help wooden flutes. My final arrangement, which works extremely well, was to take a small closet and install a humidifier in the bottom. I cut 1.5-inch holes in the shelves that divide up the closet, to allow the humidity to move around. This has given me a very steady humidity at my goal percentage of 50-55%. I realize this is overkill for most Baroque flute players, but it is a good way to store any wooden instrument.

Mold
    I have never had the problem myself, but I know of others who have. Once you get mold, it is extremely hard to really kill it off, so that it does not reappear. This can affect all types of wind instruments. I often see people storing flutes in plastic boxes with the idea that it will keep the humidity steady. It will do that, but it also makes it possible for mold to grow. You want some air circulation as well as humidity, so be careful if you use those boxes. I do use them in my collection, but generally not with flutes that are in regular use.
    Getting rid of mold is difficult. I have talked quite a bit about this issue with one of my flute restorers, Jon Cornia, and he has come up with a solution of thoroughly cleaning the instrument with a medical-grade disinfectant called Fiberlock ShockWave, used diluted. This is strong stuff and should be used carefully. When the flute has dried, oil it right away.

Joints
    The joints of Baroque flutes are a particularly sensitive area. If a joint is too loose, air will leak, and the flute will not work properly. If a joint is too tight you risk cracking the socket. This sort of crack can cause long-term problems as it takes very skilled repair work to keep the crack closed. These days, Baroque flutes have either cork or string joints. String joints are what would have been used originally and are less likely to crack the flute. Cork joints were introduced in the 19th century once sockets became metal lined. Be sensitive to how tight your joints are. If they are loose, just add some new string. The best way to prepare the string is to pull it through a block of bee’s wax. This will allow the string to stick together and stay in one place on the flute. People use many different types of thread – cotton, hemp, sink, and synthetic. It is best to use a string that is not so likely to shrink.

Breaking In
    New flutes, or flutes that have not been played for a long time, should be carefully broken in. The purpose of this exercise is to help the wood adjust to the right moisture level. When I get a new flute, either modern or antique, I really want to play on it. It takes some discipline to control the time I spend playing the instrument. I think the most important period is the first two weeks. Playing the flute two or three times a day with a good break in between, is ideal. I think the flute adjusts more quickly this way than with just once a day. The first two days spend maybe 15 minutes per session. Then add five minutes per session each day. Keeping the instrument in well-humidified air is especially important during this time.

Storage
    As the joints are one of the most often damaged parts of the flute, it is important to store the instrument disassembled. This lessens the chance of the tenon or socket warping. Always swab excess moisture before storing. It is fine if it retains some extra moisture – just not drops of fluid. Do not leave your instrument out in the sun as this changes the color of the wood. Don’t leave your flute anywhere you might sit on it. This may seem obvious, but I have seen it happen to a number of people.

Oiling
    I have saved oiling for last, but it is one of the most important proactive things you can do to protect your Baroque flute or recorder. When someone asks on social media, “How do you oil a Baroque flute,” there are generally 50 answers and a good bit of disagreement. Following the advice of your instrument maker is always a good idea. They know the wood and how it was prepared. My main Baroque flute maker, Marten Wenner, uses a mixture of three parts almond oil to one-part orange essential oil. These should be top-grade, organic, natural products. The orange oil helps keep the almond oil from growing rancid, makes a nice smell, and adds to the cleaning properties of the oil. I have experimented some with other types of natural essential oils, but orange is a good safe choice. Some makers and player recommend Linseed oil, and 40 years ago this was the standard. In recent years, however, people have shied away from it as it tends to build up like a varnish on the surface of the wood.
    My rule of thumb is to oil a flute at least at each season change. The most important time being the start and end of winter. In practice, it depends on how much you are using a flute. If you play it every day, you may well want to oil it more often. If you sense the wood is getting dry, it is time to oil it.
    To oil, I suggest using a swab stick with a small piece of cloth that does not put off a lot of lint. I often use two different pieces of cloth, one smaller for the RH and foot joint, and a bigger piece for the head and LH joint. It is easy to get the swab stuck in the RH joint if the cloth is too big. On the other hand, if it is too small, you will not have enough contact in the head. I dip about 1/3 of the cloth in the oil and shake off the excess, then swab out the interior of the flute.  Some people believe it is necessary to remove the cork. I don’t do that, and generally unless you really know what you are doing, you might not end up with the cork back in the same position.

    With a 1-key flute, you want to avoid getting oil on the pad or in the mechanism of the key. It is a good idea to put plastic wrap under the key to protect the pad. You should put on enough oil that it is very clear that all surfaces have oil on them, but it should not be dripping oil. Next, I would oil and lightly buff the exterior surface. A flute can get pretty dirty, and this works as cleaning as well as oiling. It is also a good idea to take a Q-tip with a small amount of oil and run it around the interior of the embouchure and tone holes.
    Once a flute has been well oiled, let the parts sit vertically to allow any excess to drip out. I usually leave the flute siting for four to six hours, allowing the oil to soak in. What you see after those four hours is important. Some flutes will soak up every bit of oil and look dry again, while others will still look wet with oil. The ones that look dry should be oiled more often. The ones that remain very wet may have a finish on the wood that prevents the oil from being absorbed. In either case, use a dry, clean cloth to remove any excess. When done, a good bore will look shiny but not really wet. Use a dry Q-tip to remove any excess oil from the embouchure and tone holes.
    I normally let a flute sit for at least four hours after playing before I oil it, and I would wait an hour or so before playing it after oiling. Your flute should now feel very happy. It should look, feel, and smell better. A wooden flute really can last a lifetime if properly cared for. 

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