Dr. Cate's Musings

Thank you for following and subscribing to Dr. Cate’s Flute Tips over the years. It is so gratifying to see how many people continue to use this blog as a reference, share with their students and tell their colleagues to follow and subscribe. Though it has been a hot minute since I last wrote an article for the blog, after a lot of life in the interim, I’ve started compiling all the blog content…

All about the Headjoint Cork

Recently, one of my private students reported that their band director had told all the flutes in band that you could adjust the cork placement for tuning purposes, rather like a tuning slide on a brass instrument. I would like to know where this idea originated in music education literature and pedagogy. It can be said with certainty that flute makers and professional flute teachers kindly wish…

Lining up the Flute Foot Joint

What do you tell your students about how to line up the foot joint on the flute body? After all, there isn’t a clutch, as with the clarinet middle joints, linking the two parts together that dictates how to line them up (well there can be a clutch, but it’s a really rare option on handmade flutes, if there’s an extra left hand pinky lever for the foot joint keys). My approach is super simple and…

Dr. Cate’s Flute Camp goes Virtual

We’ve been doing Dr. Cate’s Flute Camp the old-fashioned way for 20 years in a school, at a music dealer, in person. Now due to the world being a completely different place since March, Dr. Cate’s Flute Camp is going virtual. And you know what? I’m really excited for this new opportunity to help keep students playing their flutes, give them some ensemble experience, explore the basic skills of…

The Antidote for Fake-arando

Simply put, the antidote is to have a long term strategy for your ensemble so that your woodwinds develop the necessary technique to play fast passages and runs with accuracy and clarity. Then they won’t need to fake. What this means in practical day-to-day terms is to have technical warms ups for your flutes and other winds to incorporate into your daily rehearsals. It also means, at least in…

Fake-arando is Not a Thing

Sometime last school year, one of my private students was learning the Poulenc Sonata for flute and piano. If you are familiar with the piece, you know that there are at least five 32nd note runs that the flute does together with the piano in the first movement. When she got to the first run, she played the first couple notes, did some kind of faking in the middle of the run and played the last…

The Secret of Tuning Up Db (C#)

The truth is that if your students can learn to correctly place Db (C#), their overall tone will improve exponentially and they will be able to play with better intonation throughout the range of the flute. The obvious question then is how to teach this to your flute students?

Start with making sure your students have a good physical set up with the flute:

Make sure the flute is properly…

It’s been a banner year at Dr. Cate’s Flute Tips, nearly doubling the number of views of the previous three years just this year alone. There are now 100 different articles on all aspects of embouchure, tone production, hand and body position and teaching beginners. There are more new posts coming up in the new year. Your suggestions and comments are always welcome. With no further ado, the top…

Intonation on Piccolo

Over the last few weeks, students have been asking me for help with piccolo. For such a diminutive instrument, pitch awareness and placement is a huge issue. It might even be the biggest issue because so much of what we know about playing the flute translates directly to piccolo. Here are a few tips to help your students play better in tune on piccolo:

Make sure the piccolo…

Do’s and Don’ts of Flute Care and Feeding

Helping our students take proper care of their instruments is an important part of the instruction we provide, especially when the kids first start playing. It is important to give the kids accurate information so flutes play their best.

Tenons

Do keep the tenons squeaky clean. It is a friction fit that shouldn’t need any lubrication. I use alcohol prep pads to clean oil and dirt off the tenons.…

“What??? But, but…….how can a wind instrument sound good without support?” That’s not what I’m saying at all. I’m saying we need to stop paying attention to “support” as a concept. Let me ask you a few questions. If I tell you to support your sound, what do you do? Can you explain what you are doing or how you are doing it? What is your definition for “support”? How do you explain “support” to…

It is so exciting to share the amazing news that Dr. Cate’s Flute Tips has reached 100K views in less than three years.

What’s coming next? More great content, including more video demonstrations and a flute exercise book for school flute students.

Thank you for reading Dr. Cate’s Flute Tips!

You Wouldn’t Think it Makes Much Difference But……..

There are a number of seemingly insignificant habits your flute students can get into that make a bigger difference than you might imagine to intonation, tone quality and technique. Some of these are more visibly obvious than others. All of them can negatively impact your flute players, both individually and as a section. Keep an eye and ear out for these things in your flute students for a…

The Dreaded Nay Palm

What is the dreaded nay palm? Every band flute player is well familiar with the so-called nay palm. That’s when their band director is always asking them to play quieter because they can’t hear the……you name it, trumpets, low brass, clarinets…… By the way, my old teacher, Thomas Nyfenger coined this expression with more than a little irony. Trust me, every flute player has experienced the nay…

If You Can’t Hear It, It Doesn’t Count

When I was a grad student, my flute professor said to me, “It’s obvious you have a very active inner musical life. The problem is, I can’t hear it.” To say that this was a light bulb moment for me would be a bit of an understatement. This observation really shook me to the core and completely reordered my priorities in my practicing and performing from that time forward. What I realized is that…

A Few Words About Piccolos

There is a lot of variation in types of piccolos available on the market today, maybe more variation than for any other band instrument. There are all metal piccolos, plastic piccolos, combination plastic body with metal head piccolos, wooden piccolos, plasticized wood piccolos…….the list goes on. So how do you know what kind of piccolo to either buy for your instrument inventory or recommend…

To “Tut” or Not to “Tut”

As I frequently tell students, the tongue is used to start a note, rarely, if ever to end a note. So if there is a distinct “T” sound on the release, you are going to have some really nasty sounding note endings. Not to mention big problems single tonguing any faster than moderately slow. All that tongue noise from the tongue flailing around in your mouth isn’t tone. Or as my teacher Tom Nyfenger…