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| Raffaele Trevisani |
September: How would you advise placing the head joint?
Raffaele: Put the bottom lip over
the top; let the bottom lip droop over, especially if you have thin lips.
Keep the cut of the embouchure hole under the red-“vermillion line’-down on the
lip. Not too high on the lip. Personally, I prefer slightly left side, too.
September: You have a sizzling fast, light tongue technique.
Where do you place the tongue?
Raffaele: I say French-tu and du
on the palette on the teeth but not touching the lip. If you have a stretched smiling embouchure, the
tightness will create a false syllable like “twah-twah”. Rampal was a master
for speed and lightness. You must tongue lightly and connected (more legato) to
play fast. Try the syllables le-le-le-le, de-de-de, ge-ge-ge, in an almost
unpronounced, legato way. No accents. You must single tongue all rhythms for
hours, months, and years, then do double and triple tongue. Unfortunately there
is no short cut. Moyse wrote another great book: 50 Articulations on the Allemande of J.S. Bach. It’s a real workout but not to be done all at
once! Study a few rhythms at a time.
Double tongue uses the back of
the tongue where the tongue connects to the throat. The key is the back part of throat, used as
light as possible and only the little part of the tongue! One other thing, to get a really good detaché you
have to have a very clean focused sound-so here we are again at the importance
of Sonorité. Detaché is sound
production. If the sound is good then the articulation will sound clear and
strong. The better the sound the better
everything is. Don’t reinforce the tongue in detaché; not strong but
incredibly light strokes- no hard syllables. Try leh-geh, leh-geh, then geh-geh,
geh-geh, then go back and forth -leh-geh-leh-geh until you can’t decipher
between the two sounds. Blow and play leh-geh in a flute position by putting
your finger under lip to emulate a flute embouchure. Emphasis the “L” not the “E”.
So, to recap-play scales and Sonorité all day long because it’s the basics to the to
understanding and controlling the complexities of the flute
September: Anything about vibrato?
Raffaele: No diaphragm in vibrato. Use the throat.
September: You get unusual colors in your playing. Do you
change vowels?
Raffaele: For color I use different
vowels but not in the mouth. I change the direction of air in the embouchure
hole--I play over and under, and a tiny bit more open without losing focus. I
don’t use the chin for color although it’s possible, it depends. Blow more in
to the head or up. Jimmy’s (Sir James) school is to blow more into the flute
keeping about 1/3 to half open hole in head piece.
