Technical Exercises For Flute Warm-ups

While taking professional flute lessons in Folsom, you will come to know that flute warm ups can be compared directly to warm up routines of athletes. If long tones are the metaphorical stretching, then technical exercises are the metaphorical calisthenics. The point of warming up on the flute is to ease into playing so that you keep away from potential injury, strain, and stress. You would like to start out plain and slowly move to more intricate exercises.

In a baseball game, relief pitchers do not simply get off the bench and throw a 95mph fastball. They gradually warm up in the bullpen. This idea is why we begin flute warm ups routine with long tones. Throughout the whole warm up routine, you would like to keep this “easy to intricate” theme in mind. When you are practicing technical exercises, you would like to start off slow and easy, and then step by step move to faster and more intricate. It’ll help make sure precision and ultimate success.

A few instances of technical flute warm ups include running through the arpeggios, scales, etc. The following are some of the technical exercises that can serve as potential flute warm ups. Take into account that these are only instances, a template to help you plan your own routine for warm up. What you make use of in particular depends on your individual needs.

You can warm up with major arpeggios and major scales, through the entire range of the flute. You would like to take into account the same principles as playing long tones and octave slurs. You would like a constant, consistent, and steady stream of air, and you would like the lip to move out and the air direction to move up as you go up the scale, and vice versa as you go down the scale.

In addition to diatonic exercises, you can warm up with chromatic exercises. These are the exercises that will ensure that every note is working properly, and that there are no pads striking etc. You are supposed to listen for consistency of intonation, consistency of tone, and precision. In addition to warming up the fingers, you are even required to warm up the tongue. Such exercises can be used in order to warm up the tonguing, as well as the double-tonguing.

Warming up may seem like a waste of time. It is uninspiring, repetitive, and boring. You may think it is not essential. Well, no person can compel you to warm up. However, it is in your best interest. It significantly lessens the possibility of injury and significantly boosts the possibilities of success. If you select not to warm up, best case scenario, you may mess up a few complicated passages; worst case scenario, you may get tendonitis or a different injury, and need to take time completely off from playing in order to heal.

According to every experienced instructor delivering flute lessons in Folsom, flute warm ups may seem like a waste of time, but in reality, they end up saving a significant amount of time!