Warming-Up

"A lot of guys ignore the warm-up, and that's about standards."

Okay, so I stole and modified a quote from Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog, but my point stands!  Besides, it seems appropriate that my first blog entry should be about warming-up.  It sets the tone for your entire practice or rehearsal session.  Unfortunately, many younger flutists either don't have the patience or, sadly, haven't been told about the importance of warming-up not only their flute, but themselves.  I will try to keep this brief, but will make no attempt not to be preachy.

Musicians really ought to take their warm-up as seriously as any athlete would; let's say a gymnast. If you have "The Paula Robinson Flute Warmups Book", this should sound very much like her analogy to a ballet dancer. That is a great book, by the way, if you are in search of your own warm-up. Use it as a guide.  Now back to our gymnast!  It would be insane and irrational for a gymnast to start flipping, twirling, and bending in very, very odd ways without a proper warm-up. So here we go.

Stretching is key to a gymnast.  They slowly wake up their bodies doing basic stretches that, well, warm up their body.  What is a great stretch for a flutist?  Long tones.  And there are a multitude of ways to do them.  My personal favorite is starting on a low G and working my way chromatically down to a low B.  My goal is not only to have a beautiful sound, but also to make sure my air support exists and is consistent.  This also serves as a wake-up call to my lungs.  I can usually tell what kind of a "breathing day" I am going to have in just hearing the first few notes.  But, as with any good stretch, the result is that my breathing improves and becomes (dare I say) more flexible as I go.  Next?  I start on my low G again and go down chromatically to my low B in gradually bigger leaps (G-F#, G-F, G-E, G-Eb, etc. down to G-B).  This is another good air support stretch.  Don't let the bigger leaps slow your air, sounding hesitant.  Long tones can go up the range instead of down.  Use these ascending long tones to control a soft, but full upper register.  Borrow a tricky pattern from a solo or ensemble piece and work out the kinks (more on incorporating music you are actually working on later).  Long tones are flexible.

After a gymnast sufficiently stretches, they should start doing the real simple tricks (cartwheels, handstands, front and back walk-overs...occasionally forward and backward rolls, no joke), though it is tempting to skip these.  So what do flutists have that we often want to forget about, skip over, ignore the existence of?  Hmmm.....SCALES!  I know, I know.  How could I go there and do that to you?  Honestly, I avoided scales as long as I could, only playing the ones necessary to get me through my lesson or through an audition.  Yet now that I am in my "wiser" years, I have to admit that I would really like to go back and slap some sense into younger, lazier me.  Scales are the stepping stones to success.  Practice all major and minor scales sooner rather than later.  Switch up the rhythms and tempi.  Hopefully you know that the knowledge of scales is also essential for any jazz improvist.  Jazz Improvisation classes will spend weeks and weeks playing blues scales to the riffs of jazz pieces.  Practice your scales people!

Often gymnasts will be asked to do a variety of combinations of flips and twirls that they never actually end up doing in a routine -- why?  Because these combos are hard, and if you can hack your way through etudes you can do anything.  Kind of just threw you into that one, huh?  Well, those dreaded etude books are much like scales, they never disappear.  They keep coming up one way or another. So get 'er done.  It may seem odd that I am including etudes in the warm-up category, and some people may and are welcome to disagree, but the etudes only improve your playing and tend to contribute greatly to the success of whatever piece you are working on.  Why are they so hard if they seem so basic?  There is always a method to the madness of etudes.  They are composed to make you, whether you are aware of it or not, work on cleaning some of the dirty clothes in your laundry.  Is it dynamics?  Articulation?  Breathing?  Rhythm or style?  I'll bet if you gave it a good enough look, you'd see it and realize that your lesson teacher isn't just giving you tedious, busy-work (yes, redundant).

Finally, there are the really hard tricks that gymnasts only actually do in performance, or a cold run, and break down into its simpler components during warm-up.  Back flips, the ones with no hands, they are all about the set.  A set is actually pretty much exactly what it sounds like in generic terms.  Have you set yourself up to successfully flip and not break a bone in your body?  A set is the strength of the spring you get out of the previous move going into the flip, the height you get from your spring, and your posture (straight back/body, arms above your head, head facing straight forward) prior to the flip.  I can't tell you how many times I did a round-off, back hand spring, set in practices in high school.  And my coach always seemed to be able to tell how my flip would go based only on my set.  So what is this in music?  Picking a tricky passage in the music you are working on and warming up, slowly, the tricky pitches, working out the rhythm, or going back to the basics of an extended technique, is a great start.  If you can figure out why a passage is hard, break it down, see it for what it is, and get some serious warm-up done on it you will be amazed at what will happen the next time you play it as written.  Remember, the key here is taking what is hard out of context.  Don't waste hours playing the same measure over, over, over, and over again.  That's just frustrating.  Work on the "set".

Why am I going on about this?  So far, every student I have had in the last half decade has ignored warming-up.  And they don't seem to take me seriously when I first talk to them about the importance of warming-up.  Remember, this is a benefit to you, your instrument, and your relationship with your instrument.  Many students seem to think practicing is just "cold runs" of all the music they are playing.  A cold run is, in other words, a run-through.  You don't address any problems, you just play.  Having said all I have said, cold runs can be beneficial after a certain amount of time spent on a piece.  You should probably still do some long tones and scales, but basically picking up your flute and playing does have one benefit...you know, without a doubt, what you are and aren't capable of doing on the fly.  Save the cold runs for a couple weeks before a performance/audition and actually take the time leading up to said performance/audition to do a good warm-up so that you can launch into a healthy practice session.

Since I said I would keep this short and I have already failed, miserably, I will forgo listing all the wonderful warm-up books out there.  If you are in need of one, ask your lesson teacher, your band/orchestra director, or a friendly neighborhood flutist.