Toot! Toot! And on to the flute
For years, I have been lackadaisical at best with my flute playing. When my mother moved here in March of 2020, eventually dying, I left my flute to molder, bringing it out a handful of times but to no avail. So how odd that when Carl and I got home from the Cal/Can trip something clicked. I reached out to an online teacher. I’ve started lessons again.
In my first lesson, the teacher, Eva, commented that I might consider turning the headjoint out more. And—as have past teachers—she noted the tension in my jaw, neck, and throat, and my lips are puckered too tight. She suggested I lower my elbows, tighten my abdominals in order to attract the excess energy in my shoulders and support the out-going air, and put a chopstick in the mouth to force me to loosen up my lips.
Need I say that trying to play with a chopstick in one’s mouth, while also dealing with a newly turned out headjoint, is next to impossible? Breathy non-notes. Dizziness. A sense of hopelessness. Really?
The good news? I sound like sh*t anyway. This is the perfect time to change my embouchure and attempt to turn out my headjoint. If I’m going to sound terrible, I might as well accomplish something in the meantime, right? This is like being a beginner again! As if I don’t know anything about flute playing. It is hell.
My sister-in-law looked at me rather askance. “But you aren’t a beginner.”
Exactly! Beginner’s mind! The art of not knowing. No preconceived shoulds! No too high expectations! I will be open to all kinds of learning. The old year might be ending in the next few weeks. Darkness might be falling. Things could go really good or really bad. But I am going to be free and accepting of whatever it is that’s going to happen.
One can hope, right? I know. Change is hard. Exhibit A: my current flute hell situation. But if we make shifts and adaptations now, ready ourselves and prepare…won’t that make the future not quite so squawky? Other changes more endurable? If we can practice change, imagine what life might be—with a positive, but not Polly Anna, attitude—I think we might just save some small part of this beautiful world. Step by step. Choice by choice.
In other words, I am, by a miracle, practicing every day. 15 minutes will make way, as it did yesterday, for 30 minutes, an hour. And here’s a glowing secret that I will share: yesterday while practicing, I played a few notes, all in a row, that were far richer, far more open, far more beautiful than I thought I could ever play.
