Fife Help

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 03:47 PM

Congratulations. Once you make your first sound, the rest comes easier.

Reminds of that glorious day when, at age four, I first whistled.

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 08:38 PM

The trick about starting with the middle notes (leenia above) also works on all similar instruments such as whistles and recorders.

Practice the difficult things - sounds simple, but people seem to want to keep doing the easy things, and avoid the difficult ones. Stretch your comfort zone - the octave jump is one of the difficult things, but achieving it involves controlling breathing - the more you practice this, the better your overall technique becomes, for instance.

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 01:51 PM

Thanks everyone! I'm getting somehwere, at least it makes a sound, but progress is slow.

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: Tweed
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 01:29 PM

Nothing Make a Fail but a Try
Mebbe Mr. Otha's story will help you a little.

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 09:46 AM

A wooden fife was my first transverse instrument. I took it camping for a week and picked it up whenever I thought of it. By the end of the week I was able to get notes out of it. (I still can't say that's a very useful instrument.)

Long after that, I bought a wooden flute in D. I made an appointment with a flute teacher and told her, "I've had it two weeks, and I can only play an octave!" She said, "Do you realize that there are people who buy a flute and can't get their first note out for months?"

In case you don't play flute, here are a few basic tips.

1. The easiest note to produce is the one that takes the three fingers of your left hand. Low note and high notes are harder.

2.   Moisten your lips.

3.   Hold your head up. (Dipping your chin closes your throat.)

4.   My fife is in B flat. It's lowest note is a B flat, and when I lift one finger after another, I produce a B flat scale. For some reason, the music and fingering chart that came with it pretended that it was in D. I had to write the seller a complaining letter before they told me what was going on.

5.   Pretend you are in a room and there is a large china cabinet in the opposite corner. To play a low note, aim the jet of air at the base of the cabinet. To play the middle notes, send the air to the middle of the cabinet, and to play the high notes, send the jet to the top of it.

6.   If you are reading music and your neck and shoulders hurt, put the music to your left and look over your left shoulder.

Hope this helps. Let us know what happens.

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 09:05 PM

Blow, don't suck...

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: Kaleea
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 08:49 PM

If you are able to play a "regular" transverse flute, you should be able to play a fife. The smaller flute, the smaller the embouchure. Only a tiny circular--not oval--opening in your lips is needed. When you find the "spot" John was referring to, if you stand close to a mirror & watch as you play, you will see a little "V" of moisture on the mouthpiece just under your lip.   

Not to sound ridiculous but, have you looked inside it? I once found a piccolo which had been in an attic for decades, and was completely closed in with moldy gunk. What fun it was to clean it out!

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 03:42 PM

Sorcha -

Most of them are about the size of a Bb p'whistle.(?)

LeS -

The technique often suggested is to place the mouthpiece on your lower lip, about where the "pink" turns to skin. The hole in the mouthpiecs should be pointing just about straight up. Blow at (not into) the hole, and then roll/pivot the thing "up and down" on your lip until you "find the spot." Once found, it's usually pretty easy to capture the feel of it.

John

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: Sorcha
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 02:32 PM

LOL! Ya, just keep blowing......

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 02:31 PM

Thank you, John. Keep on blowing until something sounds you say?

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: Sorcha
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 02:20 PM

Well, except that it is transverse.....and my hands weren't big enough for the one I had.

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 02:14 PM

Note that "tight" doesn't necessarily mean "tense." You need a fairly narrow and smoothly flowing "jet" of air, directed over the top of the hole so that it strikes, and is split by, the far edge of the blowhole.

Many fifes don't have the fully developed hole found on flutes, so it's hard to predict whether yours may require significantly more air than a decent flute. Some do need a bit more, but "blowing really hard" isn't likely to help. It's mainly a matter of an even flow aimed fairly precisely at the right point on the mouthpiece.

I don't have a saved site for referral, but a Google on "flute embouchure" should find pictures that may be helpful.

Once you accomplish "making a tone" it should be pretty much like a pennywhistle.

John

Subject: RE: Fife Help
From: Sorcha
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 01:08 PM

I can't play em either, but it is sort of like blowing across a soda bottle.....very tight embrochure...(sp) 'Most' fifes are in Eb.

Subject: Fife Help
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 05 Aug 05 - 01:05 PM

Cleaning my room in order to find something (fuuun) discovered a fife mum bought in Williamsburg more than thirty years ago. So far I've been unable to make any sound. Help!!!