Sarah, I love your videos! I'm 61 years old and have started learning the descant recorder - something I've always wanted to do. This tutorial really helped me lessen the squeak and shrillness and get some nice clear high notes - I was so thrilled!!!!
Thank You for your cool videos, Sarah! I finished clarinet in music school and played in an orchestra and an ensemble for over a decade. I found my love to recorders again after playing the garklein and the tin whistle. Right now, I am praticing to play alto and sopranino recorder. You're videos are a big funny and interesting motivation! You are such a beautiful, funny and smart woman, and also your husband is such a wonderful, funny and cool guy. Keep up the good work! :-) lovely greetings from Vienna, the old city of music, KR
Just found your fabulous videos, I’ve played the recorder for years but only had a handful of lessons in primary school. I’m now learning so much from your tutorials ❤️
I was about to get an Alto Recorder, but I couldn't find any of them near my place, so I've just got a soprano today. I'm enjoying its sound, and it's a good instrument as well. Thx for the vid. ;)
Wow, Sarah. I grew up learning, studying and performing on all types of brass, woodwind, and fipple instruments and I have to say that this section on air speed is one of, if not the best, description of how we breathe and how to control air that I have experienced. I will be stealing it for my own students. (With credit of course) 😀 Cheers to you!
This is a wonderful recorder lesson! I am a beginning player and teaching myself. Slow and fast air, and breath support are all used in singing, so it was good to hear about them for the recorder. Thank you, Sarah!
Hello, how are you, Ms Jeffery? Since there are no recorder teachers next to where I live (I live in the countryside of RS, Brazil), I have to struggle with self teaching and relying on the internet to learn and I have to say: you were the best discovery that I have made! Congratulations for your awesome videos! Well, I have one question, Ms Jeffery, which is making me mad: I started to learn the alto recorder because the pieces that I loved most were written for it and, since I'm an adult, it seemed easier than the soprano. Now I got really serious with my studies and I intend to make the examination to enter the Music university. So, my question is how to avoid making the confusion when reading music, since there are two sets of fingerings? I can play relatively well the soprano but I'm always mentally going back to the treble fingerings. It's like I know that I have to speak in Spanish but end up speaking in Portuguese and everything gets ruined... If you could make a video to help me, I'd be in great debt with you! Anything would help: maybe and indication for books, routines to practice with both the recorders and train the brain so they won't mix anymore etc. Again, thank you so much for your videos! Cheers from Brazil!
Esta es la pregunta que yo iba a hacer a Sarah. Es una pena que no te haya respondido. Yo supondría, usando tu ejemplo de los idiomas, que primero se debe dominar la soprano a la perfección, para después abordar la alto y empezar no de cero, pero sí nuevas digitaciones, tal como se haría estudiando primero portugués y luego italiano o español. Y se supone que podrías abordar sopranino y tenor por extensión ¿no? En fin. ¿Cómo vas con tus estudios? Yo acabo de empezar con la soprano Yamaha y recién una Honner de madera de maple. Saludos desde Ciudad de México.
@@20teverify Oi, Felipe, tudo bem? Então, estou na UFRGS, fazendo licenciatura em flauta doce! Já melhorei bastante e acabei aprendendo a diferenciar soprano/tenor e contralto/baixo, mas, como vim do sax, ainda acho que seria melhor encarar a flauta doce como instrumento transpositor e fazer partituras dedicadas, unificando as digitações. Entendo por que não são feitas, do ponto de vista histórico. A flauta doce continua sendo um dos instrumentos mais fascinantes que já descobri e sigo tocando e aprendendo, meu amigo! Grande abraço!
This should be shown to every Elementary and Middle/Junio High School child: if they absolutely have to be taught Music also by playing the descant/soprano, make them sounding it good!
I'm an adult teaching myself recorder mum had to stop school lessons because the teacher was mean because I'm deaf so teaching myself now I just wanted to wait intill I'd been left school awhile your videos are inspirational I have subscribed
@@_yuri That's terrible. One school teacher once said I wrote with my feet. I am dyspraxic so can't physically write because my brain doesn't send the electrical impulses fast enough for me to have the right dexterity for handwriting. It was like laughing at someone with a walking stick saying ha you walk funny. So horrid.
Really helpful video as always, thanks, and love your enthusiasm - very inspiring. On the dead air thing, one tip my teacher gave me, especially for soprano/sopranino, was to first breathe out fully at the start. For van Eyck pieces I find it useful to do that between modes as well, and also it helps get me in the right place for the last one.
You are so sweet, thanks for sharing. I never played this in my life and now I can learn something new. All I played in my life is a guitar, an electric one and it was only metal music. But I love instruments of music and recently I've got Yamaha Soprano recorder so I can learn something new. Thanks for your video.
Very funny - "Sorry, new neighbours..." I thought of that when having a go at my descant and laughing through the recorder is definitely NOT recommended - LOL
Here in the Philippines majority of people use descant. Music colleges here doesnt have the recorder as a major concentration. This video is very helpful. Thank you so much.
I play mostly soprano. My tenor sounds so bad. These tips are great. I can't wait to try them my self. I have three questions by the way; 1. Do recorders go out of tune and irreparable if you play them for over a long time? 2. How about playing high notes, does this make it go out of tune? 3. Are there specific tricks how to make cheap recorder sound decent while playing notes higher than high c?
Thank you so much for your tips. I am hearing a better sound now! You are amazing! I do meditative breathing and I find that I have good breath control.
Les conseils de Sarah sont précieux pour l'apprentissage de la flûte à bec ! C'est un excellent professeur quand on ne peut pas en avoir un sous la main. Comme je joue aussi de la clarinette, beaucoup de ses conseils me permettent aussi de mieux jouer sur la clarinette, notamment pour la respiration (abaissement du diaphragme pour respirer par le centre) et souffler vite dans l'aigu mais sans jouer "fort", complexe, ça demande pas mal d'entraînement !
Got new ideas.. I am using soprano recorder for my channel as newbie, so this video guides/strategies in playing recorder, really helps me a lot. Thank you so much ma'am 😊
You are a lovely player and quite inspirational. Thanks. I've just bought myself a soprano recorder by Aulos for taking camping with me. It's easy to carry and would be fun to play if only I could. I want to play like you. Anyway, believe it or not, it was Mark Knoplfer's tune the theme tune for Local Hero ' Going Home' that inspired me to buy a recorder. I've got the start of the tune good and I'm in tune, I think, but then I get lost. I'm continuing to try to find the right change of notes, but it is hard to find and get right. I'd love to hear you playing it, if it is possible on the recorder.
Thanks Sarah, a very helpful tutorial for me, I am a total beginner. I just bought a new (vintage c.1971) Moeck soprano that I am excited to learn how to play!!
I like what I've heard by Steve Vai about 'giving each note it's own world' - or something similar to that... the idea being: don't just play 'a note / some notes' - play each note and section of notes and entire song to have a depth that is correct for that piece. You can't play the song with the correct feel unless each individual note has the right feel.
I play the clarinet. The first time I blew into a recorder I'm sure it nearly exploded. I find it really hard to moderate the airflow down to such a small (in comparison to clarinet) amount. Also, that renaissance recorder has such a beautiful sound.
hello sarah i've just discovered your channel and i'm sooo glad to watch all your vidéos!! I really want to learn the soprano and alto recorder and your tutorial help me a lot; thanks a lot also for the video on the best method it's very interresting! hope i'll be a great recorder player one day! :) thanks for this channel!
Thanks so much for this very informative and entertaining video. It's so great to see a teaching lesson focused on the higher instrument. I love a soprano and actually prefer to play it over the alto. I find the sound more pure.
Hi Sarah im a complete novice so I have started to watch your vids there realy very helpful, my chosen recorder is an barock alto recorder just love its tone, anyway love the vids there so helpful thank you. :)
Hi Sarah, my 7th grade recorder players enjoy and benefit from your videos! Question - what can be done to avoid the substantial change in pitch when different air speeds are used?
Your videos are so informative! I've only just found your channel but I love it! I used to play recorder but I stopped aged 11, now I'm 22 and want to start playing seriously again! I just love the recorder so much! Please never stop making videos (as they are absolutely brilliant)! :)
Thanks a lot ! You have brillinantly marvelous amazing showed everything about the spledndid recoreder music instruments ! Keep on ! I am Mirica Mihai Antonio .
I need to go back to this video again. I started to sound nice and was able to play songs and could play the first mode of Doen Daphne and sounded nice. I started practicing a lot more piano and doing my own youtube videos, which is great, so I haven't been practicing recorder enough and I sound horrid again!
Hello Sarah! I’m not sure if you will ever see this, but it’s worth a try! I just purchased the ecordear soprano and alto recorders by Yamaha! I want to advance my playing. I consider myself to be a strong beginner and early intermediate player. What books can help me bring my playing to the next level? I would love to play more advanced music, eventually. I am also a music teacher and classically trainer opera singer! I teach recorder every year to my third and fourth graders. Thanks for your help!
Mohamad Abdallah Choose the instrument that has the type of sound you prefer. I started with the alto first. After playing several months, I then started the soprano. Some recorder makers sell the soprano and alto together at an affordable price. Look for those. And if you can play them first, definitely choose the ones that sound good to you. Then you'll practice more because you like the sound.
Any tips on where to practice?? I live in an apartment and I want to try and learn but I can't bring myself to subject my neighbors to the initial screeching :(
Watch the video about the Top hacks & tips for playing recorder - there is a part of the video that Sarah shows how you can 'muffle' the sound: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-G2944Wc2V_4.html
Blessed day!,Why I can't hit the second octave, it sounds like I am still on a first octave even I have tap the chords for the second octave, it sounds like the recorder itself has a problem🙁, Thank you and God Bless you!😁
Sarah Jeffery Can you please expand on your comment (14:53 in this video when speaking of dead air) about breathing (improper) leading to headaches? Please! MY granddaughter has switched from me teaching her recorder to learning flute (her passion) but now she gets headaches. I told her and my daughter it must be connected to breathing - but I don't think they believe me. I don't want to be an interfereing granny but I do want my graddaughter to love playing (hard to do with a headache!).
Hi Susanne, I listened back to that section, and I meant 'headache' in the figurative sense! I meant that if you take in too much air, it can create an annoying problem, rather than getting an actual headache. When switching from recorder to flute it may take some time to get used to it - a flute is much bigger (if you were playing soprano recorder) and takes more air, plus in the beginning your embouchure may not be so precise, so the player might be losing more air... I went through this too! In the end, practising a little every day will mean that you soon adjust. Any other flute players have tips?
Hi Zegan - this is an inclusive community, where people can use all the emoticons they want. I don't know why using a smiley would mean you're not 'serious' about the recorder.
I played Tuba since the 6th grade, I'm in college now. I started recorder this year. Breathe like you're going to go above in staff Bb. That's what I do to get over dead air.
I have a plastic soprano and a plastic alto recorder. If you were in this situation and had this choice, would you prefer to save your money to buy a wooden soprano or plastic tenor recorder next?
Hello Sarah. I very often watch your fascinating ans so plaisant tutoriels. I am about to buy the two Advanced technique books. Could tout tell me wether they are for both alto ans soprano (exercises, scales...) or mainly for one or the other. Best regards.
thanks for your videos Sarah. Wanted to ask a slightly different question: what is the difference between a flute and a recorder and which one is more suitable to orchestra music?
Hi Sarah, your recorder is great. U mentioned dead air in the video. Do u mean that when playing the recorder, leaking air through the nose is not good?
Hi Phyllis,yes - leaking air through the nose is not good! It means that air is wasted, which is a shame for the breathing technique.. With 'dead air' I could explain it that you breathe in and take in a lot of air (sometimes too much), but don't regulate the breathing out effectively. So of the 100% that you take it, you only breathe out and replensish like 20% of it. So a whole load of air just stays inside and feels 'dead'. That is almost certainly not biologically accurate, but it' the way I find it useful think of it..! So in conclusion, the breathing out is just as important as breathing in :)
Is there a device for keeping sound down on a descant, I live in a flat and do not want to upset neighbours. I'v tried paper mute but found it poor. Any advice Miss Sarah, most welcome.
paper gets wet and distorts. I use plastic from old photography film - or any flat plastic with that thickness - it holds it shape. Cut a strip piece the exact width of the fiipple, bend the last 1/8-1/4 inch into a sharp bend like almost 180 degrees bend back, then just CAREFULLY clip it over the fipple. the more severe the bend the less it will mute - if it is bent about 90 degrees it will mute 100% - just air, and somewhere in between you can barely hear the pitch which useful.
I just bought a soprano recorder to learn another instrument (I'm a guitar and ukulele player) but I'm finding it really difficult. I can memorize the notes and chords but I can never make it sound good. I always cringe away and get headaches
I know it's another purchase, but you could try starting on an alto? It's quite a bit less "shrill", but once you are decent at alto you can transfer all of those skills back to the Soprano! Once you have learned the skills to avoid the headachey squeaking it'll be easier to transition to Soprano with less cringing. The only con with alto is that the holes are farther apart so it's a little harder to begin with if your hands are stiff/small (I found the shrillness of the soprano intimidating, especially since I"m living in an apartment, so I started with the alto - I'm not that good but I've managed to improve the sound a lot (pretty big reduction of overblowing/leaky-finger squeaking issues) in just 3 weeks; while I'm not great, there's far more pretty parts and far less cringey parts than there were less than a month ago which is encouraging!). Although you can memorize the notes, being able to play them is another issue; unlike an instrument like piano, you can't really play any note you want from the beginning because some notes are much harder to play than others - it's really helpful to start with a book that lists the pieces in order of how many notes they require and teaches you one or two notes at a time and learn to get a good sound from those notes AND moving between those notes, before moving to a piece with one more note or more difficult transitions. You can't just use the entire range of notes from the start or it DOES sound terrible and you'll be frustrated; if you play a tune where it's mostly notes you know and only one transition or note that you have trouble with, then MOST of the song will sound good and you just have to work on that one part. Which means less cringing and more enjoyment and a steady progression :) I have one book that begins with left-hand-only (I didn't like this as much, because it has you learning half-thumbhole notes too early; I find the half-thumbhole note FAR harder than the plain right hand notes AND they're more shrill, so IMO it's easier to tackle the second octave after you're comfortable with making nice clear sounds in the first octave?) and another book which begins with both hands but no half-thumbhole notes until it covers the first octave (I'm having better luck with this one). I'd look for a beginner book that says "for adults" or contains some music that you actually enjoy because playing 5-note children's songs is not very satisfying; I bought the suzuki book because while the first half is still full of children's pieces that I'm sick of from my childhood piano lessons, the second half (which is still easy to progress to) has some pretty folk tunes that I haven't heard before and didn't see in the other books available around here, and it has a good skill progression re: note range and difficulty of transitions. (sorry this whole comment is probably uselessly out of date since you posted this a year ago but maybe someone else having a similar problem with soprano can use it... x_x) .
Great video. A lot of helpful tips... Just a quick question: you mentioned about not playing in bursts. When you are playing other instruments such as a piano or violin, there are ways to distinguish between separate / detached notes as opposed to slurred notes. Do you actually make that distinction on a recorder or do you play different notes as if they are "slurred" notes?
Hi, that's a good question! We absolutely do distinguish between notes, not everything is slurred. But it's important to take into account that the air stream and the tongue (articulation) are two separate entities. The air stream is ideally always continuing, and the tongue is turning it on and off, like a tap. In that way, you can always acheieve a nice, supported sound, and shape the notes themselves through the articulation. (As opposed to re-starting to blow for every separate note, which would sound uneven and pushy). And in the end, the range of aticulation on a recorder is incredible - staccatissimo to beautoful legato - as it reacts quickly like no other instrument. Hope that helps!
@@Team_Recorder I seem to keep the air stream moving turning it on and off with tongue, but I suspect that I actually stop the air stream in my throat or someplace else without realizing it. Is there a way I can check or test to find out what I am actually doing? The notes I play always sound too disconnected even when I try using very soft tonguing. Thanks for all your wonderful videos and for your help with this.
to avoid dizziness when doing the breathing exercises you might consider using a blowing bag . one inflates the bag and then re-breath the air inside the bag. one works with a metronome, starting with a four count in and a four count out and gradually work with a one count in and one count out. if you do not want to spend the money for for this idea you might consider using a plastic bread bag connected to a 1/2' diameter pvc pipe. as one lives longer you will find it a necessity to work the lungs daily. I did not discover this idea until I started playing sackbut and started working with Elliot Chasinov, the trombone professor at the University of Illinois. He has had asthma since childhood and needed to search out these solutions from the get-go. thanks again to Sarah for all your helpful ideas
12:22 but if i make this path couldn't i end linking the sound of a note that is a little higher than correct? i thought the notes have to stay exatc in the middle when i use a tuner, for example. so i have to blow the air until it matches the note on the tuner
Hi, I tend to ask my students to get a Mollenhauer dream flute (wooden body, plastic headjoint) as that gives a great sound as is still affordable. To go cheaper but still fine quality, go for a Yamaha plastic one (I hear the 400 series are good but I don't know them yet, I only have the old 300 series). Or the Aura instruments with wooden body and plastic headjoint. Good luck!
I play soprano recorder and have played it for 3 years. I only have a plastic one, if I were to try to improve my sound, would it make sense for me to upgrade to a wooden one to get a mellower tone?
7:35 your finger number 6 is a little forward, i play like this too, is this ok or i must practise with it more rounded like the others? i find it is difficult to make D# with it forward (i'm practising the "look at your wristwatch" turn to uncover one hole from the note.
