How to fix slow and fluffy flute tonguing

If you've ever wondered why your tonguing on the flute is slow or fluffy-sounding, I've made you this detailed video about what's ACTUALLY going on!!

I show you how embouchure affects your tonguing, but also 3 other things you might be mistakenly doing that makes your tongue heavy and slow.

In other words: You betcha, we can get your tonguing lighter and quicker!

Jane xx

How to fix slow and fluffy flute tonguing

Happy new year. If you're watching this in January. And if you are not watching this in January happy, whenever.  I'm gonna show you in this video, the causes of slow and unclear tonguing on the flute. So if your tonguing sounds a bit sluggish, I'm going to explain why.

Three reasons why tonguing is slow on flute 

The cause can be your actual tongue and there are off clues from the way your embouchure looks from the outside that can tell you what your tongue's doing on the inside incorrectly and we can fix that. But there are actually 3 other reasons that your tonguing on the flute can be slow and unclear, which I will tell you in a sec.

Flute School

My name is Jane Cavanagh and I started my flute school online because I love showing people the small changes that you can make to your playing that make a big difference. Understanding these small little changes, make the world of difference to how good you sound.

Use tip of the tongue 

So firstly, your actual tongue can be the reason that your tonguing sounds sluggish, slow, unclear, fluffy, which makes sense, right? That's probably what you thought it was going to be, but you might not know all the details.

So firstly, when you tongue, it should be the tip of your tongue. The very tip of your tongue, touching up behind your top teeth, near the ridge. So if you feel with your finger or tongue there’s like a ridge behind your top teeth, the tip of your tongue should be touching near that ridge near the back of your top teeth.

Flute tonguing

There’s  really, really easy way to get this position right and it's to say this: TTT or ta- ta-ta feel where the tip of your tongue is touching. That's a perfect little, what's it called? Alliteration. The tip of your tongue is touching TTT exactly where it needs to touch when you play the flute.

So if you're using the wrong part of your tongue, instead of the tip you're using, for example, the flat part of your tongue, your tonguing’s not gonna be very clear and it will sound like this. I'm going to use ta- ta-ta like that.

No curled tongue for flute

Tatata is not as clear as ta- ta-ta. You can have the wrong shaped tongue. For example, at it can be curled like this when you're tonguing. And the clue for that is that when you look at yourself in the mirror, your embouchure is going to be round like that, too round. That's how you can see that someone has a curled tongue.

If someone has a really round embouchure, I'm like, Hmm, their tongue's doing something a bit weird. So you can see without actually having x-ray vision into your mouth, which is quite handy.

Another wrong shape of your tongue is when it's curled back like ta- ta-ta. And it sounds, you might think that sounds clear, but as soon as you start going fast in your tonguing, it's gonna become very difficult. Also up high - that's not going to work.

And the reason for that is if you have room in your mouth to curl your tongue back, it means that your embouchure is too open. The hole is too big and you're losing air. That's why high notes won't work cause you'll run out of air cause the hole is too big.

Fix tongue movement for flute playing

And the last way your actual tongue can make your tongue unclear is if you're doing the wrong movement with your tongue. So the best way to work out, if you're doing the wrong movement is to take your tonguing that you do on the flute, but take the flute away and say it, and if you end up saying something like this - or, and there's a bit of a whistle in there if you can't hear it. Then you know you've got the wrong tongue position.

No whistle sounds on the flute

 So if we go -  on the flute, you'll actually hear that. And there's a really big delay. If you are whistly, you'll start to hear the whistle and you guessed it, your embouchure is gonna be too round as well losing too much air. And obviously, your sound is not going to be very clear because your embouchure is not right.

Did you notice the common thread through all of those things that I said just then if you have a good shaped embouchure, it means that your tongue is more likely to be doing the right thing and a good shaped embouchure will obviously get you a really good sound as well.

Airspeed on the flute

The 3 other things that affect your tonguing clarity, airspeed, syncing - I'll tell you in a sec about that and tension. Okay, let's go through these 3 things. Airspeed. Too slow speed of air is going to make your tongue have to work really hard because it feels heavy and sluggish and it will be unclear and slow. Two ways that your airspeed can be too slow. One is if the hole in your mouth is too big and it means that too much air is coming out, the air is moving too slowly. And like as said, your tongue has to work and ends up being really heavy and slow and sluggish. So that's one thing, the hole in your mouth is too big.

Correct embouchure on the flute

The other thing is if you've got your embouchure right, the hole is small enough. You're getting a really good sound. You're still finding that your tonguing is not clear and slow. It can be because you're slowing the air down between notes. Okay. I've got a really good example on this one. If I say a sentence like this, I have consistent air when I'm speaking. But if I say a sentence like this, you'll hear that between the words, there's a drop off in the speed of the air.

If you do the same thing, when you're playing the flute, you're going to have a not very smooth effect when you play, but it's going to affect your tonguing too. So let's do the one where my air continues through, which is good. And now let's do that if I slow down the air between each note. It kind of sounds like it's my tonguing that's the trouble, but it's not the tonguing. It's the air.

Fingers and tongue in sync for flute playing

The next thing that can make your tongue sound unclear and slow is when your tongue and your fingers are out of sync. So the trouble there is not that your tonguing is too slow. It's that your fingers are uneven or your tongue is uneven and then put them together and it sounds totally outta whack. It's a really easy fix because you either just need to take away your tonguing and do it slurred or take away the fingers and do it tongued like this.  Get those two even, and you'll end up with - and it's much more in sync.

Tension when playing the flute

And the last thing that can really affect the speed of your tongue is tension. It. If you have a tight tongue, it's obviously gonna work really hard and has trouble moving lightly and quickly. But it's never your tongue that is the problem. You are never gonna have an isolated tight tongue. It's just not possible. The tension is always coming from somewhere else. Like you are never going to have an isolated say tight ring finger. It's never just gonna be one finger.

The tension's always gonna be coming from somewhere else. Just like your hand, your arm, your shoulder, something It's the same with the tongue. The tension's gonna be coming from somewhere else. For example, your face, your neck, your shoulders, your jaw, it's all interconnected and the tongue can suffer by being too tight and not being able to move too freely.

One of the clues of this is if you see the tension in other parts of your body, like if you have a really tight embouchure like this. It's very difficult to have a really tight embouchure and a beautifully relaxed tongue that can move freely. There's going to be a flow-on effect. The good news about that is that is easy to fix as well. You work out where it's tight, you start relaxing that and it flows through to other parts of your body like your tongue and freezes it up to move more quickly.

The Flute Academy

So there you go. You just learn 4 different reasons and lots of examples of each one about why your tongue can move slowly or be unclear. If you like what you saw in this video and you want to learn more, then you might be interested in joining The Flute Academy. This is a paid program and you can find out at www.flute.school/academy more about this program, what you'll learn and if it's right for you. Good luck with your flute playing