LFP 006 | How to Avoid a Brown Tarnished Flute

Hey, it’s Rebecca here on the Learn Flute Podcast- Episode 6.

Medium Intro – start with the radio dial

Well Hi, and welcome, welcome back for this new episode here on the Learn Flute Podcast where I, Rebecca Fuller am the expert at all things flute, and I’m rooting for you!

This free podcast resource is brought to you by the good Gold Level members over on the Learn Flute Online dot com website where they are busy engaging and learning from my awesome and very large collection of video lesson tutorials.

Now, speaking of those awesome flute students I thought it would be fun today to start out with a little testimonial from a sweet lady named Sara.

Sara posted this in the forum comment section in one of the modules there. I forgot to write down which number this is in, – there are over 82 modules in the Gold Level alone so I’d have to do some digging to find out exactly.  But anyway, she says,

“Hi Rebecca, I am going great and smoothly on these modules. Your style is absolutely amazing, and I just love my flute even more thanks to you. I am soooooo happy that I found your website. Thank you for being an amazing teacher.”

Well, thank – YOU Sara for being such a great online student of mine. I wish you well and tons of success in your practicing this week! I’ll be watching for you again in a future module.

Now, I just realized that I keep using the word “module” here, and I don’t think I’ve even explained what that means. So, I’ll do that real quickly here now.

I have worked really hard on a perfect system of organization and learning so you fine people who are interested in learning how to play the flute can come and participate easily. I set everything up in order for your success.

I have the lessons set up in “modules” which include several video lesson tutorials where I personally walk you right through the skill that’s being taught. I also make it easy for you to click and download the sheet music, progress notes, and mp3 accompaniments that go along with that module. It’s all set in a nice, neat little package for you. Everyone learns when they come to Learn Flute Online!

I chose the subject of today’s podcast because I’m always surprised at how many people don’t follow this little rule.

Let me explain by telling you a little story.

Last year I had the absolute pleasure of visiting another country where I was touring around, having a ton of fun. This is one of the most gorgeous countries in the world. And while I was there I was able to hang out with some of my online students — you hear that? 

This flute teacher likes to travel, and will take her students up on their invitations to visit. Well, anyway one day we had been out walking along the canals and checking out the quaint and absolutely amazing sights and scenery when we ended up in a Tulip field. Ok, by now you’ve probably guessed I was in Holland.

And, while we were in this Tulip Field we met a nice lady who invited us back to her place – okay, it’s not creepy or anything. She was an acquaintance of some of the people I was with. So, we went into her cottage and my eye was immediately drawn to the piano where I spotted a flute sitting on top of it.

I couldn’t help myself, so I walked over to it to check it out.

Well, I kind of stared in horror for a second, and then I had to recover myself because I felt rude. The reason is because this flute was completely ‘brown’. Like the color of a brown crayon. Now, this flute was not originally the color brown like some of the new fun flutes you can see junior high students using – they have purple and pink flutes. But, this flute was brown from being left on the piano top for years and years (I was guessing).

The interesting thing then was that the owners of the place saw my interest in the flute and started talking about it. They mentioned how it was a sweet gift and how the wife was so excited to learn how to play it someday.

Someday seemed to be the key word, because that flute looked like it had been waiting a long time!

They asked me if I played, and when I said “yes” they wanted a concert. I tried to decline (seeing the condition of the flute), but out of curiosity I decided to pick it up and see what it could do.

I tried one note first, a B. It worked, .. a little fuzzy on the tone, but it did work. So I went for another note, and another. Well, it kind of sort of played. So, I went for a fancy tune to show off a little. Well, to say the least it didn’t really turn out so well because the mechanism was all gummed up from months and years of dust settling on it. So, some of the keys were sticking down when they should have popped up, and others were moving slowly like they had hydraulic hinges on them.

Anyway, to make this long story a little shorter for you. I think you can see my point here today. Flutes are not like other inanimate objects. They have feelings..  ok probably not really. But maybe because they definitely must have proper care or they shrivel and die.

The brown color of this flute I saw was because of something called Tarnish. If you have ever checked out your grandmother or great grandmother’s silver collection, you’ll know that these pieces must be polished and kept in a carefully guarded case or the pretty shiny-ness gets covered over by icky, dull, brownish tarnish.

I actually snapped a picture of this flute before I left their house. If you’ve been on my email list and in the lesson series very long you may have seen this exact picture.

I was so sad.. because with just a tiny bit of knowledge and a few seconds of care, this flute could still have as much potential it had as the very first day they received it.

So, here are some flute ‘rules’ for you all in flute-learner-listening land:

Number one: you must swab out the inside of your flute after playing it. It’s just as simple as that. These flutes get moisture in them from our breath as we play, and if the flute is put away with the moisture still in it, then the pads will poof up and eventually crack and start to leak.

And, we can get into more details in a future episode for which cloths are the best and all that.

Number two: you must wipe your fingerprints off of the flute before putting it away. Our skin has a lot more oil in it than you think. This oil and acid on our skin will change the composition of the silver and cause it to grow tarnish.

And, again we can talk more about all of that later too.

Ok, and the last thing you need to do with your flute is to actually put it away in it’s case every single day.

Now, take my advice on this. You may not notice a difference in your flute color or playing ability right away from leaving it out, but it will definitely eventually happen. It creeps up and creeps into your flute mechanism causing the person playing it to have a much harder time getting it to sound good.

Now, I don’t think we all are going to a lot of trouble to learn and practice just so that we can give our flutes some abuse by not cleaning and putting it away now should we?

I didn’t think so.

If you can love your flute, chances are it will love you back!

Well, that’s a wrap today for another great episode here on the Learn Flute Podcast. I hope you’ve enjoyed the information given here. You can show me this by giving me a nice rating in Itunes or wherever you are listening, and also don’t forget to come over to the website at Learn Flute Online dot com where you can join in on the conversation in the forum comment sections of each podcast episode.

Remember that it’s really easy to find them.

If you’ve just landed yourself on the homepage at Learn Flute Online dot com, then you just need to click on the Bonus Content Page in the top menu bar where you’ll see all the different categories I have there. One of them being this Podcast. You can see a line up of different episodes that have already been released and click in to read along, listen again, or leave a comment or question.

I’ve also made it really easy to get right to these episodes by typing in the address of each one in your browser window. For example you could type in the URL learn flute online dot com forward slash and the episode number. Now, I already knew I was going to be making a lot of these so I started the numbers with two zeros at the beginning like; 001, 002, etc. This particular episode is Episode 006. So you can find it at learnfluteonline.com/006.

I can’t wait to see you there.
Bye now!