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| Our self-taught hero takes a lesson |
As I progressed higher in the second octave, I decided that I ought to get at least one lesson under my belt to ascertain that I wasn't acquiring any bad habits that would impinge on my development as a flute player, so I called a friend who's an accomplished flute player (neither the one who lent me my flute nor the one who found the wood in the headjoint). She tells me that she's not comfortable with the idea of giving me a lesson and suggests that I call another friend who I know as a sax player who apparently also occasionally teaches flute.
I call him, and he suggests that I call the first friend. I tell him that she said that I should call him.
We schedule a lesson and he offers some suggestions with the caveat that he's really a sax player and not so much a flute player (not to mention that his flute isn't even playable anymore). He gives me some suggestions on some useful exercises to help develop my embrouchure and reassures me that my technique is largely sound (with some small exceptions, easily corrected). I get home and try them. One thing that he points out that I should have connected with is that the overtone series continues beyond the initial octave (something that I know fairly well from low brass days) and I realize that the fingering for D3 suddenly makes sense since it's based on the next overtone up from the octave using G as a bass. (The next overtone, where the vibration is divided into thirds is an octave and a fifth. After that, we reach two octaves, followed by two octaves and a major third, but I suspect that these higher overtones play a much lower role in the woodwinds than in the brass where overtones continue into increasingly smaller steps where they eventually become chromatics).
I discover on getting home that while I still can't play a clean C3, I can get a lovely D3 and D#3.