Making a beautiful diminuendo on the flute is one of the hardest things to do. The pitch tends to go flat, and when it does, it’s easy to compromise by squeezing the lips. And while that may save the pitch, it impacts your tone quality.

But, the good news is that it’s possible to make your diminuendos effortless and in tune.

In this blog post, I’m sharing the exact method I use to create diminuendos that float off the flute and into thin air.

You’ll learn:

1. The 3 main components of the air stream.
   • Angle of air
   • Air speed
   • Volume of air
2. How to make a diminuendo
   • How air works in a diminuendo
   • How to avoid going flat
   • The mechanics of making a diminuendo – what to do with your embouchure and air stream

⬇️⬇️⬇️ If you’re tired of the same ‘ol long tone routine and want to try something new to practice your diminuendos on, download your free Expressive Long Tones for Flutes book. ⬇️⬇️⬇️

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1| The Three Main Components of Air and Breath Control

Before understanding how to make a diminuendo, or taper, on the flute, it’s important to understand the three main elements used for breath control. They impact pitch and the quality of sound on the flute.

1. Angle of air
2. Air speed
3. Volume of air

Angle of Air

Changing the angle of air affects pitch and register. 

William Bennett (Wibb) often referred to changing the angle of air as covering and uncovering. 

Uncovering the embouchure hold raised the air stream, and covering the embouchure hole lowered the air stream.

You can change the angle of air by using your lips and allowing the jaw to follow.

When the upper lip is over the lower lip, the air will enter the flute at a steeper angle. When the lower lip is over the upper lip, the air will enter the flute at a shallower angle.

You can experiment with this by holding your hand—fingers together—out in front of you about 8 inches with the bottom of your hand even with your nose. Make sure your wrist and hand are straight.

Then, practice blowing with your flute embouchure up and down your hand and arm, from fingertips to elbow. Only use your lips to change the angle of the air and not your head.

You’ll feel the movement of your lips as one slides over the other. Allow your jaw to follow freely without tension.

If you have long hair, you can also put your hair in front of your face and practice blowing your hair out of your eyes by blowing up.

Having this type of flexibility in your airstream is necessary to make a proper diminuendo.

Air Speed

In its simplest form, air speed is how fast or slow the air is moving when it exists your mouth.

Higher notes (and thereby higher pitches) require a faster air speed. Lower notes (and lower pitches) require a slower air speed.

Many people are taught to close the lips to increase the air speed. And if you were taught this, it’s okay.

However, when you use your lips to increase air speed so you can either sharpen the pitch or play in a higher register, you lose flexibility. 

Try squeezing your lips to create a smaller aperture and do the exercise from above. When your lips are tight, it’s more difficult for them to move.

So, instead of creating more air speed from the lips, I like to use the largest muscles first.

It’s like when we lift something heavy. We need to lift with the legs, not the arms. The same principle applies to flute playing.

And in this case, the largest muscles for changing air speed are the lower abdominal muscles.

Using your lower abdominal muscles allows you to alter the air speed by changing the breath pressure. When your your lower abdominal muscles exert pressure on your diaphragm, your diaphragm pushes air out at a faster rate. (See this post on vibrato to learn more about how the breathing mechanism works.)

You can also increase the air speed by bringing the lips forward. This creates a smaller aperture, which creates a faster airstream. However, most of the faster air should come from the abdominal support muscles with a small amount from bringing the lips forward.

Volume of Air

Volume of air is the amount of air that goes into the flute. 

Louder dynamics require more volume than soft dynamics.

You can use your aperture size and the angle of air to control how much air goes into the flute.

A larger aperture, while angling the air down, sends more air to go into the flute.  A smaller aperture (by bringing the lips forward) and aiming the air up means less air goes into the flute. 

It’s important to note that the volume of air going into the flute can be different than the volume of air you expel—because the angle of air affects how much of your exhaled air goes into the instrument.

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2| How to Make a Diminuendo

Now that you understand how air speed, air pressure, and the angle of air work together. Let’s discuss how to make a diminuendo.

How air works in a diminuendo

Many thoughts exist on how to use air in a diminuendo. Some people say you use less air, but what I think happens is less air goes into the flute than out of your mouth because of the angle of air and aperture.
William Bennett (Wibb) said that you need to maintain the same airspeed out of your body. So instead of 80% of your air going into the flute, like when playing forte, only 20% goes into the flute when playing piano.

Not going flat

To prevent the pitch from falling, you need to maintain the airspeed. Like a plane, your sound will fall in register and pitch if the airspeed isn’t maintained. 

But because making a diminuendo requires gradually less air going into the flute, you also need to create a smaller aperture by bringing your lips forward. This does two things:

1. It keeps the same tone quality. Less air requires a smaller aperture and vice-versa.
2. It increases airspeed because airspeed increases when it goes from a large chamber (your mouth) through a constricted pipe (your lips).

Mechanics of making a diminuendo

To make a diminuendo, you need to raise the airstream while bringing the lips forward. This also prevents the pitch from going flat. To raise the airstream, don’t move your head. Instead, use your lips to make the adjustment.

Manipulating the air stream

You can raise the airstream—and consequently the pitch— by bringing your lower lip forward of your upper lip. Doing the opposite—upper lip over lower lip—lowers the airstream.

Revisit the air direction exercise from above to feel how your lips can alter the air direction.

Aperture Size

When making a diminuendo on the flute, it’s important to remember not to squeeze the lips to create a smaller aperture. When you compress and tighten the lips, you compromise the sound quality.

Instead, you need to bring your lips forward. This automatically creates a smaller aperture without the need to squeeze. It also creates a round aperture, which creates a round sound. And we need that! A diminuendo is hard enough. Let’s not compromise sound quality.

“Ah”-“oo”

A helpful way of thinking about a diminuendo is to go from an “ah” vowel shape to an “oo” vowel shape. “Ah” for the beginning, and “oo” for the end. You’ll find that your embouchure naturally makes the necessary adjustments.

Lifting the Air Off the flute

When making a diminuendo to niente, one of the most challenging embouchure maneuvers happens at the very end.

To lift the air off of the flute, continue bringing your lips forward and raising the air stream until you hear the air lift off the flute, then let go of the air.

Once I hear the air lift off the flute, I like to continue aiming the air higher to ensure that a whistle tone or airy sound doesn’t come out.

If you hear excess noise in your diminuendo at the point of air liftoff, try lifting the air faster and/or stopping the air. This part of the process takes a later of practice to master, but when you do, the payoff is huge.

You may find it helpful to think of the “wasabi point,” as Emmanuel Pahud calls it. At the same time he makes embouchure adjustments, he’s also thinking of sending the air at the point between your nose and eyes that burns when you eat too much wasabi. From a technical perspective, you’re thinking about sending the air up and into the nasal pharynx instead of letting it settle in the chest.

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Additional Tips for Practicing a Diminuendo on the Flute

1. A diminuendo takes time to learn. Avoid rushing the process.
2. Marcel Moyse’s De la sonorité is a great place to start working on diminuendos.
3. Practice with a tuner
4. Practice slowly
5. Left-hand notes (G-C) tend to be easier to manipulate pitch. I recommend starting with B in the staff as it is quite flexible.

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From the angle of air to airspeed, there are a lot of things that have to work in perfect coordination to make a diminuendo on the flute.

To make a diminuendo on the flute without going flat, you need to:

• Gradually raise the air stream
• Gradually bring the lips forward (creates a smaller aperture and helps maintain airspeed)

Both of those things prevent less air from going into the flute while also maintaining a steady pitch.

If you found this post helpful, please let me know by commenting below.

Now that you know how to make a beautiful diminuendo, don’t let your posture compromise your playing. I’ve got this post queued up to help you with that.

⬇️⬇️⬇️ Don’t forget to grab your free Expressive Long Tones for Flutes book. ⬇️⬇️⬇️