A complete guide to breath control on the recorder, taught by international virtuoso Piers Adams. Over 4 hours of clear and easy-to-follow video instruction to help you gain mastery over this most fundamental aspect of your playing, allowing you to perform with confidence, reliability and previously unimagined expression!
There’s a common misconception of the recorder – that it’s pretty easy to play, and doesn’t really require the same level of breath control as other, seemingly more advanced wind instruments. Certainly it’s true that it’s one of the easiest instruments to get a note out of – which is one reason it has been so popular with children learning music – but in fact the recorder requires, if anything, more control, more subtlety, more nuance than other instruments if we’re going to bring out its true expressive voice. This is the true challenge, and the true joy of playing the recorder!
In this course I will walk you step-by-step along the road to mastering your breath control, so that you can coax the instrument into far greater expressivity than you might have thought possible! Proper breath control is also an essential tool for overcoming performing nerves, and can have the perk of improving your general health and wellbeing.
For little more than the cost of a single private lesson with me you can watch the 4 hours of video tuition over and over again, at your own pace, to allow these concepts to seep deeply into your practice and performing. All course subscribers will also have access to the Enlightened Recorder Player community on this site, in which you can ask me questions, post videos of your performances and progress, and chat to other course members.
I look forward to welcoming you on this journey!
I designed this course to be an essential resource for everyone who is serious about their recorder playing, whether you are an amateur, student, teacher or even professional player. Although the course is focussed purely on breath control, and therefore does not require you to have great dexterity in other aspects of your playing, it is likely to be of most benefit for those who have already reached, at least, a high intermediate standard of playing (Grade 6+ in the UK), and who are able and willing to look at this important subject in the detail it deserves. The rewards will be well worth the effort!
A note to advanced players, teachers and professionals: although many of the concepts presented here may be very familiar to you, you may find my particular approach contains useful nuggets of information, or different ways of approaching time-worn topics, which you can incorporate into your playing or pass on to your pupils. In my own learning journey, I sometimes would gain just one or two seemingly insignificant new ideas from a whole, expensive course of lessons... and yet these tiny jewels would enable me to make giant leaps forward in my playing! I hope that you may gain similar insights from within this course.
I teach the course on an alto recorder at A440 pitch.
What you will be learning...
These are the 24 video modules which make up the most complete, in-depth, and yet deceptively simple guide to breath control which you will find anywhere in the world! Good breath technique is like riding a bicycle or learning to swim - once you have it, you have it for life. These are the very techniques which revolutionised my own playing - and I'm confident that they will do the same for you!
Piers Adams is widely recognised as one of the greatest living recorder players, with an international performing and recording career spanning some 40 years. As founder and director of the trailblazing baroque quartet Red Priest, he is particularly known for his bold, virtuoso playing style, but his true love is in coaxing the recorder into its full expressive potential, through use of a wide range of techniques gained from a lifetime of study of the instrument. Piers delights in passing these insights on to serious students of all levels, in the hope that everyone can enjoy the true beauty of the recorder!