Scales in Octaves: What it Can Teach You (+ Free Printable!)

I recently came up with this exercise as a way to work on several different aspects of tone at once, without having to go through the hassle of playing long tones.

No offense, Moyse, but De La Sonorite doesn’t do it for me on a daily basis anymore (and never really did, to be honest).

The point of this exercise is to play my major scales in octaves, and focus on one element up to four different elements regarding tone production. The elements are as follows:

Tone Quality
Like any good tone exercise, you should of course focus on your tone quality. A good tone is homogenous and beautiful throughout all registers; the color should never change in the middle of any register unless you are intending for it to change. I generally go for a dark tone color (I think of it as a “black” tone) when I first begin to warm up, for a tone that will serve all forms of music well. I then trade that out for a light tone color (“gray” tone) that helps bring out the characters within French and more contemporary music.

In this exercise, you can practice good tone in these ways:

1. Play through the first key (C major) with a dark tone color, then repeat with a light tone color.
2. Play with a dark tone color ascending the scale, and light tone color descending, or vice versa.
3. Use this as an exercise in balancing your registers: play the low octave louder and consciously play the higher octave softer. Record yourself as you do this; no one note should stick out like a sore thumb.

Airflow
I’m a stickler for smoothness in my sound; the one thing that sticks out most to me in recordings (besides intonation) is hearing “bumps” in my sound. To eliminate “bumps,” your air must be continuously moving as you change notes and registers, even as your embouchure moves to compensate. As you ascend in register, the tendency is to blow faster; as you descend in register, your tendency should be to blow ever-so-slightly slower, or to just relax, as I think of it. Now, if you’re blowing too slowly, that will affect the pitch and the overall tone quality. You just need to relax enough that the lower octave comes out smoothly and effortlessly.

Vibrato
Vibrato is a tricky thing to discuss, because everyone seems to have an opinion on what constitutes a good vibrato. For me, a good vibrato is a vibrato that is integrated into your sound and does not function independent of the sound. If you’re thinking of vibrato in terms of the depth, my vibrato is generally not too deep or narrow unless the music calls for it.

Here’s how you can practice vibrato with this exercise:

1. Metered pulses: you can practice your vibrato with whatever pulses-per-note are comfortable. For me, it’s usually 5 pulses if I’m thinking about it.
2. Play with special attention to when the vibrato starts as you articulate. Hint: it should start right away unless you’re intentionally delaying it to fit within whatever music you’re playing.
3. How I practice vibrato: presence of vibrato should be independent of the change of note. You can practice with metered pulses, but then gradually pull away from it by keeping a constant pulse of vibrato and moving your fingers independently of it. It’s incredibly difficult for me, but a great challenge nonetheless.

Intonation
Believe it or not, your ears are likely better than you think they are. My flute professor at UNL, John Bailey, had a habit of making us start our etudes, then stop them and start them again by playing the scale of whatever key we were in and the tonic/dominant arpeggios. From there, we noticed an immediate difference in our intonation: it was much better because we were orienting ourselves in whatever key we were in.

This exercise is GREAT for intonation! Here’s how you can improve it:

1. Use a tuner (of course) on the needle or the drone setting, whichever you prefer.
2. If you have a tuner app that allows you to turn on multiple drones to make a chord (I recommend Tunable, and I am not being paid to say that), use that along with the chords of your major scale! For example, you can turn on C major, F major, and A minor and play your C’s with those chords. Take notice of how your notes have to fit within each chord and what their functions really are. They all function differently, given the context.
3. While using your tuner, turn yourself away from it and test your ear on your octaves. Then turn back to the tuner and see if you’re right!

Tips for this scale sheet:

1. The exercise is written out for C major, but then two measures per key are written out for you. The reason for this is that it allows you to transpose what is written out into all 12 major keys, and because I can’t afford Finale and Finale Notepad is limited.
2. Articulations are listed in the text box below the exercise, but experiment and add in others! There are no wrong answers.
3. Add in harmonics on the final whole notes of each scale, for extra practice in flexibility.

Download and print my Major Scales in Octaves and let me know how it works for you!

Major Scales in Octaves
File Size:	441 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

---