Moyse: Tone Development Through Interpretation

Hi everyone,

In today's post I'm going to talk about Moyse's 'Tone Development Through Interpretation' flute book.

This was the first Moyse book that I'd ever purchased and its been part of my flute sheet collection for a number of years, and I know that this book is still a tricky one to try and get hold of. The edition I have is by the publisher McGinnis & Marx, but I think the more recent edition of this book is now published by Peter's Edition.

'Tone Development Through Interpretation' is made up of orchestral excerpts from a range of composers, but they are set out to help you to focus on developing different tonal qualities on your flute.

The book itself is split up into eight different sections, and they are :-

- Register: Low Dynamic: Soft (p, pp)

- Register: Low Dynamic: Loud (f, ff)

- Register: Low Diversified Expression

- Register: High Suppleness (p, pp)

- Register: Low to Middle Suppleness, Delicacy and Colour Variation

- All Three Registers: Fullness of Tone

- All Three Registers: Diversified Expression

- Interpretation of Classical Pieces

What Moyse has done with this book is essentially given you areas for you to work on using orchestral excerpts, but at the same time given you 'free reign' on how to interpret the pieces he has given you. There's very little input from Moyse himself apart from the titles of each of the sections. There is directions and articulation within each of the pieces for you to work on while you are learning the excerpt. 

This also a nice introduction into the world of Orchestral Excerpts, and getting an understanding of what would be required if you ever decide that you would like to work in an orchestra. As it enables you to start familiarising yourself with well known orchestral pieces, but in a smaller format while at the same time developing your personal tonal development. There's also a piano accompaniment part, so then you can always work on these with your teacher or a friend who plays the piano.

This book is aimed at flute players, but other woodwind players can also use this book. You just might have to adjust the range of the pieces to suit your instrument.