I have a question for all the experienced oboists/oboe teachers here!

Is oboe vibrato something you have to consciously learn, or is it something that develops spontaneously? I'm not talking about the sort of vibrato that you might consciously employ to colour a musical phrase (such as I'd use when playing my violin), but rather something that produces a lovely sound when playing in general. It's difficult to describe, but my oboe teacher sounds fantastic, and even when she is just playing a single note, it has this lovely swelling sonourous sound that sounds like very slow vibrato.

Anyway, something appears to be happening to my sound - it's like it's started to develop into that sort of sound, it's not just a plain tone anymore, and I can actually feel it being produced as a sort of very slight, slow pulsing feeling in my upper chest and throat. Could this be vibrato developing naturally, and is it something desirable, or am I simply doing something wrong and this is a bad habit that I should try to stop happening?

I've read all sorts of things on the web, and there are instructions about learning to do vibrato by bumping your diaphragm in time to a metronome and things like that, but there are also articles which say that oboe vibrato can develop naturally as it does for singers. I can't sing so have no idea if this is right!

Thanks for your thoughts!

T xx

I had to "learn" vibrato and I think it arose from wanting to do it. I started with long notes in the middle octave range - D to A, took very deep breaths then pulsed it from my diaphragm in regular beats (groups of four beats at semiquaver rate), sustaining the note for multiples of these groups. Then I did it in triples. Imagining the vibrato seemed important. That's how I varied the speed/depth.

My teacher said that vibrato has to come from the diaphragm, never the jaw or throat. I'm not sure why never the throat but that may be because the flow is controlled by the diaphragm and the throat might constrict it.

It is probably worth referring back to your teacher in case she also disapproves of using the throat and upper chest to do vibrato/control the airflow.

Kai

Thanks for your advice! The thing is, it's happening involuntarily, have you any idea what I could be doing wrong? Could it be because I've been practising a ###### of a lot recently, and my throat etc is tired?

'wrong'? it's definately not 'wrong' to be naturally improving your playing without any concious effort! probably when you get the knack of it more you'll refine it down to your teacher's skill. likey it'll sort itself out naturally anyway, but maybe for a few practice sessions try to replicate the effect with lots of diaphragm accents, and your playing may naturally take to producing vibrato that way...

I'd be inclined to say, at least speak to your teacher before you start trying to suppress something that might be *good*!