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Interview with Jan Gippo, Part II

© Karen Stafford

Last week in my article about Jan Gippo, I covered how he got his start as a professional piccolo player. This week's article includes some of the basics behind his pedagogy and his ideas for better piccolo performance.

In teaching students the basics of piccolo playing, Gippo says it should be taken for granted that the student has studied flute for a while and understands the differences between the piccolo and flute, besides the size, of course. The piccolo is conical in shape, with a cylindrical head, about one-third the size of a flute. The flute is exactly the opposite in shape. Because of this, using some flute fingerings for piccolo causes intonation problems. From his research and experimentation, Gippo came up with a fingering chart of over 45 different fingerings for the piccolo. At least three started out being considered alternate fingerings, but he discovered soon that they should really be primary fingerings, especially for C, C#, and D.

Another playing difference between flute and piccolo is in the breathing. The usual flute breathing - deep breathing with quick releases - doesn't really work with piccolo, because of the resistance. An air reservoir needs to be established and added to. The diaphragm needs to be held out and taut while refilling. The pressure used in breathing should be in the abdominal area and not in the embouchure itself. According to Gippo, this is much better for high register playing and for tone color in general. The sound is better and more sophisticated.

When Gippo works in masterclasses, the problem he notices mostly about the performers is that they have not studied piccolo in a masterful way. Much of this stems from the fact that many flute teachers are not aware themselves of the differences between flute or piccolo, or if they are, they don't know how to remedy the problems these differences can cause.

Gippo's advice to aspiring performers? Get a professional instrument. He likened this to buying sports equipment. If you go with the cheapest sports equipment, you may not get the job done and do damage in the process. The best for performance is a wooden, conical shape piccolo. This includes the wooden headjoint as opposed to silver. He also suggests learning to perform the piccolo as a solo instrument rather than the "icing" on many band or orchestra pieces. Chances are, a student will concentrate more specifically on improving the sound for solos than for an ensemble.

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