Flute Studio

A founding member of the Colorado Flute Association, Dr. Potter has enjoyed teaching for over 25 years. Her students range in age from 7 to 70; she teaches beginners, engineers, boys, cancer survivors, advanced students, moms, other flute teachers, people who are coming back to the flute after years of not playing and, teenagers. A member of the National Flute Association's Teacher's Committee for seven years, she is especially skilled at developing each student's confidence, creative problem solving, finding the right pieces for each student, helping each student find their best tone, and developing performance opportunities suitable to the students personality. Some of her students have performed at National Flute Association Conventions, some at state competitions, some only want to play as part of a community band or flute choir.

She is frequently hired by flute organizations in other states to give worksops on vibrato, air management, intonation, tone development, solving rhythm problems, articulation and becoming a better ensemble player.

Lessons are weekly and last 30, 45, 60 or 90 minutes depending on the student's abilities. Usually a school age beginner (9-12) will have a 30 minute lesson for the first year, then progress to 45 minutes in the second year. Fifth year students usually have the maturity to begin taking hour lessons. Adults generally start with 45 minute lessons and quickly realize they have far too many questions and need a 60 minute lesson.

Students are expected to practice a minimum of the length of their lesson multiplied by three. So someone taking a 30 minute lesson each week would be expected to practice 90 minutes during the week, not including time spent in band or other ensemble.

There are usually three recitals during the course of the year and students are expected to participate. Duos, trios and larger groups are a part of each performance, in addition to solos. Each recital has a theme. Popular ones are Halloween, Irish, Love Songs, and Patriotic Songs. There is also a studio class once a semester where students play works-in-progress for each other. Both the recitals and the studio classes are filmed and turned into DVDs.

Beginning at the first lesson, each student starts collecting pieces that they use for tone development. One third of each lesson is spent on these tone pieces and working with tone quality, phrasing and vibrato.

One third of each lesson is spent on developing technique. Dr. Potter has developed a system of scale and arpeggio exercises that break technique down into attainable goals for the first ten years of playing. This system is based on guidelines developed by the pedagogy committee of the National Flute Association (NFA). This is available in a book titled Technique Standards for Flute; Levels A, B and C.

The final third of each lesson is spent on repertoire. Dr. Potter has a wide knowledge of repertoire and a large personal library. As a member of the NFA's pedagogy committee, she helped compile, evaluate and publish a repertoire guide that covers the first ten years of playing. This guide is used by the international membership of the NFA.