My thought here, Jose Luis, is that your pad might not be STICKING but rather moisture has built up at the tone hole and the pad, so that when the key comes up the water blocks the tonehole, and you get the wrong note.

I'll notice this problem when I quit getting, say, a C# after a C by lifting the LH 1st finger. (Or if a trill using a trill key doesn't actually trill the note.) When you look at the key, and move it up and down, you can see the water under the pad and in the tonehole.

This happens on flute or piccolo, to me, when I have been playing for a long while (usually 45 minutes or more) without swabbing moisture out of the instrument. It is more common when the room is cool or cold, such that moisture from warm breath condenses inside the instrument faster. It also happens more to the top, smallest toneholes such as LH ring finger, and the trill keys. (I don't think I've ever had it happen with any other toneholes on the flute).

Cigarette paper would absorb this moisture and clear the problem.

Swabbing the moisture out of the flute at the end of your warm-up, right before your performance, should be completely adequate if this is indeed the problem.

It could also be that there is a small tear in the pad membrane, so that the pad is retaining condensed moisture. This would necessitate a new pad, though frequent swabbing and cigarette-paper 'mopping' might get you through your performance.

Good luck!

Not going to take any sides here,but i always have a cup of coffee hanging around when i'm playing the flute, ( british and i don't like tea,,lol), which has 3 teaspoons of sugar in it, (very sweet tooth or maybe i need it to be such a sweet person??), but i've never had a problem with a sticky pad, so as to eating and drinking whilst playing the flute,,i'm not quite sure. Maybe its because flutes can cost so much,and maybe because we look at them at such a delicate instrument that we treat them with such care??? which they deserve of course,,i don't know..

My 2 pence worth(cents), but then i'm a oldie newbie flute player.....oh yes,,i've still got all my teeth,,despite all the sugar.lol.


Kara, Micron,,don't fall out,,over the past year or so,,reading all your posts has been enlightling,,it would be such a shame to see people such as youselfs stop posting...

Thanks everybody for your extensive and complete explanations.

I am genuinely interested in all of them, even when they could disagree or just be different.

I strongly believe that the essence of a Forum is the discussion of different opinions and so I welcome all of them. But a ground rule of Forums (an many other activities in life), is to deal with disagreement in polite and friendly manners. I encourage everybody to make all possible efforts in this direction.

It is clear that the possible effects on the instrument of sugar intake (be it liquids or food) is a subject of important disagreement.

I would add, in an attempt of conciliation, that it may well depend on the physiology of the person. In other words, for a particular player it could have little or no effect, while for others it could mean sure problems with the pads.

I think that I make part of this second group and to be on the safe side, I am not taking anything (with the exception of water if needed), less than an hour before any practice.

Well, I had my audition a few hours ago and it was OK. We played the Adagio of the JS Bach Sonata 1034 in Em.

It could have been better as it sounded better in previous rehearsals, but the room conditions where dramatically different compared top our normal classroom. The place was crowded, the air so dense and humid that I am surprised I could finish without falling to ground (OK, I am exaggerating a little...). The main problem was that the room sounded completely dead and we had not rehearsed there before. So I was surprised and had lots of difficulties with dynamics and understanding what was going on.

Anyway, fellow students that listened said that it sounded good, so I am happy because this piece was a challenge, at the upper border of my present level. Playing it as a duet was an increased difficulty, in a way, but also made the performance a little more tolerant to my errors, that were not too many and basically minor ones. Or so I hope...

As it had to be, the key got stuck today, but fortunately before the audition, during the warmup/rehearsal. I used the cigarette paper as I had planned and it was OK for the audition.

In this opportunity I could "feel" the key rising too slowly, I cannot say whether I heard a noise or, much probably, the flute vibrated slightly when the key started moving or reached the open position. Whatever the sign was, I could "feel" it clearly. One problem is that I cannot reproduce the problem at will, it just happens when i Numi of music so decide.

Now that this is over, I will try some of the suggestions you gave in previous posts in this thread. Will post if I find anything interesting.