My leeward telltales are streaming straight back. my lower windward is matching them. my upper windward is stall/fluttering. what am I doing wrong?

sheet in more. Assuming this is light air. In heavy air both windward telltales will flutter some.
Also, after market sails, i.e., Calvert or North will allow both sides to stream as you are suggesting, but the Wave sail seems to sail better with the sheet eased a bit.
Rick

I always think of it as: whichever tale is fluttering, the mast is blocking the wind on that side. So you would need to sheet in or fall off a bit to get the mast out of the way of the wind.

If the lower tale is streaming, but the top is fluttering, the head of the sail must be twisting off a bit; kind of the nature of boomless sails with no vang or traveler to pull it down flat. You could always sheet in harder and head up, if you want to go that way.

All that being said, in Rick's book he say's it's okay for the windward tales to dance just a bit, as long as the leeward ones are streaming. So you're not doing anything wrong. Right Rick?

yet

What about batten tension on the upper battens? Anything to do with it?

When I sheet in hard and pinch, it does better, but the boat slows and the leewards dance.

I keep my batten tension pretty tight all the time.
Rick

Thank you. I do too, but sometimes my tacks do not have enough "Snap" in lighter wind to pop the battens to the new tack.

I have to stand up and yank and beat on my sail to get that top batten to flop over in light air. You just have to work on the technique to get the right yank-and-beat combination.