Chiff and Fipple Forums

I tried one briefly while I was in Skip's workshop a while back, and I personally couldn't do much with it. It's pretty unforgiving ergonomically because all your fingers have to be exactly on the holes, so if the flute doesn't fit your hands nicely I imagine it would be hard going.

It's fine to leave R3 down while playing C# -- I often leave the whole right hand down when it's convenient. I was taught to do this on the silver flute and it seems to carry over to Irish flute with no ill effects that I've noticed.

As far as I know, the rod-system keywork on Skip's older flutes is his own design, though it's clearly Boehm-inspired. He used to work for Chris Abell, who makes blackwood Boehm flutes, so he may have picked up the idea there.

I'm a little late to the party, but here are my comments. Overall, this is a very nice effort from a self-described intermediate beginner. As others have said, you're on the right track. But there are a few things you might work on: You breathe in the same places each time through the tune. It would...

The Return Home is another jig that is often played syncopated. The B part has a phrase like AFG EFD that's often played in twos: AF GE FD.

I usually just play the offending note an octave up, although for this particular tune that's probably not the best approach. In order to get that "octave ambiguity" to which others have alluded, I was taught to imagine (visualize?) that you're playing the note in its correct octave. For a...

You're right. I was looking at the fingering chart in the beginning of your post (which shows an L3 cut) and thinking of that.

I've never tried cutting E with the left index finger. I can see how it would pop a lot, though.

The roll fingering that raises the left index "pops" too much for my tastes... Interesting... on my flute I have the exact opposite problem. The L3 cut is so soft, you can hardly tell it's there. It works ok for a normal long roll, but when the cut falls on the beat I switch to R1 to get ...

At the risk of bringing this thread back on-topic, the OP may want to check out Grey Larsen's book "The Essential Guide to Irish Flute and Tin Whistle". It breaks down some of the many ornamental variations in great detail.

I am the next recipient of the flute -- little did I know such controversy had erupted while I was waiting for it! It was postmarked September 28 so the blame lies squarely on the USPS for the delay.

This summer there was a block party on my street and I discovered that I'm apparently a minor celebrity in my neighborhood -- with the windows open my flute and concertina can apparently be heard several houses down. But I've had nothing but compliments (clearly they aren't listening very carefully ...

I'm also a flute player who recently (well, a few years ago now) took up the concertina. The ornamentation is really quite different -- there are rough equivalents to long/short rolls, cranns, etc, but they don't have the same feel to them at all. I find I ornament in different places on the concert...

If you can hold the flute steady and it's not causing tension somewhere else, there's no need to put the pinky down. Having it free can leave your RH more relaxed and makes E rolls easier. Putting the third finger down on the A and B is fine, too.

I cut E rolls with either L3 or R1, depending on the tune. R1 produces a noticeably crisper cut on my flute (a Healy), so I try to use it whenever possible. But it is a little trickier on the fingers, so I'll switch to L3 if R1 isn't coming out smoothly. For me, that tap is really the hard part of t...

I find Bb pretty easy to cross finger (X 0 X 0 0 0), and exceedingly rare in Irish music. Even the handful of D minor tunes I know all avoid the Bb. You could certinaly get away with omitting the key. Or, as others have mentioned, a RH index finger key works fine.