An afterthought. I've just returned from a long walk in -13 centigrade, listening to Catherine McEvoy's The home ruler. I hear nothing "girly", or feminine, or, for that matter nowt, manly, or masculine about the flute playing at all. Just a brilliant musician playing Irish traditional music on the flute with great technical ability, feeling, and tone.

So prehaps Aoife Granville meant that female flute players just play the flute as best as they can and don't try to sound like men as there is no male "flute sound". I'm inspired by flute players such as Catherine McEvoy, because they are great flute players.

Possibly. There's a definite validity in wanting to support minority players. It could also indicate that they don't want to be accused of trying to be male flute players; or that they don't want to appear to be saying that "playing like a girl" is a negative thing, so they don't want to try not to play in a way stereotypically seen as "female." (Yeah, everything comes with societal baggage...)

_________________
Here's tae us--
Wha's like us?
Damn few--
And they're a' deid--
Mair's the pity.