my 1st post here so hello to all! i started learning flute in october & have been using a metal practice flute, but it’s time to progress to my 1st real flute. i want to buy an african blackwood / ebony flute - but i’m not sure what to do about keys?
if i buy a keyless flute is it easy to add keys later on? (money is holding me back from buying a keyed flute straight off)
and if i get keys - which keys do you recommend i get 1st? can i start off with 2 or 4 - or is there any point?
My suggestion would be to buy a keyless flute from a maker who offers the option of upgrading to a keyed flute. Keyed simple system flutes are a more of a pain to maintain than keyless flutes, they are a bit more fragile, at least in terms of keeping the keywork from getting damaged, and of course a keyed flute is far more expensive, so my advice is to go simple to start. Heck, you may even find after playing for a while that you don’t want a keyed flute - many players choose to stay keyless.
Post-mounted keys can be mounted after the fact fairly easily. Casey Burns does this. While I believe it’s technically possible to graft blocks onto a flute after construction, generally it isn’t worth the expense.
Aout what keys to get - keyless flutes will get you by for just about all of the common Irish tunes. I find myself wishing for Fnatural keys frequently for tunes like Julia Delaney and the Yellow Tinker.
“Post-mounted keys can be mounted after the fact fairly easily. Casey Burns does this.”
This may be, but very few makers offer this particular option, so check with the maker about specifics ahead of time. One certainly doesn’t want to send maker “A’s” flute to maker “B” for the addition of post mounted keys, as the result can be less than optimal, and it the case of very thin walled flutes, the outcome can be disasterous.
“While I believe it’s technically possible to graft blocks onto a flute after construction, generally it isn’t worth the expense.”
That’s not the way it’s typically done (although it can be for repair/restoration work) - most makers of simple system “Irish” flutes who offer the option of having keys added after the fact simply exchange the non keyed center and/or foot of your old flute for a new, keyed center/foot section, for a reasonable fee, of course.
excellent thanks for that.
I am gonna contact a few flute makers this week, my flute teacher recommended Martin Doyle, Arie de Keyzer and Eamon Cotter…I think they’re gonna be around the same price range - €500 - €700 for keyless, so I’ll see what they say about the possibility of adding keys later.
Martin Doyle has his flutes keyed by Maurice Reviol who makes some great flutes as well. There was a keyed Reviol on sale here in the past week or so: http://chiffboard.mati.ca/viewtopic.php?t=35316
Reviol might be worth looking at as well. I loved the Martin Doyle I played.
pinkyirl, i seriously starting yearing to play irish flute about then years ago. my teacher played a keyed olwell and so i put an order down for one. ten years later the flute arrived. just last week, in fact. it is hands down the best possible instrument imaginable. However, if i had to do it all over again I would have simply ordered a keyless flute (one year wait only) and worried about finding a keyed flute i liked later. according to olwell’s price list (january 2004 the heading says), the price of a blackwood flute with sterling silver trim and silver-lined head is $1350. No small chunk of change, but that’s not much in the scheme of instrument buying and for having one of the best possible instruments for playing irish flute, which will make learning go alot faster and the flute will grow with you for as far as your abilities seek to strive (with the exception of being able to play tunes in lots of fancy keys). That’d be my two cents. Good luck!
For the record, I should add that in the intervening time i came by a used keyed hammy hamilton flute that served my exceptionally well; i’d without hesitation recommend Hammy’s flutes also, keyed or keyless.
perhaps the moral of this story is this: don’t let your desire for keys hold you up from getting an excellent flute.
If you can’t play a tune with a keyless Flute it isn’t worth playing. That is my philosophy, spend a couple hundreed to be able to play a couple tunes that don’t even get played much, why? Of course if keys were cheaper then I might think differently. I have to reccomend a Bleazey Flute I got one a couple weeks ago and it is amazing and it is vastly underpriced. Of course you can’t go wrong with a Doyle or a Cotter.
I’ll throw this out there: forget keys exist for now. Buy a great keyless based on reccomendations in this forum, or one you’ve tried out from a fellow player. Then enjoy it for a long time. The embochure, the mere holding of the flute, and getting your tone, could keep you busy for a long time. Then, down the road you might want keys. I’ve been playing for 6 years and still don’t want them, but that’s my humble opinion. Brian (eedbjp)
I am about 6 months ahead of you, so my experience might be useful.
If you want to play mainly Irish traditional music, a keyless is all you need. In fact, keys can be a distraction. I started with a Sweetheart keyless, and I recently picked up a Sweetheart 6-key from someone esle on this forum. I like the keys becasue I play a lot of songs and non-trad music in other keys, but really the keys are an expensive distraction for most ITM - and they make the flute significantly heavier. I am glad I started on a simpler flute.
The Casey Burns Folk Flute is also a good reasonably cheap way to get started on ITM. The Sweetheart or Casey Burns are probably the cheapest “real” wood flutes, but they are top quality just the same. If you want something in Blackwood with a tuning slide, I would look at the Marcus Hernon or Jon C flutes that offer great quality and value in a keyless.
Last question/comment - you started on a “metal” flute? Do you mean a “classical” boehm system flute? Be aware that the “Simple System” flutes used for ITM are fingered differently, so you need to be prepared to start again with a new system when you get your wood flute. I have nothing against the Boehm system, but you probably don’t want to spend too much time with it if you ultimately want to play the Simple System flutes.
I just tried a Martin Doyle the other day & thought it was great - the only flute I’ve tried so far that for me at least had a low end that could rival that of an Olwell!
thanks for all your comments people…it all makes alot of sense.
i am only a beginner & can barely scrape a tune of the flute at the moment so i really needn’t worry about keys for a long time yet. i just got that notion from my flute teacher, he’s very pro-keys.
my metal flute is a hammy hamilton alright - it only cost €70 so was a good starter instrument & does the job nicely. it looks a bit like a bicycle pump but sounds like a flute!
i dont think i can wait 10 years for my real flute though… and i think even hammy hamilton has a 5 year waiting list. martin doyle & arie de keyzer are about 6 months as far as I know…not sure about eamon cotter. i can really only afford €500 - €700 at the moment & i think they’re all within that price range.
looking forward to my next lesson now…think i picked up a bit of speed on a few tunes over Xmas, they’re all a bit unrecognisable at the mo cos i’m playing so slowly…but sure practice makes perfect eh?
(or closer to perfect at any rate!)
I’ve not played a DeKeyzer flute, but I got a chance to play a few tunes on a Doyle flute (one of his slideless models) and thought it was a wonderful flute. Harry Bradley has had nothing but good things to say about Doyle’s flutes on this board and he certainly should know what he’s talking about.
…erm…see…i am such a beginner i dont even know the answer to that. i know very little about flutes. although learning more every day thanks to slipping on here for a peep when no-ones watching.
i am gonna take my time deciding, but still cant wait to get off the metal yoke & play a real one
Note, this is important…If I had taken my time, I’d have chosen a flute for smaller hands, or a three-piece flute with smaller bores (holes in flute)
The three-piece flute can be turned to adapt to hand size as the instruments was made to be more adaptable to be change to your physical make-up (short/long arms short/long finger, wide/narrow palms of hands…etc). A two-piece flute cannot.
This was not explained to me and I am now adapting but it is taking a lot longer.
Make sure you do have an appropriate reach as you won’t be able to play fast later on.
Murray, Hamilton and Casey Burns are adaptable enough in my experience. I tried an antique English flute (Made by Flutemaker by the name of “Wilde”) last night belonging to Cian O’Sullivan, the reach and bore sizes are perfect. If only I had known…
