As a newcomer to Irish flute, I’m curious as to at what point C&F posters moved to a keyed flute. Did many of you start with keys? Or is it best to learn the basics on an unkeyed?
Thanks for any feedback!
Jeanie
My 2¢ is that the styles are different, so it’s really up to you. You can play chromatically without keys, more or less, but they do fix the tuning on harder cross-fingerings or more challenging half-holings. They tend to more than double the price of the instrument, so often that’s a big factor.
Something else is that it’s not going to hamper you at all to play a keyless instrument for years and then get a keyed one. The keys are, with one possible exception (Bb), in very logical positions and easy to learn to use.
Stuart
The simple answer is to get keys when you start playing tunes that need them.
I had a keyed flute for a while (an M&E Rudall Rose) and quite liked it. That said, I almost never used the keys.
When I play stuff with a lot of accidentals I use a Boehm flute but I find that almost none of the “accidental tunes” I play are IrTrad.
Doc
Well jeez I love keys and I only use 3 of the 8 that are on my old Eb. But all of a sudden I can play Woman of Ireland (god I blanked out on how to spell Ireland but you know the song I mean) the way I want to. And love to be able to blast out the C what ever so clearley. Now of course I have a long way to go as far as realy using the potential of a keyed flute but I dont plan on limiting my self to Irish trad as there are countless tunes I will be able to play with keys. The sound of a wooden flute far surpasses the silver or gold bohem in my humble opinion. And having a keyed flute has made me decide to learn to read music. Now dont get me wrong my keyless Lehart is a total animal of a flute and again I am a long way from utilizing the potential of that breast but I think there are spicific styles of music to play on the keyless and a greater diversity of styles that can be played on the 8 key for instance. You can find keyed flutes for sale all over the place at good prices. I paid 76 bucks for my 19th century wooden Eb and it took very little work to bring it back to life. In otlher words if you want to try keys GO FOR IT. I promise you will not regret it.
Tom
I’ve moved from a keyed flute to a keyless Wilkes flute in D. I play only Irish traditional music and don’t miss the keys, I hardly ever used, at all.