Bernolin traverso-Rottenburgh or Delusse+Palanca embouchure

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imgoingtospain
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Bernolin traverso-Rottenburgh or Delusse+Palanca embouchure

Post by imgoingtospain »

Hello everyone.
Really love my Gary Sommers Irish flute, but have been playing more, more music (Eastern European, Middle Eastern, and simple classical) that wants a more chromatic instrument. I've gotten fairly good at cross fingering and half holing, and I also made a big mistake back in my tin whistle days and play lefty, so keyed flutes seem off the table as lefty seems rare and pricey.

A Bernolin resin baroque flute in 440 seems like a perfect option in terms of price and leveraging what I've been working on.

Only thing is it seems like I need a music history degree to make heads and tales of these instruments and embouchure styles.

Am I correct in understanding the Palanca embouchure on a Delusse will be closer to what I'm used to?
Any benefit to a Rottenburgh with a traditional embouchure?
Any advice at all really...

I like bending notes through rolling and using considerable vibrato with some sorts of music-- how might that be affected by this different embouchure hole cut?

Thanks!
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Peter Duggan
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Re: Bernolin traverso-Rottenburgh or Delusse+Palanca embouch

Post by Peter Duggan »

imgoingtospain wrote:Am I correct in understanding the Palanca embouchure on a Delusse will be closer to what I'm used to?
That's what I chose as the best single-flute solution for repertoire from Bach and Telemann to Mozart. Whether it would meet your expectations beyond that, I don't know. Be aware that even the larger Palanca embouchure will be tiny compared to what you're used to, producing a smaller sound and requiring considerable adjustment. In a nutshell, baroque/classical flutes require new skills and don't (indeed can't) bark.
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Re: Bernolin traverso-Rottenburgh or Delusse+Palanca embouch

Post by The Sporting Pitchfork »

I play lefty and am fortunate to have a 6-key Stéphane Morvan flute that I picked up from used from Erwan Menguy a few years ago. Even used, it wasn't at all cheap. I was lucky to be relatively flush with cash at that particular moment. Not sure when that'll be the case again...

Some flute makers charge an extra fee for left-handed instruments; others do not.

If you want a good keyed flute for playing Irish music, start saving now--you'll likely need somewhere in the neighborhood of $/€1600 or more--and order from a maker who has a waiting list long enough for you to save the cash you need.

I've dabbled with other genres of music on my flute, but in that regard, having a baroque flute handy could have some advantages but also disadvantages. I became obsessed with Middle Eastern & Turkish music about 6 years ago and, after some frustration, ended up getting an oud (and then another one! One for Turkish tuning and one for Arabic... Oy...) to play that music properly. Then Sylvain Barou turned me on to the playing of Emad Ram, a mid-20th century Iranian musician who played Persian classical music on an 8-key wooden flute. Sylvain does an amazing job of managing some microtonal intervals on the flute himself, but I still don't really have the patience for this. A baroque flute _might_ be better suited in this regard, as it was designed at a time when there was still an audible distinction between certain intervals, such as A# and Bb, a distinction that still exists in Turkish music but has been lost in Western music.

That said, as others have pointed out, a baroque flute is a completely different animal from any Irish-style flute you'd find. It would require a lot of re-learning and unlearning to play it well. If baroque flutes were well-suited to playing Irish music, then trust me, you'd see a lot more people playing them.

FWIW, I did once hear someone bark on a baroque flute, but it was Conal Ó Gráda, so no, baroque flutes don't bark.
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chas
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Re: Bernolin traverso-Rottenburgh or Delusse+Palanca embouch

Post by chas »

No traverso will be anything like your Somers. It's not the same instrument.

From your remark, I assume you play the flute lefty, too? If so and you don't want to shell out for a custom instrument, you'll need to make sure of a couple of things: Some instruments don't have a rotatable Eflat key. If you were playing righty, I'd suggest a Sweet baroque flute, as these have a modern embouchure cut with small holes. They're a compromise between the sound of a romantic wooden flute and the versatility of a baroque flute. The other thing is that not all makers cut the embouchure symmetrically. That is, it only sounds well in the direction from which s right-handed player blows.

I've owned a couple of modern one-key flutes that are fully chromatic. One was a Sweet that half-holed the Fnat and Bflat very nicely, and a cross-fingered Gsharp was not bad. I also still have a Noy small-holed flute that cross-fingers very nicely. I've listed that one for sale a couple of times. Lemme know if you're interested, although it will be much more than a Bernolin.

All that said, the Palanca has a reputation for being a loud traverso, so that might be your best option.
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imgoingtospain
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Re: Bernolin traverso-Rottenburgh or Delusse+Palanca embouch

Post by imgoingtospain »

Thanks all.
I'm assuming the embouchure would be like sounding through a finger hole--not impossible.
Sometimes the bark feels wrong for the music I'm playing -- so that can be an advantage. Looking forward to the new challenge.

Chas, thank you for the offer, but prefer resin (and the price).
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Re: Bernolin traverso-Rottenburgh or Delusse+Palanca embouchure

Post by LEgregius »

[Thread revival. - Mod]

I know I'm late to the party, but so others can see it, I figured I'd reply.

I have a Delusse+Palanca flute from Bernolin. For fun, I've tried to play it lefty, and the embouchure is certainly not cut to play that way. It's possible to play, and isn't the end of the world, but you could probably ask him to cut it to work that way.

The embouchure is cut so that it works best, at least for me, to put my lip on the head joint so it just touches the edge of the embouchure hole, rather than wanting to blow down in to the hole like on an irish flute. I get almost no sound and the third octave becomes nearly impossible otherwise. It does take noticeably more force to get the upper registers out than on my Reviol Irish flute. This was really helpful for me: http://www.earlyflute.com/pages/sweet.html
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Re: Bernolin traverso-Rottenburgh or Delusse+Palanca embouchure

Post by jim stone »

http://www.flutebeaudin.com/Home.html

This is an attempt to make a modern, louder traverso.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9mIkWoP5Jk
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