Buying an antique flute

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Firecrest5
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Tell us something.: I love folk music but am a classically-trained flautist and want to have a go at the other side! My knowledge of this world is through my admiration of great bands like Planxty and Dervish whose flute players leave me in awe. My sister has recently started playing folk fiddle and is encouraging me.

Buying an antique flute

Post by Firecrest5 »

This is my first post on this forum. I'm just embarking on the Irish flute journey having played classical music for many years. So, a whole new world to discover and, hopefully, enjoy. I'm casting around for a good instrument to get me going and have already had some wonderful support from a couple of individuals. I'm not sure if I should be looking for more views which might just muddy the waters but I'm going to ask anyway...and this is my situation. I visited a kind and solicitous restorer who regailed me with flute lore for many intriguing hours; I know much more than I did. I've been presented with an initial choice - a Riviere and Hawkes needing some embouchure work; the possibility of a William Hall flute which I'm going to see in a few days' time. I think both are likely to be fine instruments but I'm more concerned with which would be best for me as a novice, albeit one with flute experience of another kind. Any thoughts would be gratefully accepted.
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Jayhawk »

Welcome to the dark side of fluting... :-)

I'm biased, but a big fan of American antique flutes as they often have excellent tuning and are at modern pitch most of the time. I also like the smaller bore/tone holes that still achieves a good volume. Try them both if you can and see how you feel about playing them...one may just speak to you. Unless you want to pay for repairs, often the best choice is the one already fixed up and ready to go!

Eric
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by tstermitz »

Go for the William & Hall. It will be in tune at A440.

The volume on the W&H may be a little less than Session-loud, but in exchange, your articulations (decorations) will be crisp and fast. The embouchure will probably require focus and strength, but that is a good training for any other flute you may desire in the future.

Jayhawk is now playing my Firth, Pond & Co flute which is very similar to the William Hall. We both have really liked the American flutes.
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Conical bore »

This may not be a popular opinion here, and I admit I have zero experience with antique flutes. But I play Irish and Scottish traditional music with my Significant Other who is a fiddler with a very good ear for intonation. She will often say "is one of us out of tune?" when she really means I'm out of tune.

So if you're playing with others where intonation needs to be more-or-less in the 12TET system, then it's not just about being able to hit the A note in the first octave at 440 Hz. It's about the overall intonation of the flute.

And again, I have no experience with antiques, but my first flute was from a modern maker, a Windward keyless, and my current flute is from another modern maker, a Thomas Aebi keyed flute. Both flutes had good intonation but the Aebi is close to spot-on for the 12TET intonation with the tuning slide pulled out just 1/4" or so to hit A at 440Hz, not the more extreme slide pulls you might need for an antique flute.

So personally, I'm sold on modern flute makers who respect the designs of 19th Century wooden flutes, but tweak them for playing in 12TET intonation around an A440 pitch. You might find a great antique flute that *can* be "lipped" up or down into great intonation, but I'd rather not have to work at it.

P.S. There is a whole discussion to be had about whether these "Irish" flutes should actually be 12TET or something more idiosyncratic for the music, like the slightly sharp cross-fingered "Piper's C natural" that's a little bit sharp. I prefer that to using my Cnat key, but that's a whole other discussion, just an indication of how deep this rabbit hole is.
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Jayhawk »

Conical bore...your P.S. is good. Too many musicians are slaves to electric tuners...it's made music much, much harder over the past 30 years. When everyone tuned to a pitch pipe, it was a different world. However, with a flute, it's really up to the player to play it in tune as much as the maker (provided the flute is decently in tune). Roll the headjoint out a bit, or in, simply because you are tired and it's out of tune. I think whatever flute you frequently play is the flute you play most in tune. Also, those variations on tuning, playing Cnat or other notes with different fingerings, add significant color to Irish music.

Just my $.02 worth...YMMV.

My own PS...I love Tom's old flute. I play it in sessions with 20 people and have never been told I'm quiet, but no one has ever accused me of playing any flute quietly.

Eric
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by an seanduine »

I am going to be somewhat of a contrarian here. I do like the American flutes. I have played, and even worked on various flutes from the families of Firth, Pond and Hall. These families, on the whole, made excellent flutes that can be played for ITM at modern pitch. BUT, I would need more information about this Hawkes Riviere flute before I would disqualify it from consideration. Riviere was a maker for Hawkes. On at least one occasion Patrick Olwell has restored and sold a Hawkes Riviere through Blayne Chastaine´s Irish Flute Store. This flute was from the 1870´s and played extremely well in tune at A=440hz. Both Hawkes and Riviere made instruments for a long period of time, up to and through the madness of the High Pitch era. Matt Molloy recorded his early cds on a Eb Hawkes, and John Skelton recorded with The House Band with a Hawkes flute. Could you indulge me by giving us some more information about this Hawkes Riviere. What sort of keywork does this flute have on the foot joint. Boehm or Rudall Rose ´grasshopper´ style? What is the length of the headjoint including the tuning barrel? Can you give us the sounding length from the center of the top hole to the center of the Eb keypad? Ideally, of course, would be pictures, but a brief description of the headjoint endcap would be nice.
Like Patrick Olwell, Riviere favored a shorter headjoint matched to a correctly scaled flutebody to achieve his target tuning.

awaiting your reply,
Bob
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Firecrest5 »

Thanks for all these thoughts. Bob, I've contacted the restorer who's currently in possession of the Riviere and Hawkes and will get back to you when he gives me that info. I think my purchase may come down to experiencing the instrument first hand and whether it feels right, whether I can keep it in tune and so forth. Expediency might be a factor too - I can't imagine the Hall will hang around long so if it feels promising I might take the plunge.

I will buy a new flute only when/if I have fully incorporated folk-playing into my life. It'll clearly be a significant outlay and I'll need to be sure. So far this is all at 'project ' stage!

Thanks,
Julian
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Firecrest5 »

Here are some details about the R&H instrument, Bob. Roughly from my restorer friend's description:
'It has rod-axle Boehm style foot keys, pillar-mounted German Silver keys and a typical domed crown. Measurements aren't really useful as they don't act as a pitch indicator in (his) experience. It's a high-pitched era flute but works fine at A440 with a non-excessive, mid-range tuning slide extension after modification of the C# and keyed Cnat tone holes to bring them up to A440 pitch.'

Hope this helps.
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by an seanduine »

Thank, you, Firecrest5, for your answer and indulgence. Barring measurements, the Serial Numbers, if any, could be very helpful. Many of these particular instruments were built to the highest standards of fit and finish, exquisite Cocus Wood with mirror-like polished bores. They often had metal reinforced joints, with some displaying half-lined headjoints.
I am confused about your man´s assertion about sounding lengths. A worthwhile read here: http://www.mcgee-flutes.com/flutelengths.htm would help clarify some of the issues at hand. In particular, I am concerned about his seemingly contradictory statements about the flute being from the HP era, and yet the C and C# needing to be ´brought up to pitch´. If the instrument were truly High Pitch, the opposite would be the case, given that the headjoint is original and unmolested. But, as you say, the proof of the pudding would be in the eating. Rather than using a tuner, I would urge you to play the instrument against a set of drones, listening to the interplay between the instrument and the partials and harmonics of the drones. There are several recordings of Uilleann Pipe drones playing in ´D´ available on the ´web. Real drones, not synthetic would be the best. As you progess through a scale you can readily discern the tuning tendencies of each note, whether sharp or flat or any variation, even to the extent of being able to count the ´beats of variation´. Since you are an experienced flute player, you will also note whether this variance is readily within you embouchure´s ability to compensate.

The best of luck,
Bob
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Firecrest5 »

Thank you for these reflections. There is a practical problem that I should probably have made clearer. This particular flute is unavailable to all intents and purposes until it's undergone embouchure bushing and this may not happen for several weeks. In the meantime I will have the opportunity to look at and hopefully try the Hall flute. Realistically, if I like it I will have to buy it unless the dealer were to agree to delay selling until I'd tried the other flute...no, it's not going to happen! Only if the Hall proves not to be to my tastes will I wait for the R&H to try. I have seen it and heard it played by the person who has restored it (apart from the bushing for which he'll pass it on to a colleague). He was only able to do anything with it unbushed by plugging one side of the hole with a bit of blu-tack - and it sounded good to me. Perhaps I'm saying that I don't have an easy choice under the circumstances!

Julian
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by an seanduine »

Again, thank you, Firecrest5, for your response. I can fully appreciate the constraints you are operating under. John Sebastian summed up your dilemma with his song performed by The Lovin´ Spoonful https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR5vcCI9YtM . It is difficult for me to portray the selection of a Wm. Hall flute as a consolation prize. . . :boggle: I have a third alternative, perhaps an even more difficult choice: Buy both :o . . .wives can be replaced :lol:
Bushing and revoicing a flute is not a simple task, nor one to be rushed. Buy the Hall unless you find it disagreeable. Then, if given the opportunity, buy the Hawkes. As an additional data point, the Olwell restored Hawkes sold for just under $1,300 USD. A call to Blayne Chastaine would prove invaluable. Moving on, quite possibly at a profit, from either instrument should prove ¨nae bother¨.
To put it further into perspective, the cost of both flutes should not stand up to the cost of a single, professional modern Boehm flute.

You, Sir, suffer from an embarassment of choices!
Bob
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by jemtheflute »

The Rivière & Hawkes is currently mine. The OP visited me recently, as he described - 'twas a very pleasant afternoon. 🙂

By definition by their dates (1876-89) as a partnership R&H are a British High Pitch era firm. Rivière was a French bandmaster/conductor living in London who went into partnership with Hawkes for those 13 years (according to the New Langwill Index). He was not SFAIK a flute maker. R&H flutes do not (that I've seen) have serial numbers, and indeed Hawkes & Son later on were never at all consistent about giving serial numbers to their products. The flute is stamped with the 28 Leicester Square, London, address, but that was the address for the whole of the partnership according to Langwill, so provides no further definition of time.

The flute has a sounding length of 575mm. In my extensive experience the C#-Eb length is of no functional help in determining playing pitch design as the tone-hole sizes and placements are too variable, especially the Eb hole. I like and sympathise with Terry McGee's argument, but unfortunately his proposal simply doesn't work in practice as a diagnostic or predictor.

The flute plays well at A440 with a significant slide extension - I won't give a measurement because of the issues with the embouchure hole which affect pitch. The embouchure had previously been damaged and overcut and although I improved the crack repair running through it (not the cause of enlargement - it was closed up properly) and tidied it up, it is too big. I propose to ask Chris Wilkes to bush it for me. With a smaller embouchure hole it will play better and need less slide extension for A440 than it currently does (as the blutack experiment proves), although that is not excessive. I very circumspectly retuned the C# and C holes because, with the flute tuned to 440, those notes were significantly flat because they were sized/tuned to suit the higher pitch/shorter scale length with the slide not much open. However, as is often the case with English simple system flutes of this period, the rest of the scale is excellent for 440 use - no flat foot!

I posted a video of the flute on Facebook back when I was renovating it: https://www.facebook.com/605989270/post ... 890769271/
I think there is absolutely no problem apparent with crispness and immediacy of finger articulation because of the large tone-holes!

It is very like other later Hawkes flutes which have passed through my hands and are demoed on YouTube: https://youtu.be/CVjxJQwnbIA & https://youtu.be/wYjDOn6Eaa0
Last edited by jemtheflute on Fri Aug 27, 2021 4:57 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Firecrest5
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Firecrest5 »

Thanks for weighing in with this clarification. I feel like a dwarf amongst giants in this new world - ironic, being in the process of retiring from teaching; I'm now the student!
Salutary, to say the least.

The prospect of purchasing both instruments is not impossible but a bit more than 'the finding a decent instrument to see if this was my thing' kind of idea I started out with. I guess my acquaintance with the Wm. Hall will give me a lot more perspective.

Thank you.
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Firecrest5 »

It didn't take long for me to make a decision on the William Hall this morning. After an inspection and a chat with the seller I was satisfied though always with the thought that I was acting with a certain degree of ignorance. Anyway, thank you for all your feedback and I look forward to many years of satisfying playing.
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Re: Buying an antique flute

Post by Jayhawk »

Congratulations on the William Hall flute! Get to know it and have fun.

Eric
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