Nicholson, the flute master

[Akiba]

Much seems to be said and written about Nicholson in wooden, 19th century English flute circles. Olwell makes a model named after him and the custom flute he helped design. I came across this arrangement of a Scotch Air, "Roslin Castle" by Nicholson himself. Apparently he played this exactly as written to 'enthusiastic applause' and 'rapturously encored'.

It's in F minor which seems a terribly tricky key to play in with the simple system flute. I can't imagine how to play this on a Boehm flute, let alone a simple system flute. Anyways, I'm blown away by this. Nicholson must have truly been a genius flute player.

Here's the link to the sheetmusic:
http://www.oldflutes.com/articles/roslincastle.htm

Jason

[clark]

Oh my!

[cocusflute]

Olwell makes a model named after him and the custom flute he helped design.

Who is the "he" in "he helped design"?

[daiv]

Olwell makes a model named after him and the custom flute he helped design.

Who is the "he" in "he helped design"?

as i understood the phrase you quote, it meant that the general characteristics (i.e. hole size) of olwell's nicholson flute are based on the flutes from the 19th century which nicholson favored, and either designed or took credit for designing.

[Akiba]

I could be mistaken, Cocus, but I thought I read that Nicholson worked with a prominent flute maker to fashion a flute according to his specs. Then I assumed that Olwell modeled his Nicholson after that. I could very be mistaken, and certainly there are greater flute historians in our midst that could speak much more authoritatively than I.

I mainly was just marvelling at the virtuosity of the piece because it illustrates to me the vast potential of the simple flute. I have a tough enough time playing in D and G let alone Aflat/Fmin and playing chromatically with all that ornamentation, polyphonics, dynamics...astounding really.

[Cork]

...in wooden, 19th century English flute circles...

Flutes can be of wood, but perhaps flute circles could not be wooden.

;-)

[Denny]

...in wooden, 19th century English flute circles...

Flutes can be of wood, but perhaps flute circles could not be wooden.

oh do go with metal!
Ivory isn't much help and the dang thing's already wood!
By all means put something substantial around it to hold it together.


aren't they called rings?

[pixyy]

Here's the link to the sheetmusic:
http://www.oldflutes.com/articles/roslincastle.htm

Jason

Hey that's pretty close to the version I play

[Jon C.]

Olwell makes a model named after him and the custom flute he helped design.

Who is the "he" in "he helped design"?

as i understood the phrase you quote, it meant that the general characteristics (i.e. hole size) of olwell's nicholson flute are based on the flutes from the 19th century which nicholson favored, and either designed or took credit for designing.

Daiv, have you mastered your Nickolson tune yet?
I think most modern flute makers don't follow the Nickolson's Improved design very closely, as the original are quite a challenge to play in tune. It was said that Nickolson was able to blow his flutes in tune by shear force of his playing! The original Nickolson's Improved flutes made by Prowse, that I have played Have a very dynamic tone, and play well with themselves, but there is a lot of errors in the tuning, at 440. Maybe a lower tuning work better? The flutes are very elegant.

[Terry McGee]

You can obtain facsimiles of Nicholson's tutor "A School for the Flute", Vols 1 & II, 1836 from:

Peter H Bloom, 29 Newbury St Somerville, Mass. 02144;
Ph (617) 776-6512.

He starts off in the key of C, moving though the sharps and then the flats. By page 43, he'll have you playing in six flats (Gb). Vol II is devoted to all the tricky stuff.

Terry

[jemtheflute]

It was said that Nickolson was able to blow his flutes in tune by shear force of his playing!

That's a cutting point! Perhaps that's why few of Nicholson's own flutes have survived? They're all in bits ! Went to pieces at what he demanded of 'em. Sheer nonsense of course (on my part) but perhaps Jon is feeling sheepish about his spelling? Mind he doesn't fleece you! Or perhaps (indulging in stereotypes) Terry might like to give the Oz view on shearing? (Sorry folks, I was working till 04:40 this morning, have just got up to watch the rugby and am feeling a bit woolly!)

[cocusflute]

Olwell's Nicholson is no more like a historic Nicholson than his Rudall is a Rudall or his Pratten a Pratten. These are just names he uses to distinguish between small, medium, and large hole flutes.
Olwell has played and measured thousands of flutes - and made over a thousand, all considered. At this point his designs are as much his own as any flute can be, as is the case with Martin Doyle, Hammy, Wilkes, McGee and most of the older established makers.

[daiv]

Who is the "he" in "he helped design"?

as i understood the phrase you quote, it meant that the general characteristics (i.e. hole size) of olwell's nicholson flute are based on the flutes from the 19th century which nicholson favored, and either designed or took credit for designing.

Daiv, have you mastered your Nickolson tune yet?
I think most modern flute makers don't follow the Nickolson's Improved design very closely, as the original are quite a challenge to play in tune. It was said that Nickolson was able to blow his flutes in tune by shear force of his playing! The original Nickolson's Improved flutes made by Prowse, that I have played Have a very dynamic tone, and play well with themselves, but there is a lot of errors in the tuning, at 440. Maybe a lower tuning work better? The flutes are very elegant.

no, i havent! i left all my sheet music at home and keep forgetting to bring it. what's even worse, is that last time i went home, i left my gisborne and my copley headjoint! so i'm just stuck here with a hunk of silver and an uninspired, machine made headjoint. i refuse to put my mouth up to something that isnt wood.

nicholson must have been the bees knees to be able to play the music he wrote. i can sorta manage some of the simpler parts of that tune and other ones on my gisborne, but then i put a boehm flute up to my face and it's the easiest thing in the world!

i could see blowing it all in tune if you work on it enough. the strange thing that nicholson does with pressure against the face actually helps a lot with tuning. one time i was playing something by nicholson, and i hit a second octave c natural, but fingered a b, and lipped it up into tune without even thinking. after a while you get used to the fact that nothing is going to be the note you want it to be and you rely totally on your lips and face pressure to get it. too bad it's so damn hard....

[RudallRose]

don't be amazed at the difficulty of the tune.
The instrument and its practitioners were quite accustomed to playing tunes such as this....and with the various fingerings.

We have become lazy and accustomed to playing simple tunes -- in the very easy keys of G & D and their relative minors.
Irish music -- flute playing in particular -- is just now getting into playing tunes in more interesting keys as Dminor and Eb.

If you'd like to enjoy the simple system flute, look at music by Devienne and Quantz and Mozart and.....etc......and play the tunes. You will see that flutes were quite the impressive instrument.

Chris Norman and Niall Keegan are likely the most expressed practitioners of the instrument's legitimate boundaries.....though I favor Norman's smooth approach best.

dm

[jemtheflute]

Hear hear, D.M. Quite.

Have a listen to Stephen Preston and Lisa Beznosiuk playing Kohlert's Valse des Fleurs on 8-key flutes on the old Preston's Pocket album of music for two flutes through the ages (amongst other gems thereon). I believe Brian Berryman is another player of 8-key (and ITM) who explores the Classical repertory, and although most of the classically trained period instrument players concentrate on Baroque and Classical period music, 1 to 4-key instruments, there is a demand for 8-key use in the later Classical and early Romantic repertory and I believe there are players out there who supply that demand - the period instrument/historically informed performance brigade have been looking at C19th music since the late 1980s!

It's a bee in my bonnet, I know, but it sometimes needs re-stating: the "simple system flute", i.e. the 8-key "concert" flute, was originally an orchestral, classical instrument and fully used as such, the last professional players upon it ending their careers as late as the 1920s! It is/was NOT "the Irish flute". By whatever socio-economic mechanism, it trickled down/got hungover as the mainstay of traditional music flute playing in Ireland from the mid C19th as the orchestral world gradually moved on. Remember, however, the general huge popularity of the flute as an amateur's instrument throughout Britain right through the C18th and C19th - hence the large supply of low-middling quality "dilettante" 1-8 key instruments.

The modern keyless or randomly "custom-keyed" conoid bodied flute built especially for modern ITM by current makers based on period models is essentially a new development (sure, its just a variant manifestation of something ancient - as is the Boehm flute) that has not previously existed in quite that form in the developmental typology of the transverse flute (they may look rather like Renaissance or Baroque flutes, but are actually rather different in design parameters and performance).

The title "simple system" really belongs ONLY to 4-8 key flutes of late C18th to late C19th design (and copies thereof). Modern keyless flutes should not really be called by that title and may perhaps legitimately be termed "Irish" flutes as they have been developed specifically to supply the modern ITM market, whereas genuine antique simple system flutes should not really be termed "Irish" as they were not designed or sold for that use, but rather for classical music, and very few of them were ever made in Ireland.

ITM on the flute developed (presumably from pipes and whistle playing as well as Baroque style flutes) on the 8-key flute, regardless of whether the keys were much used, and again, I think modern players of keyless flutes tend to be rather rejectionist about that fact and not to recognise that their (certainly lovely and very usable) instruments are a modern development that is to some extent redefining the modern playing of ITM on the flute.

I can't do it myself, not having the classical training or the persistence and commitment to practice and technical development required, but playing advanced classical repertory on the 8-keyed flute is certainly possible, though doubtless there are works written specifically for capacities of the Boehm flute that the 8-keyer, however virtuosic its player, would struggle to achieve or simply could not do. But then, there are things do-able on 8-key or even Baroque flute that a Boehm flute cannot emulate, so........ horses for courses! Nicholson and his ilk were great virtuosi by any standards, and stretched the technique on the instrument, indeed driving the technological development of the instrument. Nicholson would doubtless have done that whatever era he had appeared in, just as e.g. Paganini did for the fiddle or Liszt for the piano. We poor ITM players are amazed not only by the abilities of Matt Molloy or Jean-Michel Veillon etc. but also (if we care to look/listen) by the top Boehm players like Jimmy Galway etc. or the top period fluters like Preston or Barthold Kuijken. All of these top-line players are blessed with extraordinary talent, but have also grafted very hard from young ages to acquire their level of virtuosity. They can do things the rest of us who haven't done that level of work can only marvel at.