Newbie Technique Question

[Dana]

Actually, on the Boehm flute, the right-hand pinkie is depressed the majority of the time. It's usually only raised for D natural in the first and second octaves. So when this classically-trained flutist (me) picks up a keyless flute, the pinkie wants to stay down, on the body of the flute.

Dana

[peeplj]

Actually, on the Boehm flute, the right-hand pinkie is depressed the majority of the time. It's usually only raised for D natural in the first and second octaves. So when this classically-trained flutist (me) picks up a keyless flute, the pinkie wants to stay down, on the body of the flute.

Dana

Me too. On my brass Burke, you can see the discoloration where my right pinkie rests on the whistle. There is a matching worn spot on my Seery flute (it's keyless). If I have an E-flat key, I use it to vent where possible; some flutists prefer to roll the E-flat key out of the way, but that sort of defeats the whole purpose of having the thing.

--James

[MeaghanEryn]

When I started the whistle, my right pinky kept coming up every time a D came along out of habit, until a friend asked why I was complicating things that didn't need to be complicated? When I moved over to the flute, I found (maybe just with my hand shape?) that I really needed the right pinky to maintain the balance of the instrument, unless I started adding other right hand fingers (which I believe some people do, and which I do on occasion, but I think I'd need to practice that way a lot more to really get the hang of it). I do sometimes turn the E-flat key away, though I have to remember to turn it back for a tune with and E-flat in it! Sometimes, for a change, I'll have the foot positioned right for an E-flat, and rest the pinky on the block of the E-flat key.

I have no idea what my left pinky is doing. Probably teacup-ing like mad.

**Disclaimer: one newbie to another, though I have had quite a bit of Classical training!**

[Cork]

Yes, that Eb key is a curious thing.

On a Boehm flute, the rules are clear about the Eb key. 'Nuff said.

Then, I discovered the keyless Irish flute, which of course has no Eb key. Oddly enough, what helped me to keep my lower hand pinkie up at all times was the fact that, between the Boehm flute and the Irish flute, F and F# had opposite fingerings, so I basically had to learn the lower hand fingerings all over again, and in the process taught myself the new rules about the pinkie.

Then, I discovered keyed simple system flutes, like Irish flutes but with keys, and this is where the story of the Eb key becomes curious. Now, I could have simply used just those fingerings and keys which would have gotten the job done, but no, I had to check out whatever the "official" fingerings could be, as found on fingering charts. Of course, all of those official charts that I first looked at were constructed some 150 or so years ago, and of the few I was able to find, they weren't all the same. Hmm. Then, I considered that I didn't have an antique flute but a modern one, and so maybe the modern fingerings could be more consistent. Yet, even there I found inconsistency, ranging from using the Eb key much of the time, to using the Eb key only minimally. So, eventually, I just plowed ahead and simply used whatever combination worked best.

However, I do have a theory about modern fingering charts for keyed simple system flutes and the use of the Eb key. It looks as though the modern charts which more often use the Eb key could be based more on those 150 year old charts, and the charts which minimally use the Eb key could be more influenced by the exclusively "Irish" technique of rolling the foot keys out of the way, in part because unless a low or a middle Eb is called for, the other uses of the Eb key are on tones which are just higher than those more commonly found in ITM, in the 2+ octave range.

[Aanvil]

Venting the Eb on vintage flutes makes a difference.

I still think they are made to be vented.

You can hear the difference and I have play many vintage flutes. It always seems to make a difference.

I'm also a sliver flute player but the pinkie is at a different spot so

I rolled out my old flute foot but I'm now working to vent.

[Ceili_whistle_man]

I've just noticed that although my pinkie finger flaps around a fair bit when not resting on the flute, there are exact points in my playing when my finger is either off or on. Here's what happens when I play each note in progression from bottom D upwards through two octaves. Capitals= upper reg' and lower case = lower reg'. d up, e up, f# up, g down, a down, b down, cnat down, D down, E up, F# up, G up, A up, B up, Cnat up, D3 up. Is there something that I am doing in the resting of my pinkie (or something else) that would make a classically trained person think that I had Boehm flute training? Does this happen to others who are not classically trained. Just curious as to why I hear it regularly.

[MTGuru]

When I started the whistle, my right pinky kept coming up every time a D came along out of habit, until a friend asked why I was complicating things that didn't need to be complicated?

BTW, to take a whistle sidetrack for a moment ... Many, many excellent whistle players ordinarily keep the bottom pinkie UP for D, E and F#, and bring it down to stabilize the instrument ONLY for the top hand notes. With various exceptions for lazy fingering, anticipating melody notes, stabilizing with other fingers etc.

This is one of the points where good whistle technique and flute technique may not match up at all, even in the same player. Some people (e.g. Grey Larsen) recommend always keeping the bottom whistle pinkie down. But I personally find this ridiculously limiting and restrictive of movement. And I used to be a silver Boehm flute player, so I understand what's involved.

Now back to your regularly scheduled flute broadcast ...

[jemtheflute]

I'm pretty much with Dana, Aanvil and MTGuru here. Just to recount personal experience, like some of you I started on metal Bohm flute but I had no significant amount of classical training (12 lessons in a c9 month period at age 17). However, from those lessons and use of a standard Bohm fingering chart and early lessons book, I established pretty much standard Bohm R4 finger technique as described by Dana above. When I very soon began footling with whistles I found that my R hand 3 & 4 tended just to behave as though playing a phantom Eb key without it posing any difficulty or demanding extra effort (on the contrary, it would have taken effort to change those patterns!). R 4 came off for Ds and went back on around E or F# depending on the fingering sequence involved, thus supporting/steadying my whistle hold higher up the scale and obviating any need or wish to use R3 thus instead. I still do it thus.

When I quite soon acquired first my family heirloom 6-key simple system F flute and then a 1-key Bb "fife" band flute I began to investigate fingering for them, and at around the same time became interested in antique flutes generally and also in period instrument performance, leading to my reading Rockstro and, somewhat later, Quantz. Thus I became aware that from the later Baroque on it had been the norm for flutes to have at least an Eb key and for it to be held open (depressed, so finger on/down) the majority of the time. (The Eb key was there from the early Baroque, but on earlier flutes was seemingly used/kept vented less....). Most certainly, by the time we get to the mid C19th 8-key flutes that are the heart of the ITM flute tradition, those flutes were clearly (both from contemporary fingering charts and from their demonstrable intonation) intended to be played with a vented (opened) Eb key for the majority of their notes, just like the later Bohm flute, and as Aanvil says, a little experimentation with such flutes very quickly and readily shows why/the advantages of doing so. There are exceptions, both by individual flute (as to exactly what fingerings work best) and in particular with the German design flutes (which actually seem from the C19th pictures we have to have been what ITM took off with in flute terms - because they were cheaply mass-produced and available by mail order etc.): the latter usually require that the Eb key NOT be vented for 2nd 8ve E, although otherwise it should be, just like equivalent French and English flutes of the era.

When I got my first 8-key concert flute, it was one (a Monzani) that absolutely required the proper classical vented fingerings to be used consistently to be at all acceptably in tune or with reasonable strength to quite a few notes. I had a fingering chart (the Boosey one in the Otto Langey tutor book) and used it. I continued to try to play things from the Baroque repertory for my own amusement as I had previously on Bohm flute - and worked at doing so with the correct keyed and vented 8-key fingerings, as well as mostly keeping them in when playing trad material. That flute wasn't really suitable for ITM, but when I subsequently got my R&R a couple of years later, the use of the vented fingerings was well established and I have stuck with it ever since. I do drop certain details of strictly "correct" basic chart fingering in certain kinds of context - but then, classical players of the era when these flutes were made did so too, by all accounts - and I do so more in trad music than when I try to play Baroque or other classical stuff.... but essentially I vent (chiefly Eb, F and C keys) when one is "supposed to" and I don't find it detrimental to my ITM playing.

In summary, I am not "classically trained" but largely self-taught. I am a trad player far, far more than anything else, but I have no background of being instructed in ITM - I have learned by listening and watching and by applying what I know about the instrument to what I want to achieve. Like most of us here, I know I am only an intermediate player. I know far more about it than I can consistently do!

Modern keyless flutes for ITM are just that, a modern invention/adaptation. I would venture to say that the majority of such do not vary far from the keyed flutes they were initially copied from and, as such, desperately miss having an Eb key to vent and thus strengthen the tone and improve the intonation of E and also F# in both 1st and 2nd 8ves. The better makers of such flutes have moved away from strictly copying the originals (minus keys) and have made efforts to optimise tone and intonation for the new, keyless configuration, but of necessity the E is always going to be compromised by needing a tone-hole in reach of R3 - so even if cut to sound sharp enough without a vented Eb key, the tone will still be noticeably weaker than the neighbouring tones.

My advice? If you have a flute with an Eb key, use it for what it is there for. Vent it except for D. It is a technique that, while maybe a little awkward at first, soon becomes habitual and unconscious (as I have said before, every kid learning Bohm flute can and does "get" it! - no excuses). If you play a keyless flute, get one with an Eb key and learn to use it! When playing whistles and other keyless instruments, let your R3/4 do whatever feels comfortable, but don't fold either little finger down into your palm as that is movement-limiting and stress-causing. Don't try to anchor R4 to the tube at all times (i.e. including playing D) - the tendon linkage between 3rd and 4th fingers makes that limiting and it is actually better to lift R4 as you approach the 6-finger note. If you have flute (and it is NOT just Bohm flute) Eb/R4 technique, you're ahead of the game! All that said, however, I'm not suggesting that someone who has a well developed and succesful ITM flute technique that doesn't use the Eb key (if any) should change for the sake of it. As Cork and others have said, if what you're doing works well for you and you can find top players who do it that way, there's nothing "wrong" with it.

One note of caution; although using R4 on the Eb key/the tube is a useful auxiliary flute stabiliser/support, do not let it take over the job of the R thumb as the principal source/site of outward pressure in supporting the instrument - you will stress the finger and it will limit general hand mobility if you do.

[benhall.1]

Bloody good post, Jem, me ole pal! I am now venting all the time - at your advice - and it definitely helps even my tone. Mind, I still can't play even one tune. I mean, it's been 5 months now! How hard can this thing be?!

[Denny]

2 things:

it's good to vent

it can be as hard as you like

thanks,

[jemtheflute]

Mind, I still can't play even one tune. I mean, it's been 5 months now! How hard can this thing be?!

Durn whingeing fiddlers! Now there's a really difficult instrument!

[Rob Sharer]

No surprise here, but I'm going to utterly contradict Jem and say, don't bother with the Eb key. Most of the eight-keyers I know in the Irish world don't vent it, and you can include me in that. However intellectually satisfying it may be to play like the original makers intended, in practical use I find that there's no compelling reason to do so. Matt Molloy apparently concurs, among others.

Rob

[michael c]

I haven't the best eyesight in the world and I've led an extremely sheltered life. That's maybe why I've never seen anybody venting the E flat key (except to play an E flat maybe?)

Most people seem to turn them out of the road unless they have E flats to exercise. The thing referred to earlier about stabilising the flute maybe depends a bit on holding it the "right" way with the left hand. I fear I do that wrong too.

I only discovered the existence of the E flat venting subculture when I got a new foot joint recently which has an E flat key on it. I have to vent this key to get a third octave E natural (I probably shouldn't be playing that note in polite society in any case).

I've still never seen this venting take place though. It happens way over to the right somewhere and if I turn round to look at it, it seems to go off behind me somewhere.

[benhall.1]

See, it's really hard for us newbies, Rob. Jem's a good pal of mine, and I trust what he says. So I'm practising venting - religiously. On the other hand, I can't play a tune yet.

Yet, what you say makes sense to me, and does in fact appear to be what most Irish fluters do (ie they don't vent). It would be a helluva lot easier for me to learn if I didn't vent. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that I'd be able to play several tunes by now if I wasn't sticking rigidly to the venting thing.

And, on yet another hand (how many hands are there ffs??!?), my tone is definitely better if I make myself vent. So, I think I'll be a better flute player in the long run if I make myself vent now.

Maybe it's just a good technique to have available. I can always drop it later, but learning it later would be hard indeed. And, in the meantime, I suppose I could always get myself a nice keyless.

(Uh-oh, FlOA alert ...)

[Rob Sharer]

Would Molloy be a better player if he vented?