classical style headjoint on Irish flute?

[billcoulter]

Wow thanks so much for all of the great information and ideas. What I liked about the silver flute was not the sound but the way it seemed to play so easily. My flute is a Sam Murray - 3 key and I love the sound of it. Seems like some days though I can barely get a low D - other days it honks with the best of them. I take it from Jem that the bore is important to the ease of play as well as the lip plate. Not sure where to go from here except to consider a new head joint for the Murray, Has anyone done this kind of thing? Seems like Noy makes one that would work well with the Murray?

Thanks again to all!

[greenspiderweb]

Bill, if you like the tone of your Murray, then just stick to it-we all have off days when things don't work for us-the more you play, the more the flute will do what you want it to do. No need for a new headjoint-just more practice will do the job. Flute is an ongoing practice, and a never ending journey. Enjoy the ride.

Edited to add: Of course, you can do what you like-a new headjoint with a different embouchure cut may make it easier to play for you-but it seems it's a gamble without being able to try it first. Most people who don't get on with a flute after a good amount of time will look for a different flute that plays more to their liking.

Or find a teacher who can help you advance and get past some embouchure problems you might be having if you really like your flute.

Flute on!
Barry

[monkey587]

Bill, I remember not being able to get the low notes out of your flute. It's the only flute I've had that problem with. Maybe it's got a leak in the headjoint? I've played other Murray's since that I didn't have trouble with. Try the suck test on the headjoint and check the cork position. Or get Lars to do that stuff for you...

[Henke]

Maybe it just needs a repadding. I've had that happen to me, sometimes not getting the lower notes, sometimes they were ok. thinking it was me, ad then finding out that a few keys where slightly leaky. How long was it since it was repadded?

You haven't washed the pads with
whisky?
that would make them leak

[jemtheflute]

Hmmmmm. It does indeed sound to me as though you need to take the above advice, Bill - 1st do a thorough leak test and make sure the whole flute is as it should be. Thereafter, don't expect your bottom register to be as full, rich and easily found as you would wish at all times - we all (save maybe for the genuinely gifted/top-line pros/hardest practisers) have embouchure struggles and variations, good days and bad days: it will come and go - treasure the good phases, try to remember how they feel and replicate that feeling as much as you can.

I've only had goes on 2-3 Murray flutes, but they have all been very easy and generous speakers, so I very much doubt there is any mileage in seeking a different head/embouchure cut.

Going back to the Boehm thing, your comments suggest you don't quite "get" (forgive me if I'm making a wrong interpretation/assumption here!) the structural function of the lip-plate on a metal Boehm (or other type, for that matter) head-joint. On a wooden head in simple form, regardless of the internal bore the maker can turn the outside profile to suit.....parallel walled to give an embouchure chimney of the desired depth, or "thinned", leaving full necessary thickness around the embouchure area but cutting away more of the timber elsewhere. In metal and again regardless of internal bore, no maker is going to seek to reproduce the wall-thickness of even a thinned wooden head - far too unnecessarily wasteful of expensive raw material plus heavy and probably response-reducing. Early all-metal heads used a profile similar to a thinned wood head - a short section of wider tube of diameter equivalent to the outer wall position desired was concentrically mounted over the main head tube and held in place by flared rings at its ends, a chimney tube then being soldered in place - like this RRC&Co flute currently on ebay (note the classic English/Rudall elliptical embouchure cut!).



Makers quite soon realised that making a suitably strong chimney riser and soldering it to the main tube and the lip-plate to that was a quite sufficient support for a partial lip-plate, again saving on materials and construction work. So, the lip-plate has no special virtue in tone production - it is simple to support the lip against the flute and the flute against the player's face whilst providing the correct depth of embouchure chimney in lieu of the thickness of the wall of a wooden head. In itself it has no effect on the timbre or voice of the flute! There are aspects of the design of the surface around the embouchure that can affect tone production - the actual angles of slope from the different edges of the hole, cut-away air channels, "wings" as in the German Reform models.....etc., but they can be made (and are by some makers) on a Simple System solid wood head-joint as well as on a metal Boehm type one with lip-plate and are not per se functions of the lip-plate. Some players reckon the material of the actual working edge of the embouchure can affect tone production and, again in any kind of flute, may have wooden or ivory or different metals or mother-of-pearl or whatever slivers inset there - have a look at the websites of some of the specialist Boehm head-makers to see what I mean.

From your last post, Bill, I'm now quite sure I was right that what you noticed in the different response of the Boehm flute you tried was, in fact, exactly what Boehm was all about - the ease and richness and volume of tone production, which indubitably are "better" on his design - but which also have a distinctly different character from almost all earlier flutes, to the extent that his critics said his instruments did not sound like proper flutes! You might find it worthwhile to pick up the pdf of Boehm's Treatise that was the subject of a recent thread here and read for yourself what he sought to achieve, how he went about it and the logic of the outcomes. (pm me your e-address and I can zap it to you.) The bore and the large and better placed tone-holes (plus reliable mechanism) have far more to do with that response character than does the embouchure cut or the material it is in or the construction of the head-joint.

A Sam Murray flute in proper working order darn well ought to be able to give you all you could wish for for ITM if you develop your own technique! Good luck.

[Tweeto]

Isn't there some guy who makes keyless boehm flutes? I think it's Dave Swindler. It seems that he could make a D-flute with the boehm style stuff. I don't see any contact info for him on the maker lists so, who knows if he still makes flutes or not.

[Terry McGee]

What I liked about the silver flute was not the sound but the way it seemed to play so easily. My flute is a Sam Murray - 3 key and I love the sound of it. Seems like some days though I can barely get a low D - other days it honks with the best of them.

Coincidentally, I have a flute by Sam here for attention at the moment that presented the challenges you mention. The owner (from Ireland, playing for 10 years) and I both found the bottom D was weak and the embouchure unreliable. You might find something of help in what I found.

Firstly, the embouchure was very crudely cut, almost as if the work on it had not been finished. (Hint - never rush your flutemaker?) There were aspects that I have found in the past contribute to an embouchure that is very "touchy". Cleaning that up solved the touchy problem and helped the bottom end a bit, but not enough.

Secondly, an RTTA analysis showed that, while the 2nd octave was reasonably well tuned, the bottom octave was sharp at A and B, and about 40 cents flat of A at low D. A typical first-half 19th century response. Of particular concern was the difference between low and middle D's - about 32 cents. That's enough to unsynchronise the jet reinforcement which is fundamental to flute efficiency. I did some re-reaming to reduce the octave width over the RH region and bring up the low D. That substantially improved the D response. I still have more work to do on the flute but am confident it will be much improved.

So, adding to what has been said before, check that there are no leaks, but also take a close look at the embouchure cut (compare it to other flutes under a bright light) and tuning. While a new head or an embouchure recut will solve the embouchure problem, it won't solve a leak or a mistuning issue. Do all your homework before spending any money!

On my 2002 Self Indulgent Flute Maker's Tour, I found the closer I got to Ireland, the harder flutes were to play. Not to say that they were worse flutes, but they certainly needed more skill and experience with similar flutes to get good results from. Whether such effort repays itself with better performance is impossible for us to prove either way at this time. A fascinating area for a longitudinal study.

Terry