I just picked up a baroque flute (one of the Aulos ones - matte black with hard case) from eBay… My big question is: what makes this a baroque flute as opposed to an Irish flute? I’ve played it and it plays quite nicely with about the same intonation as all of my Irish flutes. It’s even in the same key! The only big difference I can find is that I have a D# with the key… Seems like some of the other “problem” notes (like Bb) are a little more solid but it doesn’t have a good F-nat any more than my Irish ones.
One major difference is that a Baroque flute is fully chromatic and can play in any key. All of the chromatic notes are available with cross-fingerings, except for D-sharp / E-flat, which is available with the key.
Another major difference is the characteristic sound of the flute.
A Baroque flute has a smaller, rounder embouchure, and produces very different sound than an Irish flute.
Because of the complexity of the cross-fingerings, and the fact that notes like G-sharp and A-flat are not enharmonic (i.e. are not “the same note”) on the Baroque flute and are sometimes fingered differently, the Baroque flute is a real challenge to play well, and a very different beast from a keyed Irish flute.
I agree with James. On a traverson, the notes are all there. There’s more veiled/weaker notes, and many notes that are “there” in theory have to be played in tune by rolling the head joint in or out and/or changing the direction of the airstream (True for strong notes like F#, as well as weaker notes like F nat) to a much greater extent than for modern instruments.
On Irish flutes the bigger holes mean that notes like G# available on the traverso can’t be cross-fingered very convincingly or at all (but can often be half-holed instead). The tradeoff is that the differences between the notes on the D and G scales that remain on the Irish flute have reasonably consistent tones (although on some flutes the E and e are a bit veiled).
I had fun playing my Aulos traverso for the first 3 months or so trying to learn ITM. Over time I began to lust after that bigger, darker sound available from Irish flutes, and to wish for a flute I could play in tune more easily, and with fewer cross-fingerings.
As an aside, some posts to the RTTA thread and similar seem to imply that a good flute doesn’t have to be blown in tune, and that it shouldn’t be necessary to vent with keys to bring notes into tune. It would make sense to make this as true as possible, and to reduce the work as much as possible.
Coming from the historical flute perspective, it seemed normal to me to do whatever it is you have to do to get the sound you want, and the tuning that your fellow musicians demand, even if it means years of practice. I’d have to say though that as soon as I discovered how much easier it is to play some Irish flutes in tune than a baroque flute, I find it hard to go back to the traverso.
I wouldn’t say that any flute can just be blown and be “close enough”. Call me a purist, or if necessary, call the people I play with purists. I was playing with a harpsichordist recently and she said that my C# was flat. I asked her “which one?” thinking it might be one octave but not the other, or that there was a particular spot in the piece that was giving me trouble. She replied “All of them!”.
The Aulos is a bit unusual in the available power. Part of this is that it’s in modern pitch so the sound is much brighter than in a flute that’s naturally tuned to A415. The tuning is also really close to modern, that is, it plays really good D and G scales but still cross-fingers reasonably well. That as opposed to flutes on which you generally have to really lip up the F# and that might have a funky A or C#.
As others have pointed out, the first thing to do with a new toy like this is to try some tunes in C, F, or Bflat. A couple of the Carolan laments are in F or Bflat, I think, they’re available online and not too difficult.