Bubbly fingerwork

Irish Flute
1

I’m finding that I’m really beginning to extremely dislike the bubbly fingerwork I’m hearing in alot of today’s young accomplished players. If you’re curious about what I’m refering to, it was popularized on Matt MOlloy’s Black album and can be heard on at least one or two of the bloom of youth rte programs. I also heard a few of the young big shot American players a month ago in East Durham. Bubbly fingerwork is not to be confused with the percussive fingerwork that you might hear on a player like Seamus Tansey who really pounds the pat of his rolls which creates a drumming sound.

I’m just getting really tired of hearing it and I wonder what if these kids think flute playing starts with MM? I mean Paddy Carty, Peter Horan, John Mckenna and Catherine McEvoy didn’t/don’t seem the see the need to try to play the flute like a set of pipes so why do these kids seem to abandon the past and insist on playing the thing like a chanter.

What do you guys think? Do you like the bubby or not?

(disclaimer before Stuart jumps at me *Matt Molloy is the greatest)

2

I admit to being put off hte flute by Molloys second solo recording during the 1980s. I think a lot of fluteplayers recording today are too much wrapped up in that style, wanting too much. On the other hand, i get to hea a lot of nice fluteplayers and have made my peace with the instrument. I do have to say i generally don’t like to listen to the instrument on it’s own, it’s the best for mixing and I don’t think the mix of flute and fiddle or concertina can be beaten. The flute is at it’s best complementing other instruments sound wise and rhythm-wise.

I don’t think Molloy plays the flute like a set of pipes by the way.

3

Good question Jack!

Personally I don’t like the bubbly, I don’t like the flute sounding like a chanter, let each speak with their own voice. I think there is enough ways with good breathe and embouchure control, good fingering, good articulation and phrasing for a flute player to present a tune. without all the distracting ornamentation etc.. or “look what I can do,” mentality. Would you rather watch the bubbles in champagne or drink it!

I’ve spent fifty years in the visual arts before coming to music, over the time I’ve worked my way through more styles and “isms” than you can imagine. I draw from that experience to relate to the music I want to play, I love the beauty and simplicity of a Zen stone and sand garden, I love the strong curves and sharp edges that granite can provide, I don’t like things gussied up, I enjoy the simplicity of understatement rather than overstatement.

The young musicians that go for the bubbly are like young artists that go for shock of the new, the spectacle, the showmanship (been there, done that!). When in art school we talked about that, if you read and study the lives of artists, you will find that it takes twenty some odd years for them to find their face, as we say in the art world. That means it takes that much time to work through life to find their real self that they are comfortable living with and protraying in their art. The same goes for musicians.

The young ones that you are dissatisfied with are trying to define their own world, trying to throw everything out there to be recognized as different from…you name it …the geezers and set themselves up as artists. It might change with age, it might not, not all artists “make it!”

When I graduated from art school with a BFA and was pondering life, I thought of doing an MFA somewhere, my dad quietly said, "do you want to be a student all your life? " Well I did get an MFA and it turned out to be a waste of time and money, then went and got a MLIS, it pays the bills now! I don’t know what style I’m playing the flute in, I will eventually adapt as my own, but I do know that it will be simple in it’s idea. I painted a banner at art school to help the younger students, I went to university later in life, and it stated. “There’s nothing original in art, if you see an idea you like, steal it and make it your own.”

If it upsets you to listen to these young bubbly flute players (as it did me to watch the younger art students), don’t listen. Obviously you have an idea how you want to play the flute, then go that way, work at it, work darn hard it (not that you don’t!) You can’t spend your life worrying about what others are doing, set your own course (style), find your own way, you will be much happier with yourself.

You know what you don’t like Jack, figure out what you do like and want. happiness will follow.

MarkB

4

Can anyone try to put into words what they perceive as bubbly? Do y’all mean the general rush through a tune and ornament at every possible spot, or is it something more specific?

5

I enjoy hearing flutists play so that you can still recognize the tune. Just this week I got ahold of the CD’s of Marcas O’Murchu and of Mike Rafferty. (Thanks to the recommendations of some C&F members.) I have greatly enjoyed listening to their playing. They “serve” the tune, rather than use the tune to show-off their skills.

I’ve got some other CD’s by some of the (mostly younger) players, where it is hard to hear the tune because it’s so overwhelmed with ornaments played at an extremely fast tempo.

Jeanie

6

I’d say that that is generally true of any of the one note at a time instruments.

7

It’s a matter of taste I guess. I enjoy hearing the flute played solo more than hearing it with any type of accompniament.

8

Personally, I enjoy all sorts of different styles of flute playing. Paddy Carty and Kevin Henry (What I’ve heard of it, anyway) on through McGoldrick and Finnegan.

9

This seems to be common across the arts and even in
the humanities–young bright people seem to be better
at being quick and clever than at having deep insight
into their art. Technical chops outrun understanding.
Glenn Gould said late in his (too short) life that
when he was young he played things too fast;
I suppose he was carried away by his own
virtuosity.

Someone once mentioned
to Picasso that, while his earlier work was complex
and technical, his later work was always more
simple and colorful. To which Picasso responded:
‘It takes many years to become young.’

10

duets, trios are wonderful but a flute solo can capture the bare essence of music like no other instrument ever will.

matt molloy has said he would not want anyone trying to sound like him - and to find your own individual style or sound.

11

Hmmm, Chas… I’ll give it a shot but it might not work thru this medium. Molloy I believe started it, and then people like Egan came up and really began to overuse, in my opinion. It is a combination of piping. It’s almost like they are just adding bits of closed fingerings of piping to get the maximum amount of ornamentation. It also comes from the effect of compressed rolls and crans but the also do it on just ordinary rolls. Hehe, I really can’t describe it but I’ll point you in the direction of bubbly playing. Listen the Joey Doyle on this clip… it’s everywhere.

http://www.rte.ie/radio1/thebloomofyouth/rams/13august.smil

12

A lot of this is what some call the “finger bounce”. Basically a short trill when coming down from a higher note. Seamus Egan uses it a lot as already mentioned. So does Tom McElvogue. And of course Matt Molloy. A lot of people think of this highly ornamented style as piping style, but a lot of the techniques are not widely used in piping. Like the finger bounce thing that gives that “bubbly” sound. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think that it’s used much in piping. Crans of course are, but on flute it seems like they are used more on the middle D than the low D.

Anyway, I think it sounds great when done right. I would count players like Peter Horan, Catherine McEvoy, Josie McDermott, etc as my favorites, but I like the so-called piping style as well. It’s too bad if some players are aiming for technical brilliance above all else though, because they’re probably missing out on most of the music going that route. I bet that the people who do it well (Molloy, McElvogue, etc) had the feel for the music and were able to bring it to life a good while before they started throwing in all the flashy stuff. I dunno. Makes sense to me anyway.

13

There’s some lovely good music in that clip.

–James

14

A short trill coming down from a higher note is a piper’s trill. Unless we are talking about something else. But pounding the hole with your fingers is actually quite common in flute playing and has been going on for a long time. That is what I refer to as percussive. Bubbly refers to noises in between notes where a player might lift up a hole or tap a hole to create a bubbly noise. Which are different from cuts and taps. The hole thing seems to be a cross between tight piping and flute playing.

15

I wouldn’t think so. I actually had one of my piping students here, he does that sort of stuff and I try knocking it out of him because it’s not suitable for the pipes. It doesn’t make clean piping.

16

That’s exactly what I was talking about. Maybe “short trill” was a bad description :confused: At any rate, we’re talking about the same thing. And if I’m understanding Peter Laban right, it’s not really used in piping.

17

I don’t much care for the bubbly flute sound myself. Listening to Joey Doyle there I could picture him playing while being driven along a washboard road in a car with bad suspension. He does show ability though and if his youthful bloomin’ continues to blossom as he ages he might, in time, have another ‘face’. Hopefully not from his current one meeting the dashboard at a sudden stop!

18

There’s something to this. If you go into the Céilí House archives (24-07-2004) they replayed part of a programme from 1969. It featured two reels from Molloy about a year after his All-Ireland victory… (this would have been while he was still on the Rudall for all of the anoraks). They’re very stripped down compared to his solo albums though they still have that Molloy rip to it just not cluttered with rolls, etc.

I’m with you, Jack, about the saturation of technique in a lot of contemporary flute playing though I’m maybe not as ardent as you. Molloy and Crawford dangle over the edge sometimes but I still appreciate their playing.

In North Indian classical music the bansuri ranks just under the voice in expressive faculty. In ITM I would say the fiddle ranks above the flute because of it’s wider chromatics but the flute has a lot of dynamics that I think get overlooked in favor of technique.

Cheers,
Aaron

19

I’m guilty of getting turned on to the flute by the “bubbly” playing, and I’d wager that I am not the only one. It was the same with the whistle, I first heard it in some of the Celtic rock/pop groups around these parts, I think you know the type of whistling I am talking about. Then I started playing, listening to the standards and when I went back to listen to the whistle parts in my old cds, they just weren’t the same.

One of my first flute cds was Contentment is Wealth and I loved it, listened to it constantly. Then I picked up some others, really started practicing and when I went back to listen to Molloy… it all sounded the same. Track after track after track sounded the exact same, it all got incredibly boring. No doubt his speed and finger work is impressive, and when I listen to one of the tracks on its own, it certainly sounds cool, but it gets tiring.

20

Well, I gave the Bloom of Youth clip a listen (Joey begins about 29:30 for those who want to fast forward. Seemed like a good kid.) I was able to identify the “bubbly” stuff. Didn’t put me off too much. I suppose any technique can be overused in the course of a tune, album, or career.

I like this from Peter:

Byron