Hello Folks,
I just got notification of the expected delivery of one of the first four new Copeland flutes made to be delivered 2/17/04! I’ll try to contain my excitement and first impressions until then.‘:boggle:’
BL
Please give us a review!
Hello again,
My new Copeland flute has arrived and I am quite pleased with it!
I’ll begin with a brief description:
The body is well polished blackwood with Sterling rings 6mm wide with a “bead” machined in the center of each ring.
Very nicely done.
The head has an oval / tending toward two semicircles embouchure hole. The stopper is cork lined blackwood (could be Delrin, I din’t push it out) sliding in the brass head lining.
The tuning slide is perfectly fitted brass and has a Sterling lining to show on the outside.
The Pratten style mid-section has cork wrapped tenons and the left hand tone holes are very comfortably spaced (2-1/2" from the center of G to the center of E).
It feels like less of a stretch than my Copeland Low D but I don’t have that at hand to check at the moment.
The foot joint is long style and balances the look and feel very nicely.
Overlall, the turning profile is a straight taper with no bulges near the slide socket giving a clean line to the flute.
I cannot find one part inside or out to quibble about, the design and workmanship are excellent.
Sound:
Ahh… the subjective arts…
My embouchure is still adjusting so I won’t go very far into this.
Suffice it to say (ten minutes a day remember 
)
each day I make progress toward the “riding the edge between octaves” sound I try to maintain in my playing.
Very early on, I am getting glimpses of the tone I was hoping for. Sweet and fine when blown softly and a barker when you put the pedal down.
I may be wrong, but could the Prowse that inspired this flute design be the mid-19th century Prowse that Tim Britton plays? Interested minds want to know.
I look forward to the observations of other owners.
Brian
sounds very nice. Thanks
100-1 odds that the stopper is Delrin - it’s simply a better choice than wood for the given task.
Loren
Brian,
As I quote Michael, “Indeed it is”!
BTW, the “cork” is Cork-lined Delrin
Enjoy,
Jim
Hello yet again,
After three weeks playing the new Copeland, I have a couple more observations regarding the sound.
One of my criteria in choosing a flute or whistle is the Cnat note.
To me, it’s best when the half-holed Cnat matches in pitch and vol. the cross fingered Cnat. My Copeland is dead on in this respect.
I use either fingering depending upon the passage, so I really like having them so similar. And this is all without compromizing a good C#.
I also have been finding that the flute starts to speak with a very minimum air/speed requirment. A note can be made to very slowly come up from silence, build up to max vol. and slowly receed to silence very smothly. Great for airs.
I am assuming this is due to crafting a great embouchure design, rather than my still adjusting efforts at an embouchure match.
Any thoughts?
Brian