Flute Decibels

Irish Flute
1

Hi,

The flute is not the loudest instrument. I have troubles making myself heard in my local session. Nonetheless I wanted to know how loud I am (or rather can be). I do not know why but I feel when I’m around others playing my sound only very rarely gets out the the intensity I would like - this is probably for the greater good as I’m just a beginner :smiley:

OK, so I decided to measure how loud I can be on the flute, so I tried my 3 flutes: a Polymer M&E keyless, a Thibouville Lamy with 5 keys in cocus and a Yamaha YFL481H fully in silver with B foot.

I measured it in my quiet basement (background of 40 dB) and used the fantastic iPhone program Decibel - if it’s good enough for top Gear it should be enough for me!

I made 3 measurements for each flute, going for the full flute’s length: Low D, C# and high C# . Each flute was warmed and set in tune. The Yamaha was measured not with the full length (C and B are rather low) but to compare with the others the same measurement in D was made. All measurements were made at a distance of 30 cm from the mic

Here’s the results in decibels:

Y481H - D: 79, C#: 83, high C# 90
Thibouville- D: 77, C#: 86, high C# 89
M&E - D: 82, C#: 88, high C# 92

So, Mr Cronnolly is to be congratulated as makes really loud flutes! I was impressed with the results I got for low D. The polymer flute appears to be louder than even a silver flute. The Thibouville is quieter than the others but not as much as I was expecting When the embouchure is correct (which is Very tricky) one can hear it roar on the lower notes. I can only attribute the low results of the Yamaha flute to my embouchure, not adequate to a silver flute - I have played that for a while some years ago, but totally lost interest.

As anyone has done similar measures on their instruments? I would like to know your results! Of course I know that the results depend as well as the player as the instrument, but nevertheless I would like to know how you, fine players with marvelous instruments (Olwells, McGees, Watson’s, Murrays…), can make yourself heard on noisy sessions, and please report if you have measured your loudness

Thanks for your input!

2

Flutes can get very loud. A button accordion player (loud instrument!) once said me that the volume of my flute (it was a Lehart at that time) was making him deaf :smiley: I’m not always THAT loud though…
I’ve tried a Yamaha flute like a week ago (in the 600 euros price range, for quality reference) and it was louder than most flutes I’ve tried (not too sure about Olwell’s and Hamilton’s prattens though). Unfortunately I can’t measure the decibels.
I remember maybe Doug Tipple measuring something? And perhaps mr. McGee…

3

I did some internet searches on this subject over a year ago and was amazed at how loud flutes can be in the upper octave. I have tinnitus and at the time it was really bugging me. But at session it’s the fiddles that really kill my ears. If I sit betwixt two of them I’ll be havin’ a powerful headache the next day.

Cheers,

Kirk