My Alan Ginsberg D Keyless flute Pratten copy made from Rosewood arrived this morning Friday 12 March 2004 four days after I sent Alan the cheque on Monday 8 March 2004.
The Price for the keyless flute including wooden case and P+P was £420 pounds streling.
It will take me a few days to get used to the blowing and finger grip as I use the Uilleann Pipes grip.
After playing the flute the inside of flute was wet from playing so I cleaned the flute using long peice of brass wire with kitchen paper and the paper had brown stuff after cleaning. The flute seem to play better after that.
Did it see the best minds of its generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix, angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night?
I’m sorry. There was a great American poet who died on 1997. He was Allen Ginsberg, though, not Alan. But close enough. The poem i was quoting in my previous post is called Howl. Much more could be said, but it should be easy to Google for it.
I’m sure it’s a very nice flute. Back to our normal program.
As the moisture accumulates inside the flute, you’ll notice it lose power and volume, especially in the low octave. Removing the moisture will bring it back to normal. You probably should use a cleaning stick made of plastic or wood, and a rag. You really don’t want to hurt the inside of the flute.
The brown stuff might have been oil. It’s common for flute players to oil the inside of their instruments to smooth it out for better sound, and as a magical incantation to protect the wood from cracking.
It’s important to remove the moisture as well as you can before you store the flute too, or there’s a risk that one side of the flute will absorb more moisture than the other – this is one of the ways that flutes crack.
AG was in love with me for five minutes
in 1980. Honestly. He kicked me in the stomach
in 1971, but he did it very gently.
I don’t think he remenbered me
in 1980 as the fellow he had assaulted
nine years before.
Maybe the brass wires would
best be replaced by something
less abrasive. Best
P.S. AG the poet, I meant, not
AG the flute maker.
I have to agree with Glauber. If his name is Alan Ginsburg..I too think way to much of Howl. I studied writing at a Tibetan Buddhist Arts College in Boulder, Colorado–the department named the Jack Keroac School of Disembodied Poetics that was founded by Allen G…and twice per year, he’d be up on stage, surrounded by Tibetan Buddhist Thanka paintings, screeching out a Howl performance.
The new Alan should change his flute company’s name.
I beg your pardon!
He never got to first base.
I met Corso, too,
and Peter Orlovsky.
It’s really hard to be
old beatniks or hippies,
and poets are generally
weird. Consider Dale. Best
I was helping this friend unload her instruments
at the Gaelic Club in Sydney
(late seventies)
and this guy was looking at me
and I heard him say with an Irish accent,
“weeird”.
I’d never seen him before
and I doubt he had ever seen my poems.
By poets I don’t mean people who write
the occasional poem, but people who consider themselves
poets. There must be exceptions, Dale, for instance,
but generally what a pack of egomaniacs!
Thank heaven I had no talent. Indeed,
the project was motivated entirely by sexual
frustration and came to a complete
halt when I married. Best
