So, yesterday I walked into my office (ok, it’s only a cube now) and what is sitting on my desk but an old wooden flute. Now, other instruments have followed me home before (strumstick, saxophone, harpsichord, half of an autoharp) but never a flute. Seems someone in my office found it while cleaning out his mom’s house and thought I might want it. Looks to be of the old band variety with no markings other than “Germany”. All keys are there, no visible cracks and the only thing missing is the end ring. It plays pretty well as long as I leave the keys alone but since they are there, it would be nice to be able to use them. Is this type of flute exorbitant to refurbish and who works on them? I have a vague remembrance of a past post where someone suggested this type of flute only merited a do-it-yourself job, but I’m clueless on repair of keyed instruments and at this moment have nothing invested in it.
Get quotes from more than one woodwind repair facility if that’s possible. Refurbishing keys is a fairly inexpensive job, at least as compared with the usual prices of flutes themselves.
Well, it looks like wood as I can see grain, but the whole thing is very smooth (as in polished). It’s pretty heavy too. Were Bakelite instruments make to look like woodgrain or were they just black?
DOH!