Just a question I pose to myself in the shower. It seems to me that folk on this list have (on general) more flutes than they have hands to play them. Is there a major difference in the sound of one flute over another, or is it a case of like attracting like? Are we all searching for that one flute to rule them all - and if so - what do we do with the runner-ups? These are the imponderables that keep me up at night… E.
One can never have ‘enough’ flutes.
Unless one is a flautist with one of those new-fangled metal things, in which case only one is necessary. Until the pads go sticky, the rods bend, bits fall off and the silvery metal goes black. Then you flog it on eBay and buy another one (usually exactly the same as the one you just sold, but shinier, and with no bent rods or sticky pads). Unless you’re Sir James Galway, then you have two (probably just in case one falls to bits in the middle of a concert). He got around the silvery-bits-going-black problem by having his made in a goldy colour.
Ed, you certainly know how to have a fun evening!
Perhaps you should take up a hobby.
Whistle?
I can’t speak to anyone’s experience except my own.
I started playing flute with the Boehm-system silver orchestral flute. So call that flute number 1.
Flute number 2 was a Baroque flute that I started playing in an early music consort in college–also aquired several recorders for the same group. That traverso was my first wooden flute.
There was a long period – about 10 years – where I didn’t play flute or anything else.
Flute number 3 was an old 8-key which was in pretty bad shape. I had it appraised for a friend, and when it appraised at a very low value, I bought it and had it overhauled. To have tunes to play on it, and to start getting some “chops” back after laying out for so long, I starting hunting up free music online, many of which were Irish trad tunes.
In the process, I got myself addicted to Irish tunes and to the sound of the Irish flute. Mat Molloy’s recording of his extended version of the Mason’s Apron fascinated me, and I began to have an almost obsessive desire to learn how he made the flute make the little “diddle-de-dum” sound that I now know are various kinds of rolls and other ornamentation.
Right about at this point I met some local musicians and we started learning to play Irish music…badly, at first, and then better as we got a few years into it.
At some point in this I put my first web page up that had recordings of my instruments and a few of the band.
Michael Cronnolly saw the website and, probably out of pity for hearing my struggling to make that leaky old 8-key play, he made me a flute and sent it to me as a gift. That was flute number 4.
Flute number 4 about a year later went back to Ireland for a visit, and then came home to me having grown 6 keys. 
Then I read about the Seery flute and heard Tom Doorley play one on his recordings with Danu, so I got a Seery Pratten model. That was flute number 5.
Michael Cronnolly at some point after that started making his Rudall & Rose model, and sent me one of his first. That was flute number 6.
He also sent me one of his whistles, and a little high F piccolo that I think he made as a joke but which I can actually (barely!) play. It is so small that my fingers are not only touching but are pressed together to cover the tone holes. I call it my “ouchpfife.”
About this time I started taking some lessons online from Scoiltrad and began to try to relearn how to play the tunes, closer to the right way.
Also about this time I got on Terry McGee’s tour for his RAF flute.
That wonderful flute convinced me I wanted a high-end, wooden Irish flute.
Conal O’Grada was the Scoiltrad flute teacher, and he recommended Hamilton flutes, so my generous wife got Hammy Hamilton to make me a flute. That was flute number 7.
My Hamilton is the flute I play in sessions, and it’s without a doubt my best flute. However, each of these instruments is a part of my history and has meaning to me…and the polymer flutes are very handy for grabbing quick tunes, because I can leave them on my desk and just grab-and-blow when I get a second to play a tune or three.
I never set out to be a flute collector or to have many instruments. But I do think that each flute plays differently and requires a different approach, and I think having them and learning to switch between them “on the fly” has made me a better flutist than I would have been otherwise.
I know there are flutists who recommend getting one good flute and playing only it and never anything else. And this makes sense, too, especially for a player who’s just learning to control his sound and is in the first stages of learning tone production.
So there is something to be said on both sides of that particular argument (which resurfaces here on these boards from time to time.)
That’s my story and why I have multiple flutes. Doubtless each person has their own story, all different.
–James
Ed, ostensibly we’re supposed to release the “runners-up” back into the universe where somehow they’ll become someone else’s magic flute and thus swing all fluteal karma into perfect A=436 - A=455 balance.
But of course, that would require us subverting human nature, which never works that way (cf the fundamental Appliances on Rural Front Porches Paradigm).
So onward we shuffle, wearily tending our flute flocks … endlessly playing, oiling, swaddling, encasing, dampening, drying and generally protecting them against the caprices of Nature …
… 
! 
… The ungrateful wretches. Anyone want to buy some flutes?
we don’t need more then one decent flute, but it’s cheaper the therapy, and maintains it’s value.
i like flutes, if i could, i’d have one from each maker if money was not an issue, in part even just to support their effort (i can think of much easier way to make a living then being a flute maker).
I also don’t always drink the same beer, but that’s me 
I would agree with this, if you have flute with no keys and either played inside or a polymer flute. I think it nice to have an outdoor/in the shower, maintenence free polymer/ backup flute and a primary flute. If they have similar playing properties, all the better.
But I am a hack, so take advice from pros.
I guess I’m a catch and release kind of guy. I only have one flute these days.
I did have two flutes for a couple of years (although they weren’t always the same two flutes)…but I’m at peace with my current flute, and don’t feel the need to keep another laying around gathering dust. Underplayed instruments, unless they’re whistles (I have 3*), tend to make me feel guilty.
Eric
- An underplayed whistle is infinitely superior to a poorly played whistle.
Don’t let Eilam fool you - I think he does have at least one flute from every good maker!
Tod
Voice of inexperience, here.
For me, a bucket of PVC flutes is needed, 'cause you never know when you’ll need a Db, or a low A pentatonic. (not really, but it’s fun)
Something bulletproof for ITM in the shower is nice; I’ve got the Hammy practice flute for now.
A killer session keyless - on order.
A keyed flute for those chromatic thingies (I’m a sucker for Bach & Mozart): currently an Old Dead German 4-key, but I’m upgrading to a good old English style flute with more oomph and all the keys I’ll ever need.
A traverso, for authenticity and late-night practice. The Ronnberg is going out for restoration soon.
7452 whistles. Still a ways to go.
It really depends on personality, what types of music you want to play, and outright envy and greed. Being realistic, a pro with a full schedule would need 2 excellent, played-in instruments, nearly equal in quality and personality. That way, performance could not be compromised by unexpected cracks or thefts (feces occur).
yes Tod, but in an ideal world, i would only strive for it, yet put my money where it will grow.
we all have walls to climb, or flute to sell.
i am a man of many walls, or just really tall ones 
There was a time when I had about 30 flutes. I loved them, loved the fact that each had a different voice and different embouchure requirements. As my moods changed, different ones among them called to me to play them. I loved the sweetness of the Murrays, the honk of the Hamiltons, the ease of the Olwells, etc. Then during one year, after years of easy and event-free flute maintenance, I had two flutes crack. I started to feel guilty about having so many wooden flutes. Of course I didn’t look at or play each of them every day, or even every week. I had been playing Boehm flutes, too, and they required such little maintenance. I signed a contract for the Boehm flute of my dreams, which hasn’t begun production yet, and I sold just about all of my wooden flutes. I kept a boxwood Olwell D with no tuning slide, a Burns folk flute and Burns A/Bb flute, a couple of flutes I made with Dave Copley, a Hammy F flute, Sweet flutes and fifes in various keys and a bunch of bamboo flutes in various keys, as well as 4 very special Boehm flutes (and, of course, a number of whistles in various keys). I have since ordered a Hammy D, as that rich, creamy sound is really the only one I miss and can’t approximate on any of my other flutes.
I used to say one should have as many great flutes as one can afford, but now I think one should have as many great flutes as one can maintain well.
James Galway, by the way, has many, many flutes, but they are made of metal and won’t break from neglect.
…and I think I own Jessie’s 4pc Olwell keyless…which IMO is and AMAZING instrument. I have since ordered a cocus 4pc (Olwell) after playing skelton’s and this’ll go on the market then. Thanx again Jessie.
i have one boehm flute and a delrin Jon C. hybrid coming. i have various dreams of keyed flutes and handmade boehm flutes, but i have 2 more concertinas on the way, so its probably not going to happen for a very long time.
“need” is an interesting term/concept…
I’d say one needs as many as one can reasonably afford and play… although “reasonably” is also an interesting term/concept…
LOTS! 
I have a polymer (M & E Rudall) that does everything I really “need” in a flute. Keys would be awesome, wood would be good, but there are so many tunes I have yet to learn, and so much technique and musicality that I can still learn on this flute, that I don’t really “need” another one.
Which didn;t prevent me from ordering a nice big low flute about a year ago
But I tend to cycle through instruments of different classes rather than within a class. My last phase was electric guitars. I still have my one 6-string (Rickenbacker 330, natural - great guitar) but I sold my 12-string to finance my next flute.
My next one will be a keyed flute or a harp. Seriously. Haven’t decided yet.
How about a keyed harp?
I hear ya, dude. Please, please don’t tell me you’re making keyed flutes. At least not 'til next tax year.
On a related topic, who else is itching to get on Loren’s Guinea Pig list? C&F might be better than the NASDAQ (just kidding, Dale… I’m not into ‘investing’ and flogging tooters, except for ODG firewood. I’m now buying superglue and epoxy in bulk).