i dont think it’s far that when a violin player plays their instrument in folk music it changes name. how come my grandma plays a fiddle, when the violin she has is very obviously capable of playing classical music?
as my avatar might suggest, not only do i play a wonderful, irish flute, but i play the silver flute (with a dave copley headjoint). when i play the silver flute, i approach it as two instruments, just as a violin player would approach the fiddle differently, even if they were the same person on the same instrument. i hardly ever play classical, just as my grandma doesnt play violin (though she learned at one point so she could learn to read music), but when i do, in my mind it is not the same instrument. when i play irish music, i roll in the headjoint, change my embouchure, and change my fingerings, just as a violin player would start using open strings, stop using vibrato, change their bowing habits, and never leave first position to play the fiddle.
so, now, i no longer pick up my flute, i pick up my floodle. that’s right. fiddlers shouldnt get all the linguistic benefits of playing an ancient and respected instrument, floodles have just as proud a folk history! why should only the violin get an anglo-saxon name?
that also means that you may call me a floodler, as i’m not pretentious enough to be a flute player, .
all portmanteaux aside, does anybody have any ideas for an anglo-saxon derivative word for flute? i’m all for spending my time deriving new terms instead of practicing.
New names for our cherished instruments should be validated like baby names. Floodle gets almost 17,000 Google hits and it’s being used by a number of domain names. There’s also an entry in the Urban Dictionary–but viewer discretion is advised (I would prefer not to be called a floodler!).
The problem with “floodler” is that some would pronounce it “fludler.”
In non-Irish settings, I’ve had people refer to my flute as my pipe (as opposed to “pipes”), which I rather liked. Sort of like having a guitar refered to as your ax. To me it has the same feel as “fiddle” - a sort of affectionate slang term for what is formally known under another name.
Well, violin and fiddle have the same eytmology: Vitula, a Roman goddess of joy and victory. Is there a similar word to flute with the same etymolgy? Or maybe a cool sounding goddess we could name it after?
Since it’s a transverse flute we could call it a “tranny.” Or how about use the Italian traverso and call it a Travis?
darn! they’re all good. though i like “the toot”, i cant imagine myself saying just as i cant imagine using floodle.
i like to say that i spend too much (or not enough time) shoving “that stick” into my face. although i play wooden flute more now (or at least wooden headjoint), i dont know if i like it as much… i liked the sound of “metal stick.”
pipe sounds like a really good nick name, nice and folksy.
what does anybody think about the tube?
skh-- since you can verb any noun and noun any verb, what about the blow? (kidding!)
this has nothing to do with anything, but a couple weeks ago, someone asked to see my antique flute, and i said, “it’s over there in the pile of flutes at the foot of my bed.” does anybody irresponsibly keep their instruments in piles in easy to step on places?
You are correct, although I think “horn” is best confined to something that has a bell at the end of it. And although used fairly universally, I think “ax” is generally thought of as reference to a guitar or bass. Maybe banjo and mandolin, but one tends to hear it more in rock circles than in trad.
Flute should really have its very own trad designation. One that is dignified, yet playful; descriptive, yet whimsical; folksy, yet sophisticated; self-deprecating, yet with its head held high; not too sweet, not too tart; fair and balanced; something we can all agree upon, yet flexible in its useage; a word that can be spoken trippingly on the tongue without irony, but aglow with affection. A word for the Ages. Something that says, “I am an exponent of the beautiful melodies of Ireland, hear me roar!” without being pretentious.
At the end of the show the other night, Paddy Keenen called out to someone in the audience and said something like, “Jim? Where are you? I know you’ve got that axe of yours, now get on up here!” Jim plays fiddle.
I think flute is fine. Wooden flute, Timber flute (that’s the one Paul Bunyan plays, right?) or Irish flute.
I suggest the other guys start calling what they play a flaut.
Pass. Call me boring, even recidivist. I like plain ol’ flute. Can’t think of anything better, and I think it meets all of Cubitt’s criteria. Nicknames are fine when they work - that’s the point, whether they’re humourous, affectionate or derogatory. If they’re forced and artificial, don’t strike a natural chord, then they don’t work. There are some mildly amusing suggestions here, but nothing that works; at least, not yet. I like word games, as most of you have realised/suffered by now, but inspiration ain’t coming on this one.
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