I’ve been playing flute about 10 months and just assumed that my C natural cross fingering from whistle (OXX OOO) would apply to the flute. Just returned from Celtic Week at Swannoa and learned that some flutes need OXO XXX to get a C natural in tune. So, I experimented with my flute and tuner and it looks like the best C natural gets produced on my flute with OXX XOO. Is that a commonly used cross fingering on a flute?
Thanks for any wisdom.
John
It isn’t commonly the best (nor is oxx ooo, as you’ve learned), but it is one that does usually give a C nat. You’re going the right way about evaluating what works best on your flute. One possible drawback to using oxx xoo is that it is also the C# fingering for the octave above (3rd), which could be confusing, but if it gives the best sound and you’re comfy with using it, do. Plenty of old threads on Cnat fingerings if you use the search function.
You may also find it worthwhile to explore what you use on whistles.
I find oxx xox useful on some flutes. Just one finger away from middle d (oxx xxx) and so d-c becomes very easy. But, as Jem says, it varies a lot between flutes. Some will make that way flat.
Terry
Some of the modern makers make the C# hole larger, to bring the C# more in tune, however this effects the Cnat fingering,
oxx ooo will make the Cnat to sharp. For flutes like Olwell’s “Nicholson’s” you need the oxx xox fingering.
oxx ooo
or
oxo ooo
Those are standard and what you’ll find in most tutor books.
For what it’s worth anecdotally, I’ve rarely run across someone using these fingerings -
oxx xoo
oxx xox
oxo xxx
When I have it’s usually been someone with a Burns flute (he recommends the last one if I remember correctly) or someone learning from the internet.
To me those fingerings have a different tone to them altogether and stand out. They’re not hard to do but again to me, they just feel clunky.
In general, in order of importance, it’s rhythm, then tone, then tuning. No point in having a perfectly in tune ‘C’ if it just sounds funny.
This is well-trodden territory, but FWIW oxo ooo is very poor save as a fudge/passing fingering on virtually all flutes - way sharp - I’ve never seen it in a tutor book or a fingering chart. oxx ooo is the most commonly given/taught ITM fingering but is not usually the “best” on the majority of flutes (or whistles), notwithstanding its use by many fine players. It is often the best on Pratten style flutes, but not others. In my experience most so-called Rudall type flutes (including the original R&Rs) work better with oxo xxx if one does an objective exploration of the available alternatives, as the OP is sensibly doing. It is, I believe, the most commonly found cross-fingering in period charts (whence I learned it and adopted its use when I first transferred to simple system from Bohm flute, long before the internet!). It also has the advantage Terry mentioned for oxx xox (the best fingering on many whistles, on which oxx ooo is commonly sharp) of only requiring a single finger change to D. Of course, facility from habit and also taste in the particular tone-colour of one’s C nat can affect one’s perspective. On the majority of flutes I have played oxx ooo is flat and/or rather veiled and oxo xxx is best in tune and has strongest and clearest tone - but I know of exceptions. On flute I quite often use oxo xxo as a fudged fingering in e.g. E minor arpeggios, but on my whistles I’d use oxx xoo or oxx xxo in similar contexts.
Keep in mind, though, that it is not only tuning but tone that matters when choosing a Cnat fingering. Additionally, balancing both with speed/accessibility is a must. oxx ooo is what’s used by most trad players out there, simply because it’s adequately in tune, has an open sound, and is quicker to get on and off of at dance tempo than the 2-handed alternatives.
I myself use oxo xxx in slow airs because it has a certain wild, hairy shading to it, and responds well to lipping up/down. I don’t like it for jigs and reels, for the most part, largely for reasons of technique but also tone.
My fave, though, is xox xxx xx …
Rob
Agreed, it’s not a good fingering for a true C natural, but it does make a lovely piping C or C supernatural, whatever one calls it. I remember a class with Mike Rafferty, and he was using this fingering for part of a tune, and one of us asked if he was playing a C or a C#…neither, the answer turned out to be. (Actually, the answer from Mike was “I’m not the one to ask,” but that’s the fingering he showed us.)
oxo ooo is very poor save as a fudge/passing fingering on virtually all flutes - way sharp - I’ve never seen it in a tutor book or a fingering chart. oxx ooo is the most commonly given/taught ITM fingering but is not usually the “best” on the majority of flutes (or whistles), notwithstanding its use by many fine players.
oxo ooo is good enough for Matt Molloy & Kevin Crawford
e.g. - Matt Molloy at 4:08 plays a nice big long ‘C’ natural that way in a slow air
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0s3EU2b3g8E&feature=related
There’s nothing wrong with that fingering! People use it. Really, really, good players use it.
In my experience most so-called Rudall type flutes (including the original R&Rs) work better with oxo xxx if one does an objective exploration of the available alternatives, as the OP is sensibly doing. It is, I believe, the most commonly found cross-fingering in period charts (whence I learned it and adopted its use when I first transferred to simple system from Bohm flute, long before the internet!).
I bet it sounds great in period music, but I still think it sounds weird in ‘trad’. You’re dismissing the two most common and standard fingerings and replacing it with something else.
IMO you should say something like - “Almost everyone plays it one of two ways, but I prefer to do it this other way. Check out my sound samples on the bottom of this message and decide for yourself.”
When playing dance music at a pretty good clip, I usually use oxx ooo. If it’s off a few cents–it will be–or has a slightly different timbre–it does–you’re not normally going to be staying on the note long enough for anyone to notice much of a difference. Sometimes if makes sense to use one of the other fingerings, and there’s nothing wrong with that, either. Also sometimes it’s very handy to use the long C key if you have one.
When playing slower pieces, or especially when playing other genres of music, I’ll pick the fingering that works best both in the context of being in-tune within the scale and also of keeping the intervals as correct as possible.
In all cases, let your ear be your guide for your fingers. If it sounds wrong to you, it will also very likely sound wrong to someone else, so don’t do it that way.
–James
P.S. George, I gave some of your clips a listen. I’m going to go back and listen again (and again and again I suspect) as I have more time. Lovely stuff!
I usually use oxx ooo, in some passages (like sometimes on cbc) i half hole, other times i use the oxo ooo.
P.S. George, I gave some of your clips a listen. I’m going to go back and listen again (and again and again I suspect) as I have more time. Lovely stuff!
I’m also deeply impressed, that’s really awesome stuff, and particularly like this style of fiddle playing… any chance to find more about you guys?
If you say so - I’ve not had the opportunity to so closely examine their fingering habits - but great geniuses and virtuosos often use nuanced variant techniques that are not necessarily part of the core method…
Well, if I’m looking at the same thing, he actually has R3 firmly down and vibratos with R2 and R1, R2 barely lifting clear… thanks for the clip ref., BTW - I hadn’t seen that one before. Nice.
OK, QED, and I’ve not at any point said oxo ooo was “wrong”! But this thread was started by a flute newbie asking for help and I think I was trying to address that in an evaluative fashion. I have never before in the many previous discussions on C&F of this general topic come across so firm an advocate of oxo ooo as yourself, George, nor indeed any mention of it other than what I described it as - a special use variant, not a main choice. Nor has it ever been suggested to me at workshops etc. I’m not closed to it, mind!
I don’t really play any early to mid C19th classical music, so I couldn’t say. But (regardless of musical genre) on most of my flutes, and especially my R&R, oxx ooo is flat and veiled compared to oxo xxx, which is near as dammit the same as the keyed note. It doesn’t sound “weird” at all - to me - and it has advantages of finger-fluency in most contexts over oxx ooo. This is subjective stuff, of course - it’s all about what we expect to hear/want to achieve. As others have pointed out, mostly in fast tunes we don’t really care about or notice such subtleties of tone and intonation and facility of fingering is paramount
No I’m not/didn’t. Please re-read my two previous posts a little more closely. I agree I was fairly dismissive of oxo ooo, but not totally so. From my own experience of watching and learning from other players and from reading, both online and elsewhere, I don’t accept that oxo ooo is at all common or “standard”, though I don’t deny it can be used effectively. As Rob says, one doesn’t always want the strongest/clearest/most in tune… at least, very advanced players are in a position to make those kinds of choices. What tutor books have you (seen) that advocate it as a main fingering?
I fully accept that oxx ooo is the “standard” ITM-taught fingering and I pointed out it is often the best on Pratten style flutes, but I do not find it so on Rudalls and “Rudall style” flutes. However, I have at least one instrument on which it is the best fingering for intonation and tone and I use it on that.
We don’t even know what flute the OP has, so from the start I’ve been carefully open-ended in my comments as different flutes can behave quite differently from each other within a certain range of possibilities.
As for conditional language - well… I’m sorry it wasn’t conditional enough for you - and obviously I have been expressing my opinions - no need to lard my text with redundant “IMOs” etc. As for clips - they’re there - help yourself. I just enjoyed listening to a couple of yours.
Well, if I’m looking at the same thing, he actually has R3 firmly down and vibratos with R2 and R1, R2 barely lifting clear.
Back it up a couple of seconds, he clearly hits the C then brings down the other two fingers for vibrato.
Here’s another Matt Molloy about 2:24
He ends the part on a C, ring finger’s down again but argue it’s just for support and doesn’t affect the pitch at all.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtSjM3YU7Qw&feature=related
Here’s Kevin Crawford on a slow air right around 0:40
Straight up - oxo ooo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUQmZBUPsx8&feature=related
OK, QED, and I’ve not at any point said oxo ooo was “wrong”! But this thread was started by a flute newbie asking for help and I think I was trying to address that in an evaluative fashion. I have never before in the many previous discussions on C&F of this general topic come across so firm an advocate of oxo ooo as yourself, George, nor indeed any mention of it other than what I described it as - a special use variant, not a main choice. Nor has it ever been suggested to me at workshops etc. I’m not closed to it, mind!
I’m not an advocate for oxo ooo and I don’t generally use it, but it’s normal, common & an excellent fingering.
I said “There’s nothing wrong with that fingering!”, as in it’s not inferior, not that Jem say’s it wrong to use it. I got that impression of your opinion of oxo ooo and oxx ooo from comments earlier -
“It isn’t commonly the best (nor is oxx ooo, as you’ve learned)”
“FWIW oxo ooo is very poor save as a fudge/passing fingering on virtually all flutes”
“oxx ooo is the most commonly given/taught ITM fingering but is not usually the “best” …”
I have a Noy Rottenburgh that really requires OXO OOO for the first-octave Cnat. You’d think it would be easier to play it with one finger, but by now I’m pretty much hard-wired into the two-finger Cnat. I’ll learn. Eventually. Maybe.
I buy that OXO XXX is generally a clearer and more in-tune Cnat for most Rudall-style flutes. But many of them also have flat C#'s, so OXX OOO is often a good compromise. As I think most of us have agreed in the past, it’s good to be flexible and to use different fingerings as circumstances require/allow.
Regardless of the kind of music you are playing, one of the strengths of the simple-system wooden flute is the large number of alternate fingerings that can be used on many of the notes. These can be used to correct pitch, or to change tone, or to simply something to make it easier to play. Many Irish flutists play middle D with the L1 down, for instance, either to ease the break between the octaves, or sometimes to punch the note hard as a special “hard D” effect–you can hear a lot of that in Matt Molloy’s playing.
On the art music side, there are also some fingerings that are better for very soft or very loud playing. Also, because of the intervals between notes in each scale, some fingerings that work very well in some keys may not work well at all in other keys.
Now I don’t advocate sitting down with a complicated fingering chart and trying to memorize dozens of special fingerings. What I do think every flutist should do, though, is spend a little time with their instrument just sort of feeling it out. That middle D–is it as well in tune with L1 down as it is with L1 up? What happens if I finger this note or that note and jump up into the next partial? Does high D sound better with oxx|ooo or oxx|xxx or even xxx|ooo? Can I get a B-flat with xxo|xxx? Does high B care if any (or all) of the right-hand fingers are down?
Every flute is a little different. By spending a little time “noodling around” on your instrument, you may just discover a neat trick or two.
–James
Use what works best and sounds best in the situation. Sometimes you feel like a “nyaaah”, sometimes you don’t.
XO,
oxx xox (or xox xoxx on me piobhs)
An un-neat trick is that going from OXO|XXX cnat to OXX|XXX D I sometimes get a Bb squawk; without too much effort I can maintain it with OXX|XXX but wouldn’t want to - it’s in tune but sounds horrid. Solution is either XXX|XXX for the d or breath control that tends to accent the change.
Is this a common feature ?
As an avowed main-user of oxo xxx I can say that in my many years experience of using it on my R&R and on most of my other flutes I’ve never noticed that happen and it certainly isn’t a recurrent problem. As it is my normal fingering I automatically use it when picking up a strange-to-me flute and, whilst I do meet some on which I quickly chose to experiment with the alternatives, it hasn’t been for that reason. Indeed, on my R&R and most flutes oxo xxx works very well for a trill to/from D or in a roll on Cnat, as I’ve mentioned elsewhere before. Which is not to say that it might not or cannot be a problem on some specific flutes, as maybe yours… but “common feature”, I’d say not.
James’ advice hits the nail on the head.
Maybe it’s a quirk of where the holes have to be for the small-handed Burns, I guess it must be the C# pulled down by the lower fingers. In practice it normally only shows as a slight initial chirp if I want a quiet ‘middle’ D, and my embouchure seems to have got to the point where I can do that with XXX|XXX.
It was informative to work through this: http://www.oldflutes.com/charts/onekey/index.htm - only the cross fingered F natural was a complete failure. The tricky part is progamming the best options into the grey matter - so far only G# is available, on a good day.