Just to share a bit of my excitement of having taken delivery yesterday of the 6-key Pratten-style flute in blackwood that John Gallagher made for me.
It’s a lovely thing.
The workmanship is top-notch and very fine. I didn’t know he was going to do it, but John fitted my flute with a screw-cork adjustor: the silver pin that exits the end-cap has little graded lines etched on it for reference (derived, John says, from Baroque flutes, when players frequently adjusted the cork to match their corps de rechange). The end of the pin is cut into subtle facets. He also made my flute with the sort of rounded-end footjoint I’ve seen on some nineteenth-century flutes, as opposed to the squared off end most modern flutes have.
The silverwork and keys are very nice, and the keys work smoothly and seem quite solid. I’m new to keys, so I’ll have more to say about them as I learn the things.
I’ve only got about ten minutes playing time on it, but I can tell the flute suits me right to the ground. I was dreading a long embouchure-adjustment battle, but no: within a minute, it was sounding loud, solid, clear, reedy – just what I’d wanted. Super easy to fill the flute; it plays, in this respect, very like some of the Olwells I’ve played. I can tell it’s capable of more than I can give it, so I look forward to earning the thing’s respect, in time!
Finger ornaments were crisp, and the flute is agile and, as I noted, very easy to fill. The finger spread is (for me) very easy. In fact, the right-hand toneholes seem considerably easier to cover than those of most of my keyless flutes. I usually use a sort of quasi-piper’s grip on my right hand, but I may switch to fingertips on this flute.
I don’t have nearly enough time to write a comprehensive review of the instrument, but will try to remember to do so in future. I can take some digital photos of it, but I might need a volunteer to host them. Any takers? (And any advice on photographing blackwood flutes?)
I wrote John last night after I played the flute and put it away, and received a nice note from him this morning (he’s a great guy with whom to work). He mentioned in that reply that he’d asked Ivan Goff and Louise Mulcahy each to try my flute while they were teaching in Elkins, and that they both liked it. So I’m looking forward to learning more about the flute and possibly seeing in it the same qualities that those fine players saw (though I’ll never be at their level of excellence, of course).
Can’t wait to get home tonight and put some more time in on the flute!