Yes, David. But ultimately we simply cannot find out why some Irish players back in the C19th or earlier may have started to use it. None of them wrote a rationale or even a description, let alone a tutorial exposition. We do know that it was and still is frowned upon and denigrated in classical circles throughout, ditto using a plosive (P) sound to initiate a note. Yet both glottals and plosives are legitimate techniques and effects to use if one takes a wider view that any variation which offers something different can be put to good use. My presumption would be that, among non-classically trained/exposed early ITM fluters, simply some discovered they could do it/use it, maybe found it easier than tonguing, liked the effect and went with it. No need to postulate it being a result of having to use unresponsive or faulty instruments. We’ll never know how far that was true in any case. It worked, was liked, was disseminated… It also seems to me (N.B. this is a speculation!) that there is some chance that language/linguistic factors might be relevant - the kinds of sounds, mouth shapes etc. which come more naturally to Irish speakers/speakers of Irish-influenced English - that gutteral throat sounds might be more part of their general phonetics than light tongue-tip strokes such as come so naturally to the French…
Maybe the early Irish flute players were people who liked to mouth whistle or lilt.
I can’t work out how to link the post but back 2009 a reliable source on this board was quoted as saying that whistler Donncha O’Briain used glottal stops rather than tonguing. (I can’t do it to any useful effect on whistle)
They had access to great flutes that were available to them, for whatever reason.
That is not maybe entirely true. From what I have heard from older players over time, flutes were more often than not not easy to come by and what decent flutes did become available were mostly ones sent or brought over from England or America. In rural areas particularly it was not easy (or even possible) to have repairs done and keep instruments going.
FWIW and not addressing th OP, I can do it just as readily on either flute or whistle - don’t really see any difference there. I just don’t much like (doing) it - I prefer unstopped on-beat breath pushes and very occasional very light tongue-strokes in my own playing.
I agree with an implication of earlier comments that, just listening and not being told what is being used, when done very well it is virtually impossible to distinguish glottalling from tonguing. But I tend not to like very much playing which is heavily laden with very obvious glottalling - I don’t care how “authentic” it may be, it just gets on my wick, as does a lot of flashy tonguing in ITM.
Back on the matter of the state of instruments, I suspect Peter has the right of it - a lot of the old hand-me-down instruments would not have been in prime condition! But while I accept the OP’s contention s/he personally finds it easier to force a recalcitrant flute with glottalling, I personally don’t (and as I said, I have a good deal of experience!), so I doubt whether it was a significant factor - a secondary one, perhaps, but probably not a primary cause.
Nice, one of the really few times I don’t agree with Jem 
About what, precisely, since there were several points in my last? 
IMO, glottals had nothing whatsoever to do with good or bad flutes and their availability. A bad flute will have trouble articulating, regardless of the technique used, and glottals aren’t anymore obvious or easily accomplished compromise than tonguing. Both work, to slightly differing effects, and neither work well on a truly unplayable flute.
It’s not likely - in my view - that, at ITM’s fluting inception, there were lots of classically trained flute teachers around to insist on young fluters tonguing properly - that all these well-practiced Baroque flute players suddenly decided to glottal, rather than tongue, to create a new and trendy sound to Irish music. More likely, the choice for glottals stopping air flow (and the use of finger ornamentations) chosen over tonguing, had to do with traditional folk singing, the spoken language itself, and the mimicking of pipes by players who weren’t, initially, flute players at all.
With many players self-taught on unfamiliar instruments, I’d say it’s conceivable. But, if so (when it’s surely still a big ‘if’), I’d think it would have happened regardless of flute condition.
No, I don’t think the ‘if ever’ part of that’s generally agreed at all!
Well, I’m a big fan of McKenna, Morrison, Conal O Grada, Harry Bradley etc, I like glottal stops very much and tend to find most (not all!) flowing styles lacking something (I’m noticing now what you wrote about breath pushes, I think many call them glottal stops though I agree these are two different techniques, even if sometimes they can be linked together).
I seem to recall you mentioned you originally had a classical training as a flute player, someone that had no education at all of this kind may well find glottal stopping easier/more intuitive than tonguing, even if not necessarily of course. I think sometimes it only takes one single influential player to create a style, and I believe it’s not unreasonable to think that that very player preferred one technique over the other, and it’s not that unlikely that his flute wasn’t in perfect shape, or wasn’t a very good/loud one.
I don’t think 12 beginner lessons over 9 months 35+ years ago qualifies as “classical training”! Yes, I got taught to tongue, but nothing very strictly anchored or immutable! Sure, I have other classical knowledge and interests, but not the training/discipline.
Yes, I distinguish between unstopped breath pulses and explosively released glottally stopped ones, not least because one can use glottal stops without the huff just as one can huff without the stop.
I absolutely agree that one influential player can have a very significant (if anonymous) effect on posterity, and was previously suggesting exasctly that. I think the quest for volume and impulse on any flute, not just a duff one is a likely element in the evolution of a huffy-puffy and glottally stopped style.
BTW, I love Harry B’s playing (and am not atl all sure that he actually glottally stops all his huffing! - though he may say he does) and enjoy much, though not all of Conal’s, and wouldn’t claim to be uninfluenced by them, though they’re not among my top favourite players.
No-one has picked up on my thought about the role of linguistics…
As a disclaimer. I personally don’t glottal stop, that I know of, and use very occasional light tonguing. The reason I said “if ever” is because I had a flute teacher several years ago that said it is in her opinion it was never to be used for Irish trad. What I mostly use is a pulsing that comes more from my diaphragm than my glottis. It is some where in the middle ground of rhythmic playing I guess…and I hope I made sense.
I think Gordon might agree with you as, in fact and reading all the above, so do I.
However I still think that the supply of older simple system flutes that weren’t in the best of health has something to do with it, because I definitely find it easier to keep the note and flow of the music by using a glottal when a flute is leaking or otherwise compromised. And from what I can see myself and by the various bits of anecdotal evidence, I agree with others in this thread who suggest that the quality of the flutes at the ground level and in the Irish community in the early days, wasn’t the best. Makes sense to me.
With many players self-taught on unfamiliar instruments, I’d say it’s conceivable.
I don’t think many players learned in total isolation, there will always have been an aspect of handing down, players that served as an example, if not for playing style on the instrument it self then certainly for a general aesthetic of the music played.
It would probably make sense as well to consider the influence of fife and flute bands as they existed all over the island.
And would indubitably have tongued!
Pretty much what I said/do.
Hi All,
Personally, I use the term ‘throat articulation’ or ‘throat pulsing’ as it avoids people having to worry about what and where their glottis is, and gets me off the hook having to explain where or what it is (and/or pointing it out to them… which can be vomit inducing). Is there more to it than the throat? Of course there is as the body is an interdependent system of parts, but (as I do it) it’s controlled/effected from the throat, not the kidneys, the left ear or (I hope) the anus.
It’s funny to have observed the term ‘glottal stop’ come to prominence: Someone starts using it and then people think it should be, you know, a ‘thing’… a problem I find with the term is that a ‘stop’ is not an accurate description of what I and may others do with the throat/airstream to create an emphasis because there generally is no stop: its a pulse with no gap/stop either side of it. A full ‘stop’ used to emphasise rhythm would sound very weird, and it is not generally what players were doing in ITM even at their most pronounced (although, as if to prove that the world can produce exceptions to every spurious rule you can make up on the internet, it sounds to me as if Tom Morrison came very close to full stops on occasion in the vigorous passages of VERY clipped and pronounced phrases that he used to contrast brilliantly with flowing, overblown phrases… oooh, the tension and release of it all!)
What’s always more important to me is the sound of what the players are doing (whether he/she is using his/her diaphragm, glottis, kidneys, anus… or all of the above… and below). And what’s clear there is that there were more pronounced rhythms and phrasing among the older flute players and musicians generally, certainly during the 78 era of Morrison and McKenna. Morrison was the master of this IMO just in terms of the range of techniques/breath effects he was using both in contrast and in compliment to each other. A lot of this has not been picked up on by subsequent players. It’s an area open for exploration on the instrument, and something I always try to address in workshops with exercises in making rhythms with the breath etc. It’s always what I found most fun and pleasing about ITM on the flute, and there is scope for a lot of variety in the way tunes can be expressed, and how rhythms can be affected and varied, on the flute.
Regards,
Harry B.
Here’s a chap who’s doing the work to explore rhythmic breathing techniques, and doing it damn well.
You better ask him what body parts he’s employing to that end…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVwN1oeAyxc
H.
Nice link, Harry! For my money he’s mostly doing unstopped breath pushes from the guts, at least until he does those more staccato notes, which do sound as though they’re throat stopped.
I agree, “glottal stop” has become a shorthand term, but is mostly (if not always) anatomically inaccurate. But I didn’t see much point in reviving that debate in this thread.
Thanks Harry, your partecipation is always precious. Missing you on facebook…
As I said in a previous post, I think throat pulsing and glottal stops are two different techniques, even if they are (arguably?) both throat articulations.
I think real glottal stops were used by Tom Morrison, but are also used by people like Kevin Crawford, and he doesn’t use throat pulsing. Breandan O’Hare is another example of glottal stops (he does also articulate a lot with the throat, but not much in a pulsing way): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYlWVDzC-2E
Hi Lorenzo,
Personally I will always be skeptical about the hairsplittings of such terminology.
It’s probably better to just ask Brendan what he’s doing rather than put words in his glottis… so to speak.
Add to this that a lot of players haven’t really sat down and worked out exactly what they’re doing so as to be able to put a name on it and argue about it at length on internet forums, and you have a wonderfully opaque situation… 
At any rate, I’m glad there are players like Brendan making interesting and very pleasing sounds via all his various bits and organs, and good health to them all!
Regards,
H.