Rudall flutes & possible tuning issues, if any?

Irish Flute
1

Just wondering about these old flutes. I’ve had a R&C from 1892 now for a month and the tuning is spot on, and the flute is in tune with itself at A=440 with the slide pulled out. I half expected to find the tuning dodgy in some way, and possibly notes a little off. So I’m glad this is not the case.

Now it’s been claimed by a knowledgeble Rudall bloke in the New World that the 5000 series are very coveted. Why is this? I’d have thought that these older Rudalls would be a little off in their tuning when adjusting the slide to get A at 440, as A wasn’t at 440 at the time of manufacture. (“1846 Philharmonic pitch was A452.5 (very high) which lasted till 1854”) Does the tuning slide really compensate for playing with A=440 without messing up the scale, the other notes on the flute? Isn’t it these Rudalls that have the flat bottom D when played in today’s tuning?

I remember being in a session with a lady from the North one Willie Week who had a boxwood patent head R&R no. 3680 or 3860 (it was hard to make out the serial number). This flute was very in tune. Is the 3000 series also more desirable. Has it to do with the craftsmen working for Rudall at the time?

2

No, you can’t cheat the physics: If the flute was “in-tune” to begin with (a subject in and of itself), with the slide extended at a certain distance for the person who tuned it, then the scale will be “out-of-tune” for the same player as they move the slide. However, IF we have a decent ear, then we compensate and blow/lip differently enough to get the scale back in tune, whether we realize it or not. Alternately, some people simply don’t have a good enough ear to notice the out of tune scale, at least not until it becomes egregious. More likely for many people, there is a combination of both going on - we don’t hear the scale differences when they are a little off, because we don’t have “perfect pitch” or we simply aren’t LISTENING closely, but we unconsciously lip/blow the flute back into tune as we are playing once we have moved the slide enough that our ear can hear things getting (rather a lot) out of tune.

Truth is, many ITM flute players have a lousy ear for tuning, as noted by the number who play sharp in the second register and don’t adjust to have a really good cross fingered cnat on keyless flutes, for example. So these players will often say a flute is in tune (when it isn’t), but really can’t hear the problem, and hence can’t correct it. The opposite will be the players who say a flute is out of tune, and it may, or may not be, but they lack the technique to bring it into tune, even though they can hear it is out of tune. But then their lack of ability to bring the flute into tune signifies in itself that they likely lack the proper technique to play a perfectly good flute in tune to begin with…

The good player however hears and compensates, automatically playing the flute into tune as necessary, and it is more or less unconscious, at least with a flute they have become used to. The great player will hear AND be very conscious of exactly what is going on with the scale when they pick up a flute, particularly if it is different from what they normally play.

But we also have to ask what is “in-tune” - not just what pitch, but what tuning was intended - Equal, Just, etc. Also, what venting (on keyed flutes) was intended in order to achieve an in-tune scale? Etc., etc., different subject though.

But yes, those old flutes are out of tune at A=440 if they were tuned for a different pitch. So, either your ear isn’t good enough to hear that the scale is out of tune, or it is being blown/lipped back into tune by the player, whether that’s you or someone else.

But then that’s the nature of the flute isn’t it?


Loren

3

Also a flutesmyth can sometimes adjust the tuning on an old flute, thereby minimizing the anomalies (by modern standards).
Some of the older flutes you heard may have been through this process.

4

"But then their lack of ability to bring the flute into tune signifies in itself that they likely lack the proper technique to play a perfectly good flute in tune to begin with… " Loren.

Yes this was my problem when I acquired a Wilkes a few years ago. I was constantly playing too sharp in the 2nd octave. No problem now as my technique hopefully improved. My better half, a fiddler with perfect pitch, was/is quick to point out when I err. Prehaps I am playing the R&C in tune unconciously, because of improved technique, or it could just be an easy flute to play in tune, as I am still getting used to it.

“But then that’s the nature of the flute isn’t it?” Loren.

Yes, keeps you on your toes

5

Before I bought one, I spent a lot of time searching on this board for information about playing 19C flutes in tune . Much of what I learned (including a need to be circumspect about what people said) is covered in that one post from Loren :slight_smile:

6

I played a Geo Rudall flute a few weeks ago - i.e., before he hooked up with Rose. 8 key, dark ebony, no tuning slide. It was pretty diabolical tuning wise - you had to keep the bottom hand shut to get the A + B of the top hand flat enough to be in tune. Truthfully it was worse than most German flutes. Medium size holes. Perhaps you could get the hang of it but not without deviating wildly from the standard flute fingering. The owner couldn’t keep it from sounding spicy a lot of the time, either. My Wood and Ivy 4 key has pretty bizarre tuning too, without the barrel I had made to lower its pitch to A=440.

English flutes seem often to have really out notes here and there, in my experience. Probably this is in regard to the Nicholson era stuff; my Hawkes 8 key and other later flutes I’ve tried are much more in tune.

7

At the risk of heresy I’m not sure that perfect pitch tuning is the most important thing in ITM flute playing, nor that anyone who can’t (doesn’t) cross finger a C natural is a bad or lazy player. Could reel off a long list of some of greatest who don’t do it and who don’t ‘have a lousy ear’, while a quick trial of Flutini on their recordings would show up all kinds of ‘errors’ in those terms. Ditto for pipes and fiddle. Not that tuning isn’t a constant challenge in sounding ‘right’, just that the opinion sounds a bit harsh IMHO :wink:

8

I am actually just an automated topic summary feature of this message board, not a real person. :sunglasses:

9

You are confusing tunings - Just, Equal, Tempered, etc., with an ability - Perfect pitch/Absolute pitch:

“Absolute pitch (AP), widely referred to as perfect pitch, is the ability of a person to identify or re-create a given musical note without the benefit of an external reference.[1]
Correct identification of the pitch need not be expressed linguistically; AP can also be demonstrated in auditory imagery or sensorimotor responses, for example by reproducing on an instrument a tone that has been heard (without “hunting” for the correct pitch)”

If you re-read my post with that in mind, you may understand what I meant, and find it less “Harsh” :stuck_out_tongue:


Loren

10

I played a Geo Rudall flute a few weeks ago

The one I tried (owned by Michael Clarkson, it had very big holes) was a great flute, I can’t remember the tuning but I didn’t notice any particularly relevant issue.

A couple of other old ones flutes I tried had very sharp A and B, another one had a very flat low D.
A flute I own have all the right hand notes much flatter than the left hand ones (I will try to make that section shorter).
The Thomas Glen I used to own had good tuning, and the Wylde I recently got is even better (a professional classical flute player that tried it was very impressed and surprised).

Sometimes you can deal with slight tuning issues, but some flutes are actually hopelessy out.
With old flutes it’s a matter of luck really. I think flutes made in the 1820s are more likely to have a flat foot.

11

To get technical, Just and Equal and Tempered are tunings of 12 abstract notes of the octave, which are choices that people made about the sound of pure intervals and harmonic relationships. Though this is a factor in flute tuning, most of the time when people talk about issues of flute tuning and flute scales, they’re talking about all of the small adjustments that are made to try to get a flute to sound more in tune when played, because of inherent defects of flute acoustics. So these are really two different things. The first is about music relationships in the larger sense, and the second is specific to flutes (like with silver flutes when people talk about the Haynes scale vs the Cooper scales).

Whether a scale plays in tune has so much to do with how you play it. No flute is in tune or out of tune, but certain scales are brought into tune by players who know how to use them.

I have played wonderfully tuned baroque flutes, and my early small-holed Rudall and Rose has a terrific scale too. To me, that’s one of the reasons why Rudalls are worth their premium over other similar flutes – they tend to have great scales, whereas other fine flutes sometimes do, and sometimes don’t. When they don’t, the question is why. Is it that the builders just didn’t know what they were doing, or that they chose a different trade-off than the one we’re used to? Terry McGee has devoted much time to this question.

12

There’s 2 ways to look at that though.

You’re talking about ‘perfect pitch’, which some players and listeners have, and, some don’t.

Not all good/great Irish flute players do perfect pitch-

and, in general, Irish flutes do not have the tuning and tonal consistency of the ‘classical’ (Boehm) flute.

So, rather than viewing playing that is not pitch perfect as ‘faulty’ , it could be argued that, in fact, that minority of players/listeners who do posess perfect pitch, are the ones with the problem. While most of the listeners are able to enjoy the tune and percieve no problem with it, it is that select group who posess perfect pitch that find it a little jarring.

Rather than critisising the player, they should maybe place the blame on their own, oversensitive perception of pitch. Arguably, ‘perfect pitch’ is a defect, an hyper-sensitivity to minor pitch variations that the majority of people are not afflicted with.

13

Such as many of the contestants on American Idol. More’s the pity.

14

So, it looks like you got that from a site concerning Standard or Concert Pitch for Pianos. Personally, I wouldn’t get too hung up on that. For a start, funnily enough, piano pitch may not always have matched what non-keyboard people were doing. (Certainly, tuning didn’t, but that’s a whole nuther matter. :wink: ) Secondly, you’ll see in that table (even though it’s far from the best table of such things that I’ve come across) that there is a wide variation in pitch standards throughout the 19c. As a result, many makers of flutes from the 18c on, throughout the 19c, had to make their flutes capable of being played across that same wide range of pitches. As I understand it, this is one of the reasons for some of the tuning compromises made when making these flutes.

Played properly though, they play fine. :slight_smile:

15

My Boosey and Son has an excellent scale - bit of a chore to play though. Same for a friend’s Rivere and Hawkes. An R&R I played once had the flat foot and a bugaboo somewhere or another. I’ve piccolo and fife by “Improved London” :wink: with screwy notes here and there; a Blackman in F has a sharp middle D. They’re all beautifully made but some are definitely not anything you’d want to emulate for your own flute except cosmetically.

When I say “chore to play” I’m comparing it to my Frère 8 key, which plays when you just look at it, it’s so easy. I like telling people how Wagner called the Boehm flute “The Cannon,” or asking them how they’re getting along on their Hibernian PA System. :tomato:

The Geo Rudall I played had small holes, no bigger than many French/German jobs.

16

R&R flutes have spot on tuning, as long as your playing in 430htz… Often the A and B are slightly sharp, so you can adjust that with a little wax or shellac in the upper side of the tone holes. It also helps to blow more into the embouchure.

17

R&R flutes have spot on tuning, as long as your playing in 430htz

But you can’t even pull the tuning slide out enough to get it that low…

18

Rather than critisising the player, they should maybe place the blame on their own, oversensitive perception of pitch

More strongly worded than I’d have put it but yes, having a good ear and having perfect pitch are very different things (I won’t claim either). Still, better in tune than out. The more troublesome thing is all this judging the cultural norms of one musical tradition using frames of reference from another. It’s interesting but quickly tends to a kind of cultural imperialism that elevates heirarchical, book-based, classical learning over collaborative, oral/aural, folk learning. Just/Equal/Tempered tuning, or the Lydian Chromatic Concept, are helpful within their own paradigms but about as likely as Latin to bring a smile to a Connemara man’s face, which might be a better bellwether for sounding ‘right’.

All I mean is that somewhere along the road, playing ‘in tune’ becomes playing at 440, tuning to the box becomes tuning to electronic tuners, playing with a bit of a lilt becomes syncopation, ‘nice and steady’ becomes bpm, making up a tune becomes composition, ability becomes technique, and so on. Quality becomes quantity.

19

Sure you can. It’s possible to sound most old flutes at 440 with the tuning slide all the way in with a bit of effort, so -10 should be possible with the slide. If not then Jon’s advice about blowing more ‘down’ in the embouchure rather across.

20

Now, I’m not going to believe this statement untill someone will prove it to me!
I’m working at closing the tuning slide of my Wylde by blowing flat, I know that I will eventually end up closing it by maybe 5 mm but that’s only about half way through.
Rockstro would be very disappointed as well by this approach…