Try both the tap AND a tiny pulse and hear what happens. 
Reminds me of the old story about the bloke visiting his cousin in the country. Cousin picks him up from the railway station then they drive for half an hour to the town. City fellow says āWouldnāt it have been better to put the station closer to the town?ā. Cousin says āYes, well, we thought about it but in the end decided it was better to put it near the railway line.ā
Made my night.
When I read this topic I went home and I tried the suggestions for A and B rolls. Now, I play a rosewood Sweetheart flute (D) and going from:
XOO OOO
to
XOO XXX
when trying to do a B-roll thereās virtually no difference in tone. If I play a long tone on B (XOO OOO) and then close the last three (XOO XXX) you can barely hear a tone change. Anyway - I think the idea of adding a small pulse helps to give the āillusionā of a roll. But when it comes to dexterity what works best for my fingers has turned out to be:
XOO OOO
OOO OOO
XOO OOO
XOO XXO
XOO OOO
for a B-roll, and similarly for an A-roll. Itās easier to close just the two holes instead of three for me - and in regard to tone difference it makes no difference. The rolls sound nowhere near as clean as the sample by Brad Hurley but it works for me 
The A-rolls work the best - but the almost non-existing tone-difference makes the B-rolls weak, but adding a small pulse helps. When all is said and done I prefer trying to make the rolls on A and B this way as doing them using only top hand is so difficult.
On a another note: Have you ever tried playing a tune and you hear a roll but you know your finger wasnāt lifted?
That is in fact what I do. Or did. Now that Iām learning the pipes, I canāt get away with this stuff anymore and have had to train myself to do B rolls and A rolls the standard one-handed way. Actually the two-handed technique sort of works for A rolls on the pipes, but it affects the tone and pitch of the A in a distracting way, so no more ācheatingā for me! Working on the standard rolls on the pipes has improved the dexterity of my left hand on the flute, so before long Iāll probably be able to do standard rolls on the flute too. Another advantage of learning to do rolls the standard way is that the two-handed technique really does not sound convincing on the whistle. It works on the flute for some reason, but Iāve never been able to make it sound acceptable on the whistle (even the tapered-bore varieties like the Clark).
this is totally off subject. henke, i just finally took a close look at your avatar. my vision isnāt the best and iāve always thought that hand in your avatar was a third face. (sit back and squint your eyes that may help you see this.) you folks look like the street hockey players from the movie ādogma.ā i bet folks would have a better impression of you if you cleaned up a bit, maybe took the hat off and put on a nice white shirt. sit up straight too. good posture never hurt anyone.
and this reply is totally out of order, i didnāt realize there was a page 2. henkeās reply was the last reply on page 1. and yes henke, i am good natured teasing you.
Even though Brad calls it ācheating,ā and maybe some would choose to learn the standard way or not at all, I think itās cool to have some options for people whose fingers havenāt caught up to their brains. So that thereās a way to make the sound come closer without waiting that long.
Brad, since youāve switched to the more standard fingering, whatās your advice to someone whose rolls arenāt yet up to speed? Keep working on the left hand-only fingering, foregoing the rolls when the tuneās too fast, or using the option to ācheatā?
Iām still way slower on my left-hand rolls, but theyāre coming. Maybe I should persevere so that if I lose my teeth and have to learn pipes (God help us all!) Iāll have one less thing to learn.
Jennie
Believe me, I havenāt quite made the switch yet! Itās going to take a good year or two of practice before I can make the one-handed rolls sound as good as my two-handed ones.
My feeling is that itās worth working on the left-hand rolls for B and A, but if they arenāt coming along very quickly there is nothing wrong with doing the two-handed versions on the flute. As I said earlier in this thread, I know Mike Rafferty uses this technique (Lesl confirmed that a few years back), and Iāve heard that Matt Molloy uses it, and friends have observed it among other players in Ireland, both young and old. So itās not really cheating, I just call it that because itās an easier way to get A and B rolls for those of us whose left hands are not very nimble.
Itās funny, I have no trouble getting clean B rolls with my left hand on the pipes, but Iām still having trouble with them on the flute.
Even if you donāt like the two-handed options for A and B rolls, itās worth exploring two-handed rolls for the other notes. The basic concept is to cut with your left hand and tap with your rightā¦ācut high and tap lowā for every note on the scale. I find most rolls sound better that way and it divides the work across two hands. That is a very common technique among traditional Irish flute playersā¦itās just the two-handed rolls on A and B that are not so widely used.
How about low E rolls?
One can cut with the rt index
or with the left ring finger.
Is the latter kosher? (the irish are among the ten lost tribes,
so the technical terminology is appropriate).
Itās easier than an entirely rt hand roll.
Also I sometimes do something on the low D. I sound the
low D, then
I cut with the left ring finger, then cut with the
rt ring finger. Anybody seen this before?
It sounds like a roll.
I think Mike R is doing this on the first
cut of Speed 78
I do 'em like this:
xxx xxo
xoo xxo
xxx xxo
xxx xxx
xxx xxo
That would be a long roll on E. You can leave the fingers down on your right hand; the cut goes by so fast that it doesnāt matter what note it is (it will sound weird played slowly).
Thanks, Brad. Much appreciated.