Things get a bit quiet around here at Christmas, so I thought some light reading might help fill the gap. I actually mounted this about 6 months ago, but probably failed to mention it at the time until I had some images of the flute (apologies if I did and this is old news!).
It’s probably a reasonable assumption that Pratten invented the Pratten’s Perfected, Nicholson the Nicholson Improved, Rockstro the Rocksto’s Model, and Radcliff the flute named after him. But is it necessarily so? Adrian Duncan investigates …
Great post, and I very much enjoyed such “light” reading!
When I began flute, many years ago, I was given an older, “used” flute, as the financial arm of my family was not about to spend too much money on a musical instrument for a child. Well, it indeed was an older flute, complete with open G# mechanism, ala original Boehm, but as none of my early music instructors knew any differently, it served me well for the first few years. Moreover, after all these years, and now with a small collection of Boehm flutes, all of my Boehm flutes are open G#, and I likely could be the only open G# Boehm player on this, the C&F board (and if not, please let me know, for we are RARE these days). Indeed, I have an Alto flute with open G# mechanism, having silver head, body and foot, made by the wonderful Japanese company of Altus, and which just may be the only flute of its kind on planet Earth, no joke.
Very interesting stuff.
I love this stuff- I read Rockstro from cover to cover years ago.
I actually used to own a Radcliff flute which had the conical bore. I think in some ways it is a superior flute for Irish music in that you can play G minor and D minor tunes with ease.
I waited for years to try one of these, hoping all along that it would be that magical bridge between the eight-key world and the land of Boehm. Bridge it may be, but like Boehm’s heady realm, the Kingdom of Radcliff is forever sealed to me on account of my queer aul’ grip! Bloody thumb-keys…
i have to say, clinton pretty much sold me with his explanation of the 1851 patent flute, but reading your article really sold me on the idea of a cylindrical 8 key-fingered flute.
do you ever have any plans of making a radcliff? it’d sure be fun to have!
After messing around with the Radcliff for a while, decades ago, I invented a much-simplified version of the keywork which is simple and sturdy and which with no change in fingering would make the Irish flute as capable of playing in flat keys as the Boehm flute. Trouble is, I’m not a flutemaker. I had a flutemaker make one but it came out poorly- no, my system of keywork worked fine, it was just a poor-playing flute, made by a beginning flutemaker whose quality at the time was hit-and-miss. I got the miss.
But the keywork system is extremely simple: the flute fingers exactly like a normal Irish flute, and has the normal keys for C natural, G sharp, and E flat. The only difference is F/F# and B/Bb, which have a pair of holes for each pair covered with covered keys, a single touch in the middle which, when the finger is lifted, lifts both keys. So, the normal fingering for F# and B natural work as the pair of keys both open and close together. However, if you want to play F natural you simply use the fingering xxx xox because the pinkie is on a ring-key which holds the F# key closed. The F natural hole is large and therefore is a strong note with good volume even though the E finger is down.
I retained open holes for the index and ring fingers of each hand. The fact that the middle finger of each hand is on a touch on top of a pair of closed keys means that the middle finger’s position can be moved further down the flute tube, making the reach to the ring finger notes more comfortable.
The upper hand could be made the same way so that xox ooo gives B flat, but I had a touch put on the back for the thumb, so that when the thumb is on its touch xoo ooo gives B flat just as on a Boehm flute.
In fact both the F/F# and B/Bb keywork could be linked to a single upper-thumb touch so that, with the simple movement of one thumb, the flute is immediately transformed from a G major/D major instrument into a G minor/D minor one.
I still have the 25-year-old funky prototype. I firmly believe that a good flutemaker could make a great-playing thing based on it.
Moreover, after all these years, and now with a small collection of Boehm flutes, all of my Boehm flutes are open G#, and I likely could be the only open G# Boehm player on this, the C&F board (and if not, please let me know, for we are RARE these days). Indeed, I have an Alto flute with open G# mechanism, having silver head, body and foot, made by the wonderful Japanese company of Altus, and which just may be the only flute of its kind on planet Earth, no joke.