Hi,
I am looking for some advice on buying a flute. I played throughtout college on a Yamaha 581 with a Burkart headjoint which I sold. I am out of practice about 6 years now and would like to start playing again. I have played on a student model and can still play well. Any suggestions on brands or recommendated flutes it seems so much new has come on the market? I will only be playing for myself and would like to keep my price range below $1,500. I have found some used flutes that I have been interested in classifieds, but I am kind of leary on how safe the sale process is. Thanks for any advice.

My personal approach is that I would not buy an used flute at that price range from unknown people. Too much risky IMO.

Unless you can try it before and have the knowledge to correctly assess the flute status. In some cases you can receive the instrument for a trial and test it thoroughly at home (and/or take it to a good technician).

It was not may case, so I decided to buy new when I had to change my instrument.

You will find some Forum members here that probably can propose you good instruments at a fair price and that are renown and serious. I may forget important names, but Kara and Suzie come to my mind in this moment.

Also you can try at popular stores in USA o UK (if you happen to be in those countries). Sure You will get more feedback here soon. Sorry that I cannot help much; as I said, I bought mine brand new and also I am in Spain.

Call Liz at winds101.com she has always been very helpful to me

The Azumi, which is made by Altus, has had some fantastic reviews. For $1200 or less, it fits your budget.
I would definitely give one a try, but I wouldn't just order one and keep it if I liked it. You will definitely want to arrange try-outs of several flutes in your price range, preferably side-by-side if possible.
You probably wouldn't go too far wrong with a student Pearl, Yamaha or Jupiter with a handmade headjoint. I found my Miyazawa HJ on eBay used for $350, and an entire Yamaha (200 series) flute with handcut headjoint for $400.
But do try whatever you possibly can-
Pearl, Jupiter, Jupiter DiMedici, Yamaha, and the 'handmade' brands' inexpensive versions, ie Burkart 'Resona', Powell 'Sonare', Haynes 'Amadeus', Altus 'Azumi', etc.
I would probably stay away from anything Gemeinhardt, and at your playing level you can do much better than the Emerson and Armstrong flutes that would be in your price range.
Also look here, there's great advice about flute shopping:
http://www.jennifercluff.com/buying.htm

There ARE reputable online flute dealers. There ARE deals on eBay. The trouble is that there are also ripoffs, scams, etc to be found. I would ask a flute teacher in your area, if you can find a GOOD local shop that could get flutes on trial for you, you will save a bunch of money in shipping. And having a local shop with a good tech will make warranty work, as well as minor repairs, MUCH less of a pain, and probably cost less to nothing. A good local tech will certainly work on any good 'real' flute you bring in (with exception to cheap imports made of soft metal that can't be repaired), they will probably charge you less if you bought the flute in-house.
Online, you can try Liz at Winds 101 (I've also dealt with her), Nancy at Flutestar.com, (also dealt with her), Carolyn Nussbaum of Carolyn Nussbaum music, Ginger Hedrick of the Flute Exchange, and Flute World.

Oh, poo, Ginger Hedrick sold out. But working directly with people that have specifically matched flutes with players as they upgrade will probably be very helpful.

I tried a couple of flutes yesterday with no luck. I tried a couple of Pearls, Gemeinhardt, Brio, and Yamaha 400 series(newer). The store also had a nice CY Yamaha headjoint which played beautifully which I tired on a couple different flutes. Hopefully I find a match. Thanks for the listing of reputable internet dealers.

-Tibbecow, you were so right about the Gemeinhardt flute.

The Yamaha flutes (200, 300 and 400 series) ALL come with a CY headjoint, BTW. Your original Yam 581 from several years ago was probably a CY HJ also, and may have been a handcut one.

Perhaps the CY head they have in stock is handcut. The machine cut ones are very consistent and an excellent head. But one extra pass of the file, or a very slightly different pressure on the file, can make a difference to a handmade head.

The older Yam HJs, if they were sterling silver/handcut, would have an engraved/stamped CY just below the crown on the underside of the HJ. They did change that in the last few years, I think, on the newer ones.

If you liked that particular head, you could get a Yam or Pearl flute body that would fit, pretty easily. My own Yamaha 881 and Pearl 501 have barrel sizes so similar that you can pretty much swap heads without adjustments.