I was wondering if I can exclude pressing the left hand pinky key down on the flute for most notes except for the ones that are necessary to play such as the Eb. I don't think it changes much in pitch, maybe a few hertz flatter but nothing too noticeable. My pink feels like it's dying if I do press it down and I even bought the Thumbport to ease the center of gravity.

Thanks for your advise.

I appreciate your help

I meant right hand pinky. Sorry my stupidity.

I don't think I understand you. O.o You shouldn't be keeping your left pinky down at all except for Ab and 3rd 8ve Eb (which I don't think is the Eb you were referring to).

Do you mean your RIGHT pinky? Hmmm....even that shouldn't be hurting...........Are you pressing excessively hard?

<Added>

Nvm, just saw your second post.

Do you play with your fingers curved? That might also be the cause of the problem.

If your pinky is hurting from hitting your Eb key make sure the spring tension is right. Bring your flute in to a good repair person and get it checked out. It's not a very good habit to not press the Eb key on notes...

The spring was the problem. I compared the stiffness of the Eb key with the rest and it was really hard to press down. No wonder my pinky was sooo sore. I adjusted the spring myself and it's about 2x less stiff. Thanks so much Canadian, you solved a life long problem that was only getting worse:D

I should know because this has happend to me as well!

Why don't you get some proper flute lessons instead of asking a bunch of kids on a flute forum. Might be more sensible.

I've taken 5 years of private flute lessons but that was about 10 years ago. But I found out the problem. Canadian was right due to a very tight spring.

Good answer, Canadian.

I find that the left hand pinky (G# key) can also be sprung a bit too tight. Mine is OK, but my friend had a looooooooong tremolo, F# to G#, in 'Pines of Rome', and complained terribly about her poor pinky. So she had her tech lighten the spring up.

One more thing: yes-the RH pinky needs to be down on most notes.

It isn't only a matter of tuning and a few hertz, the tone of the notes suffers as well as the slight tuning issue.
Try playing both ways on notes, with your eyes closed, and listen for the differnce in tone.