Pyrioni,

Wow !!! You do have quite a collection of flutes. Do you have an Alto and picc too?

A friend of mine has 2 flutes, a picc, an Alto, a Bass, and a Contrabass flute.

Cflutist, no other type of flute, only have a piccolo - Yamaha YPC-82 :

http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad112/pyrioni15/DSC01982.jpg

Handmade, silver headjoint, grenadilla wood body, undercut tone holes, split-e, used ~ only half price, adjusted by the repairman, worked perfectly.

I don't play piccolo, I only tried played piccolo once because the conductor asked me to help, so I bought the used 82 from local repairman.
I never played piccolo before, this was my very first time played this YPC-82 during a concert 9 months ago:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_T5kJ8KGHoc

I try to master my flute first before touch other flute family.

thanks Kshel!

Pyrioni,

So now that you've had your new flute for a week, how do you like it? Has it grown on you?

Which of your flutes do you plan to use for your orchestral playing?

Yeah, thanks Micron, wow, you think so too?! It's strange EX played so well and is well accepted in especially in Asia and internationally, sir James Galway wrote a flute material letter on his blog and mentioned he thinks material is not a matter, he actually like silver flutes and he likes EX alot:

http://www.thegalwaynetwork.com/notes/material.htm

few years ago in his play testing, EX was the 2nd best favourite by poll.

Materials can make a difference, though, but only if the instrument resonates as part of its function(* there is an exception for woodwinds - more on this later) The main problem with modern instruments is that they are made to such exacting specifications that they are essentially cookie-cutter close to each other. This is great in a way, but it also means that you can make it out of any similar substance and there's just no difference.

The exception is if it's something that resonates as part of the sound creation. Not the mouthpiece but the entire body itself. For example, a brass instrument without valves will have an effect based upon the metal, because it's basically a long resonating tube. Valves kind of stop the resonance a bit, but it's not a huge deal - the effect is fairly small compared the the mouthpiece and hard to notice a large difference, unless, say, you made a trombone out of wood or something silly.

Of course, stringed and percussion instruments are the obvious example of this as the entire sound is due to resonance and how it is affected by the materials used in its construction. We love how they sound and unfortunately, the same materials and construction techniques just don't translate to other instruments.

Woodwinds or anything with a reed has a problem, though. Once it gets past the reed's interaction with the material in the mouthpiece that it is reacting against(or in a flute's case, the lip plate and riser assembly that's mated to the tube), the body itself pretty much does nothing unless the material has a massive structural difference.

Very light woods can sound different than metals. Though extremely dense woods as are the norm for woodwinds lately hardly resonate at all short of extremely loud and forced notes/using it for beat-boxing and the like. There's a reason they don't generally make guitars out of Ebony or Grenadilla. They are wonderfully stable and tough woods, but contribute little to the tone. It's just a sub-optimal wood to get tone out of, and wow - it also is a poor wood to get a different tone out of with a woodwind. Headjoints are a different matter, and materials here can make a small difference(though only the mouthpiece and riser/cut/etc and really not the tube even). But that's hardly any different than a better reed and mouthpiece on a Clarinet or Sax.

Of course, it's hard to make a business out of changes to a 1.5 inch wide 1/4 inch thick piece of metal or wood(lip plate and riser/etc). So in comes the marketing and bling... Flute makers want to sell you a flute and not a just mouthpiece/headjoint.

*The exception for woodwinds is of course using a material that specifically is made to resonate so as to add to the tone. Crystal is a good example if played loudly. Very very thin walled metal might also be forced/able to resonate to contribute to the sound, but to date, only titanium seems to be strong enough to possibly make this work. The material, if it is sensitive enough to vibrations to affect the air stream, will almost be too thin to hold without deforming(bad for tone, obviously). The torque of the keys operating alone is also likely to cause problems.(think paper-thin flute body)

Extremely thin carbon fiber might also work. But I've not seen any of the few carbon fiber flutes made so far designed with this in mind. They're still far too thick and are designed to be louder and even more "stable" than metal designs. That said, it's the optimum material for a typical concert flute as it will never ever degrade or wear out and can be constructed to nearly perfect dimensions. For less cost in mass quantities. I suspect we'll see a move from metal to carbon fiber in the next few decades much as we've seen a shift in bicycles towards the materials.

I think you didn't even read what I wrote. I went through your response and each paragraph was essentially something that I had said in my post or in previous posts. I see about 90% agreement.

Materials in woodwinds makes (almost) no difference in the sound. I suppose 5 year old kids and dogs could tell, but anyone over 20... same as CD vs DVD-A - CD alone is good enough for 98% of human hearing, as our ears are among the worst of all mammals. Anyone over 30's hearing is so shot(mostly from driving cars actually) already that MP3s sound good enough to most of them.

I suppose a flute made out of rubber or maybe bubble gum would sound different, but anything machinable makes just has about zero difference. This was what I was really pointing out, but it was a hypothetical aside, since nobody makes flutes out of silly and exotic materials that might actually make it sound fundamentally different. But let's talk about the possible exceptions to the rule anyways...

Crystal, is a notable exception, and does resonate in a fairly pleasing way to our ears. So the idea of materials changing the sound isn't without a tiny bit of truth to it. Yes, I know there are a lot of potential factors there, but I don't know of anyone who has done a real scientific study on all of them. My gut tells me though that if you can make a Didjeridu out of different materials and this makes a difference in the sound, a light enough and resonant enough tube made out of wood or something similar might also make similar sounds.(whether it would be pleasing to have your flute humming and buzzing along with you is a whole other issue)

For a metal *alone* to contribute a significant tone to the sound, it needs to resonate loudly enough to be heard by the audience - and this would mean in the case of most metals, rice-paper thin walls. .012 is normal for thin wall flutes. This would require at most 0.5mm thickness for mylar film(see planar speakers for examples), and close to 0.1 mm for steel or silver alloys. 0.012 tubing is about 3-4x thicker than it needs to be to have the desired effect, so a thinner and stronger material is needed to even attempt this(or to be more accurate to do what the manufacturers all lie about happening)

I mentioned carbon fiber because it *might* somehow be made thin enough while still being usable. You might need to make it out of Carbon Nanotubes, though, as I suspect even thin enough CF wouldn't be able to handle the stress of playing it. (the thinnest I can find is 0.024 tubing, which is far too thick)

Of course it does. What really drove it home for me(as opposed to just math and science) was going to see a Blue Man Group performance in Vegas(worth every penny for sure). They are making professional quality music with wooden paddles and pieces of PVC pipe. Hardly anything that they use, in fact, is much different than, well, what a small group of musicians could cobble together in their garage or studio, which is how they got their start.

Obviously PVC pipe is bad from a health standpoint, so you'd not want to use that for a flute.(unless you used a metal mouthpiece that is, like most of the custom contra-bass flutes do)

Concerning the mouthpiece, I'd have said that you were right, but I have seen graphs and oscilloscope/waveform output for a titanium headjoint versus a silver one and materials seem to be doing something significant. Carbon fiber also appears to respond differently, though in both cases, it's really a speed/flexibility and not tone issue. If there is ANY validity to manufacturer's claims(which I largely doubt as well), I'd only give it to the mouthpiece makers, and only because every one seems to have a different sound to it.

Also, yes, a perfect scenario would be a tube that is strong enough and flexible enough at the same time, but mounting (normal) keys to it wouldn't be possible. Even touching it with your fingers would dampen the sound, much like how touching a tuning fork stops it(simple but effective analogy I think everyone can grasp). I could imagine a "flute" like that I guess, but it would have to have a mouthpiece and a rig to isolate it so that it would resonate freely. The player would hold a keyboard-like assembly that was attached to the assembly(similar to free-floating a gun barrel). Given that it would have to hold to the headjoint at the very end near the cork and no place else, carbon fiber and electro-mechanical keys operated by micro servos with a RF or IR connection(no wires or linkages) might be the only way to make it work and keep the body under the required 3 or 4 ounces.

Of course, it wouldn't be anything like a "flute" at that point. You'd really be playing a tuning fork with keys on it.

Micron,

I have used that particular cleaning method for quite some time and never had any serious problems as a result. I don't leave it soaking for thirty minutes: that may result in some serious pitting issues, etc. But if you leave it in for 2-5 minutes (depending on the severity of the tarnish) it does a good job of lifting some tarnish that silver polish alone cannot. Have you ever attempted that method of cleaning with negative results? I would love to know your feedback on it.

Thanks

Hi there. I'm just new on this forum. Seemed fun the get into the discussion.

I think I must agree about the American flutes and their sound. However one must not judge in haste. I recently discovered that the flutes from Brannen Brothers and Nagahara make for a great sound in between of the American and Japanese flutes.

@ Pyrioni: I really believe you should at least try those to Brands as they might just fit your future requirements exactly