The Classical Music Minute

Exploring The Flute Family in Western Music

December 20, 2021 Steven Hobé, Composer & Host Season 1 Episode 34
The Classical Music Minute
Exploring The Flute Family in Western Music
Show Notes Transcript

Description
Flutes come in all shapes and sizes. But each one was created with a specific purpose in mind and marks a period in musical history. In Western music history, certain well-known composers such as Mozart, Beethoven, and Stravinsky utilized different flutes in their pieces, thus paving the way for future works. Join me, as we take a minute to get the scoop!

Fun Fact
There are several means by which flautists breathe to blow air through the instrument and produce sound. They include diaphragmatic breathing and circular breathing. Circular breathing is quite difficult and can take performers years to master. It is a technique where players produce a continuous tone without interruption. It is accomplished by breathing in through the nose while simultaneously pushing air out through the mouth using air stored in the cheeks.

About Steven
Steven is a Canadian composer living in Toronto. He creates a range of works, with an emphasis on the short-form genre—his muse being to offer the listener both the darker and more satiric shades of human existence. If you're interested, please check out his website for more.

A Note To Music Students et al.
All recordings and sheet music are available on my site. I encourage you to take a look and play through some. Give me a shout if you have any questions.

Got a topic? Pop me off an email at: TCMMPodcast@Gmail.com 

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When we think of flutes in Western music, we typically think of the concert flute, which is silver and is pitched in the key of C. 

But the flute family is quite wide and varied. If we start at the short end, we have the piccolo, which means ‘little’ in Italian. It can be made of silver or wood. Beethoven utilized this instrument in his orchestral works giving rise to its popularity by subsequent composers.

There is a flute pitched a minor third above the concert flute that Mozart was quite partial to. We have the flûte d’amour, pitched a minor third below the concert flute. Verdi was a fan and used it in his opera Aida. 

The alto flute is pitched in G. It’s too long for standard fingering, so a mechanism was created to bring the keys within reach for the player. Stravinsky used this one in the Rite of Spring.

There is no tenor flute but we skip to the bass and contrabass flutes. These are so long that they double back on themselves and the player must stand in order to play.

The flute family is pretty cool and an integral member of the woodwinds able to convey a range of emotions from cheerful to sombre.