Flute fingerings

There is a book by Thomas Howell -- The Avant-Garde Flute: A Handbook for
Composers and Flutists / University of California Press, 1974 -- that has
fingering charts for 31-tone and 24-tone scales. Has anyone tried these
out? Do these fingerings work well for most flutists? Thanks.

Bill

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
^ Bill Alves email: alves@hmc.edu ^
^ Harvey Mudd College URL: http://www2.hmc.edu/~alves/ ^
^ 301 E. Twelfth St. (909)607-4170 (office) ^
^ Claremont CA 91711 USA (909)607-7600 (fax) ^
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Just to note that I've written a part using those fingerings... but,
unfortunatly, it hasn't been performed yet.

;-)

Bill Alves wrote:

> From: alves@orion.ac.hmc.edu (Bill Alves)
>
> There is a book by Thomas Howell -- The Avant-Garde Flute: A Handbook for
> Composers and Flutists / University of California Press, 1974 -- that has
> fingering charts for 31-tone and 24-tone scales. Has anyone tried these
> out? Do these fingerings work well for most flutists? Thanks.
>
> Bill
>
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> ^ Bill Alves email: alves@hmc.edu ^
> ^ Harvey Mudd College URL: http://www2.hmc.edu/~alves/ ^
> ^ 301 E. Twelfth St. (909)607-4170 (office) ^
> ^ Claremont CA 91711 USA (909)607-7600 (fax) ^
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Come check out our brand new web site!
> http://www.onelist.com
> Onelist: Making the Internet intimate
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> You do not need web access to participate. You may subscribe through
> email. Send an empty email to one of these addresses:
> tuning-subscribe@onelist.com - subscribe to the tuning list.
> tuning-unsubscribe@onelist.com - unsubscribe from the tuning list.
> tuning-digest@onelist.com - switch your subscription to digest mode.
> tuning-normal@onelist.com - switch your subscription to normal mode.

Bill!
I actually work through this book with the Jazz Flutist James Newton
when we were both students at Cal State L.A. (is n't that a weird
coincidence!) The multiphonis would vary than what the outcome was and
somtimes James would Greatly bring out even more notes! It seems like a
good place to start but belongs a part of the oral tradition as far as
application.
-- Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island
www.anaphoria.com

Howell's book, and Robert Dick's _The Other Flute_ were landmarks, to which
Pierre-Yves Artaud's book might be added. By all means, though, you should
get a hold of Johnny Reinhard's _Pitch_, volume 1 number 4, which has
several sets of microtonal fingerings for all of the woodwind and for horn,
of which I find Jon Fonville's especially useful. None of these, however,
discusses the new possibilities of the Kyngsma flute, which is designed
especially for quartertones.

Playing microtonally on a Boehme system flute built for 12tet is quite a
bit like playing chromatically on a single keyed baroque flute. It's
possible but at the price of evenness of color and volume (which I happen
to consider to be an interesting compromise). The player, the keywork
system and the individual flute and headpiece are all important variables.
It is critical to sit down with the individual player and -- with the help
of some of the reference materials above -- work out the part for your own
work. A rehearsal tape with reference pitches is very useful. (David
Feldman has used such a tape, with success, in a 7tet solo violin piece).

For these reasons, I think it is probably easier all around to compose the
piece first and then figure out how finger it, making changes as necessary,
rather than compose with the chart in hand. (Multiphonics and
specifically-timbre'd fingerings are a different subject).

Incidentally, for clarinet, the book by Philip Rehfeld is good and that of
Peter Veale and Claus-Stefan Mahnkopf for oboe is very good. How long will
we have to wait for Johnny Reinhard to write the great big microtonal
bassoon and contrabassoon book?

Daniel Wolf wrote:

>
> Playing microtonally on a Boehme system flute built for 12tet is quite a
> bit like playing chromatically on a single keyed baroque flute. It's
> possible but at the price of evenness of color and volume (which I happen
> to consider to be an interesting compromise).

It is for this very reason that Jim French now even refuses to play such
dinosaur choosing instead to build his own woodwinds Sometimes limited in
scope but always a unique timbre. I concider this man one of the best
musicians I've ever worked with!
Personally I like a certain unevenness of color and volume even with
Marimba bars which I only tune the harmonics if there's so freak effect with
another bar or such!
-- Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island
www.anaphoria.com

From Ed:

The Boehm System Flute is a beautifully-developed and perfected
engineering design, and the result of hundreds of years of work. From
study of Boehm's own book, "Die Fl�te und das Fl�tenspiel", published in
Munich in 1871, and all the subsequent works by players, physicists and
other experts, the acoustic problem was far from the simple one it would
seem to be. The result is, of course, a compromise, as are all such
designs, but is a very fortunate one in that the result is magnificent.
The player can mechanically hit every note in the range of the instrument
at will, and on the first try (assuming reasonable skill and practice), in
very close approximation to the intended note; and can adjust the pitch
easily by controlling the air stream. For playing 12 tet music, it works
very well.

However, the myriad design compromises which facilitate playing in 12 tet
work against playing other notes. In designing his quarter-tone and 31-tet
fingering charts, Thomas Howell warned about this. On Page 52, where he
introduces the 31-tone fingerings, he says that "a certain degree of
humoring with the embouchure is needed to bring the pitches into
temperament . . .". I find that to be true, in Spades! The un-adjusted
notes produced are very unevenly spaced; e. g., between a1 and b-flat1 are
two fingerings. Without adjustment, these sound very nearly alike; to get
them spaced properly, the player needs to know what he's trying for. And
this is the problem, all the way up the scale.

Karl-Heinz Stockhausen showed the way in a concert titled "Sirius", which
we heard in Houston in January 1978. He had four performers: a vocalist, a
trumpeter, a bass player and a bass clarinetist. Each wore a single
earphone, which was tied into a console operated by Stockhausen, which
played the sounds each player was supposed to reproduce; the player then
knew what he was to do, and did it very well. As I recall, he used many
different scales, but mostly 25 tones in two octaves.

It appears to me that some such arrangement is necessary for such
performance. A musician has to be able to tell when he is making the right
sounds; and except for the usual 12-note scale, it just isn't obvious.
This, I think, dominates the problem, regardless of the particular
fingerings used.

From Alita:

My comments about the 24 tet and 31 tet fingering charts:

Without sound to compare results I can't be sure I am accurately blowing
the pitch. I need a comparative pitch tape to be sure I have the correct
pitch. Flutes and other woodwinds can be easily "lipped" sharp or flat.
Since we hear almost only 12 tet it is impossible to learn other than 12
tet or whatever tuning is used by unaccompanied musicians and singers.
(The old argument that we play or sing just or meantone or whatever when
not accompanied by a fixed pitch instrument as guitar or piano.)

These new fingerings are fun to try. We have had the book "The Avant
Garde Flute" since about 1976 (soon after it came out) and I have opened it
to try the notes from time to time. The fingerings are new and need to be
learned almost as if learning to play a "new" instrument. I need a
fingering chart below each note change and play a <slow> waltz or march for
a while until learned. Our flute doesn't have a low B foot which is needed
for some notes.

----------
> From: Bill Alves <alves@orion.ac.hmc.edu>
> To: tuning@onelist.com
> Subject: [tuning] Flute fingerings
> Date: Wednesday, March 10, 1999 12:16 PM
>
> From: alves@orion.ac.hmc.edu (Bill Alves)
>
> There is a book by Thomas Howell -- The Avant-Garde Flute: A Handbook for
> Composers and Flutists / University of California Press, 1974 -- that has
> fingering charts for 31-tone and 24-tone scales. Has anyone tried these
> out? Do these fingerings work well for most flutists? Thanks.
>
> Bill
>
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> ^ Bill Alves email: alves@hmc.edu ^
> ^ Harvey Mudd College URL: http://www2.hmc.edu/~alves/ ^
> ^ 301 E. Twelfth St. (909)607-4170 (office) ^
> ^ Claremont CA 91711 USA (909)607-7600 (fax) ^
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Come check out our brand new web site!
> http://www.onelist.com
> Onelist: Making the Internet intimate
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> You do not need web access to participate. You may subscribe through
> email. Send an empty email to one of these addresses:
> tuning-subscribe@onelist.com - subscribe to the tuning list.
> tuning-unsubscribe@onelist.com - unsubscribe from the tuning list.
> tuning-digest@onelist.com - switch your subscription to digest mode.
> tuning-normal@onelist.com - switch your subscription to normal mode.
>

On Mon, 15 Mar 1999 20:32:24 -0600, "Ed & Alita Morrison"
<essaim@texas.net> wrote:

> These new fingerings are fun to try. We have had the book "The Avant
>Garde Flute" since about 1976 (soon after it came out) and I have opened it
>to try the notes from time to time. The fingerings are new and need to be
>learned almost as if learning to play a "new" instrument. I need a
>fingering chart below each note change and play a <slow> waltz or march for
>a while until learned. Our flute doesn't have a low B foot which is needed
>for some notes.

I wonder how hard it would be to figure out microtonal fingerings for a
recorder? I know that Tui St. George Tucker has written 24-tone recorder
music, but what about 19, 31-note, or other scales?

--
see my music page ---> +--<http://www.io.com/~hmiller/music/music.html>--
Thryomanes /"If all Printers were determin'd not to print any
(Herman Miller) / thing till they were sure it would offend no body,
moc.oi @ rellimh <-/ there would be very little printed." -Ben Franklin

> The Boehm System Flute is a beautifully-developed and perfected
> engineering design, and the result of hundreds of years of work.

(Obviously much of that 100 years of work has been not by Boehm but since he
died.)
Just as an aside, as I and somebody else mentioned on the list, Brannen-Cooper
makes an explicitly quartertone flute.