Native American Flute

A number of years ago I found myself inexorably drawn into the realm of woodwind crafting.  A tangent of one of my lesser known, and much neglected skills – flute playing.  I started off with classical flute in the 6th grade.  No, scratch that… I started off with recorder when I was 7 years old.  I remember, quite distinctly, sitting on my bed in Sierra Leone with my mom, both of us tooting on plastic recorders she’d brought over from the United States the year before.  With no TV for entertainment (heck, no electricity), it was a worthy way to pass the time and gave me a head start on piano when I came back to the States in ’84.  But I digress.  Classical flute gave way to Irish flute and Irish whistles.  I have flirted here and there with other forms of folk music and ethnic tangents, but have always returned to my Irish roots.  Like many of my pass-times, it proved rather expensive, especially since folk woodwinds are not chromatic instruments – meaning they only play one root key.  Therefore it is necessary to amass a full range of keys.  Which was perfectly fine by me.  However, there were also many various and sundry kinds of folk woodwinds, each with their subtle tones and quirks, and each requiring a range of keys and modes.

And so, as with so many of my interests, what I couldn’t afford to buy, I aspired to make.  And thus my woodwind crafting days began.  I won’t regale you with tales of hours spent researching the internet, ordering obscure books, chiseling out specialized tools, and days and weeks whittling away at pipes and blocks of wood.  My first flutes looked like something chipped out by an early paleolithic caveman.  Fortunately, with the help of the internet, my skills evolved much more rapidly, and after several months I emerged from the late mesozoic era with something that hissed and rasped like a chain-smoking goat.  Over time, my clunky instruments, which were heavy and required a small team of mules to haul around, became more delicate, and the craftsmanship became more refined.  I was privileged to spend a day with world-renown flute maker Patrick Olwell as well as the multitalented Erik Sampson.  I learned to craft Quena, Shakuhachi, Pan Pipes, and Native American flutes.  A few were hand turned on a lathe, but most were made from a species of bamboo known as arundinaria gigantea which thrives in the southern United States.  I spent most days covered in wood dust and smelling like smoke from the woodburning tools I used to engrave and inlay design on the finished instruments.

In blogs of long ago I posted some of my instruments, but none exist yet on this latest installment; and since returning from Cambodia I have yet to take up my flutecrafting tools (mostly because I can’t get to my workbenches in the garage for all the junk).  So, I post here one of my favorite pieces, a Native American flute inlaid with sterling silver and bands of Honduran rosewood.  A recording I made of this instrument can be found here.