Ellis Flutes’ Essential Flute

Ellis Flutes’ Essential Flute

The “Large Hole D Prototype”, which is only recommended for players with larger hands and who use piper’s grip, is not recommended. Although the expanded hole spacing produces extremely strong E and A notes, it would be difficult to play for players with small to medium hands.

The Essential Flute can be used for Celtic music as well as World music. Diatonic major tuning. For improved projection and intonation, the head bore is tapered. Right-handed players can use the ergonomic embouchure hole position.

Geoffrey released a new Essential Flute version in June 2020. The flute bore has now been fitted with a choke point, which makes this new version even more enjoyable. The flute’s bore manipulation creates a pleasant feeling of compression. This is similar to conical bore flutes that many players love. It also gives the flute the same back-pressure and punch. It also allows for the widening of the lowest finger hole, which is always the weakest note of any open-hole flute. This gives the flute a stronger tone that matches the rest of its scale.

It is a beautiful instrument. It’s everything I could have hoped for in a “3/4 flute” (referring to the F flute), bright and with lots of potential for the old-school Irish trads I have been working on.

For players with larger hands, the larger-holed versions are better suited. These have a larger finger hole spread, but if you can manage the stretch, they produce a powerful sound. For players who use traditional (not pipers!) grips on their left and right hands, the Cherry Bb has ergo finger holes. The future models will have an ergo arrangement, but it will be subtler so that both traditional grip players and pipers can easily manage the hole placement.

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