Thank you for purchasing a Forest Flute! I absolutely love making these instruments and hope that your flute brings you many years of happy music making. Below are some useful tips to get you started but please do get in touch if you have any questions at all.
Playing your first notes
Your flute is tuned to the pentatonic scale and has a range of one octave. It has been designed to make use of a simple fingering system which should be quick to master after a little bit of practice. Here are a few guidelines to get you up and running:
- The first three fingers on your left hand close the first three holes on your flute (starting nearest your mouth).
- The first two fingers on your right hand close the remaining two holes, as shown in the diagram at the bottom of this page.
- Use the soft, padded part of your finger to fully cover the holes, so that no air escapes. This can take a bit of practice but will get easier with time, hang in there!
- Begin by blowing into the flute with all the holes open. Try to keep the air flow focussed and experiment by blowing harder or softer to find the best sound. The note you are playing is high D.
- Now close the first hole (nearest your mouth) with the first finger of your left hand. This should produce a B.
- Adding your second finger, so that the first two holes are both covered, will produce an A and covering the first three holes with your left hand will allow you to play a G.
- Keeping the first three holes covered, we can now add the first finger of the right hand on the next hole, to produce an E. Finally, close the last hole on the flute with the second finger on your right hand to play low D.
- Practise moving between these notes, being careful to fully cover the holes. Remember, you are always adding fingers starting with the hole nearest your mouth. In other words, if you are closing the third hole, then holes one and two should also be covered.
- With time, you will become more fluent on your flute and will find the best finger position and air pressure needed to produce a beautiful sound.
- If your sound becomes fuzzy or difficult to produce, you may need to clear the windway (the channel you blow through). Do this by covering the window (the opening on top of the flute, near your mouth) and blow a burst of air through the instrument. This clears any moisture in the windway.
Taking care of your flute
Your Forest Flute should require very little upkeep but here are a few tips for keeping it in good working order:
- Condensation will build up in your flute when playing, so allow it to dry between playing sessions and if necessary clear the windway, as described in #10 above.
- Once a year, or more often if required, the wood can be protected by wiping on a small amount of linseed oil. This will bring back the flute’s shine and will help protect the wood from any moisture.
Some easy pieces to get you playing
Below are a few simple pieces to try out, using only your left hand. Play them slowly to get used to changing between the notes. The words will help with your rhythm but remember the white notes are long and the black notes are short.
You can also have a go at creating your own music. Start by using just the left hand, before also including your right hand notes. On a pentatonic flute there are no wrong notes, just wrong fingerings.
