Limited Flute Repertoire
(Published as a comment on FB group , May 2016)
Ιn the early 90s I had to face this missconception. Musicians back then really believed that the repertoire for the flute was limited. This missconception was encouraged by the fact that the socalled "major" composers did not write works for the flute because the instrument was well "under development" before the "Boehm era".
The fact that a 19c. flutist had to progress not only upon the development of his own musical expression (that explains Boehm emphasizing on the flutist's voice and accent) but upon the peculiarities of the instrument itself, prevented musicians from "competing" with the piano or the violin ! Boehm himself must have respected the piano more than pianists respected flute (pianists owe to Boem the perfection of the technique for casting metal piano strings...!) A flutist had to love the instrument in order to search, to experiment and to find the right ways to play. He had to even order a new one with his own specifications if the one that he already played was not compatible with his own "physique" or even special physical properties. This actually happens even today but the basic structure is already there. If this 19c. flutist was a "professional" he had to prepare BEFORE presenting a work to the public in ways that were unbelievably difficult comparing to a pianist or a string instrument player of that time.
Pianists have the mechanism of the instrument right in front of their own eyes. String players had all the elements of the sound production literally in their own hands. Reed players understand the fundamental production of sound in their instrument by the "glottis" that provides resistance to the air stream. But flutists, and therefore Flute-makers of the time, had to cope with science, acoustics and, above all, experiment, since the rest of the flute (that is the most part of the instrument) is placed inside the body of each one of us. Boehm, he only scratched the surface. By research he emphasized in the necessity of acoustics. But all this effort to produce a descent sound, led us to the unknown masterpieces of unbelievable virtuosity upon the so-called "pre-Boem", or "later-perfected-by-soloists" old instrument. No one of the well-known famous "virtuosos" of our time confronts his Art with these masterpieces considered. They are taken as "pieces of study". Who dares for instance to produce vibrant, vivid and strong first-register "bass" lines of a Fürstenau op.125 study with the "old instrument" in such a way so as to create the illusion of multi-layer polyphony not only as a visual reality in the eyes of the soloist but as a real soundscape for the ears within the properties of a real physical high-ceiling room, altering the properties of his performance according to the number of listeners who fill the room? Reading the score is not enough.
A Flutist and his instrument was one and unique body. Not only he had to perform on a level he had accomplished as a standard but he had to pass the art to the next generation. The ammount of details that characterises this art, compared to other disciplines, is (in my humble opinion) enormous. I believe that following the generations of musicians after the early 19th c. , we now find ourselves missing a great deal of this art. I hope not for ever.