Eliana is Anomalously Designed?

Hmm. I think I have an anomalously designed alto flute.

Here's the context. I was checking out entries in the Flute Forum in Facebook when I stumbled upon this picture post of the Muramatsu alto flute as put up by a member. It was a pretty picture of the Muramatsu alto flute, and I was enjoying it very much when I noticed something strange about this particular picture. I will replicate it here for ease of reference:

Look at the upper right corner of the picture of the alto flute---this is where the upper part of the flute (i.e. the part of the flute body closest to the head joint) is located.

There are keys attached to levers that actuate the covers that cover the tone holes for the entire left hand there.

On Eliana (my alto flute), I instead have this particular set up:

Don't mind the yellowish colour---it is reflective of the wall colours than any type of tarnish. Look carefully at the upper right corner of the picture as well---notice that Eliana does not have those levers that I saw. In fact, the keys are what I would call ``direct driven'', in that my fingers immediately actuate the covers that cover the various tone holes for the left hand.

I got confused. Was the Muramatsu alto flute special or was Eliana weird?

I went to the Muramatsu alto flute page, and looked up their alto flute schematic. I will replicate it here for ease of reference:

The picture is correct; the Muramatsu alto flute does have levers in the left hand that actuate the tone hole covers.

What about alto flutes by other makers then?

A quick check with Altus' alto flutes showed the same. I replicate the image here for ease of reference:

Yep, levers in the left hand.

Another quick check with Kotato's and Fukushima's alto flutes showed the same too. I replicate a rotated version of one of alto flutes here

Yes, levers in the left hand.

Dizhao's alto flutes? Replicating the rotated and cropped image here for ease of reference:

Yes, levers in the left hand also.

I was getting confused. The last major flute maker that I knew that made alto flutes was Eva Kingma. This is where I was a little amused. Looking at the details of the left hand, we see the levers. I replicate the image here for ease of reference:

But if we scroll down the main alto flutes page to the section on ``open hole'' version of the alto flute, we find that the left hand are also ``direct drive'' on the key covers. I replicate that image here for ease of reference:

This sort of makes sense because the idea of the ``open hole'' alto flute is to allow better venting like the open-hole versions of the regular concert flute.

There was one more thing I had to check, and it was The Flute and Flute-Playing by Theobald Boehm, father of the modern concert flute design. In it, he references the ``bass flute in G'', which is what we call in modern times as the ``alto flute''. In it, on p127, he shows his mechanism schematic for the left hand (or upper parts of the flute).

From this, it is clear that everyone who was making alto flutes were basically following this idea of using levers.

I mean, even the Wikipedia entry's picture of the Yamaha alto flute shows the same left levers. I replicate the image here for reference:

It is therefore rather clear that Eliana's design is indeed anomalous.

Eliana's design seems to follow closer to that of an upsized concert flute than one that is based off of Boehm's design, possibly as a way of avoiding the need to fabricate longer and more complex parts.

That said, she still plays like a charm, and I was glad that I had enough knowledge to figure out what was going on. I suppose the lever mechanism helps reduce the arm stretch that might be needed for the left hand, which can help in the support of the rather long instrument, but for me, there really isn't that much of a difference. It is possible that I'm just used to the correct support from playing the 倍大 D 笛子, which is roughly of the same tuning as that of the alto flute.

In either case, that is all for today, I suppose; I'm kinda sorry that I nerded out again. Till the next update.