Faà di Bruno, Giovanni Matteo [Horatio, Orazio] 83

Flude, John.

See Lloyd, John.

Flue-work.

The flue-stops of an organ collectively (as distinct from Reed-work), i.e. those in which sound is produced on the fipple or flue principle whereby wind is directed through a narrow windway to strike against a lip or edge above. The term refers to the open or stopped Diapasons or Principals, the Flutes, the narrow-scaled, conical, compound and all varieties of metal or wooden stops other than those of the reed-work. The term appears only late in English writings, being absent from such authors as Talbot, Hawkins, Burney, Blewitt etc., who used only the phrase ‘reed stops’ to distinguish the non-flues. Hopkins and Rimbault (The Organ, 1855) gave alternatives: ‘lip, mouth or flue pipes – for they are called by all these names’, although he himself preferred ‘flue’. Some American authors prefer the terms ‘labial’ (flue) and ‘lingual’ (reed).

PETER WILLIAMS

Flügel

(Ger.: ‘wing’).

A term used for wing-shaped stringed keyboard instruments. During the 18th and early 19th centuries it was applied to the Harpsichord. Later in the 19th century the term came to denote the Grand pianoforte. The word is also applied to the ‘wing’ (tenor) joint of the bassoon.

JOHN KOSTER

Flugelhorn

(from Ger. Flügelhorn; Fr. bugle, grand bugle; It. flicorno soprano; Sp. fiscorno).

A valved brass instrument pitched in B with the same compass as the cornet. It has the conical bore, wide bell and large format of its parent the keyed bugle. The mouthpiece cup is deep, almost funnel-shaped, and a sliding mouthpipe serves as the tuning-slide. The tone is round and suave though rougher and bugle-like in loud playing. The flugelhorn plays a leading role in most continental bands as it has done for over a century. Military bands in Britain and America do not use it, but one flugelhorn is an obligatory constituent of the British brass band, in which it is played from the same part as the repiano cornet following the instructions ‘unis.’ and ‘solo’ (with the instrument specified).

At the beginning of the 18th century in Germany, the Flügelhorn was a large semicircular hunting horn of brass or silver carried by the Flügelmeister who directed the wings of a ducal hunt. It became a military instrument during the Seven Years War and from it was developed the Bugle (i) as known since, at first in a single-wound model, to which Halliday added keys in his keyed bugle of 1810. This was adopted by German bands from 1816, first described as ‘Klappenflügelhorn’. Substitution of valves for keys took place in Germany where the Munich manufacturer Michael Saurle registered the privilege for the valved flugelhorn (Ventilflügelhorn) in 1832. The resulting instrument made a great impression in France, where Kastner described it in Cours d'instrumentation: supplément(Paris, 1844) as ‘bugle à pistons (Flügelhorn)’ and a ‘miraculous transformation of the [keyed] bugle’. It helped suggest to Sax the proportions of his saxhorns, his own valved ‘bugle’ being practically a bell-to-front model of the B contralto saxhorn and a little smaller in bore than some of the German and Austrian instruments. This was sold in England from about 1846, first as ‘soprano saxhorn or bugle’. The name ‘flugelhorn’ had entered by 1857 probably under the influence of German bandmasters, and brass band journals by then included a part for it exactly as today.

An equally important instrument in the larger continental bands is the small flugelhorn in E (sometimes F) known best in Germany simply as ‘Pikkolo’ and in France as ‘petit bugle’ (see illustration). Expressions like ‘Altflügelhorn’ and ‘bugle tenor’ denote bell-to-front (trumpet-form) models of ‘Althorn’ etc., but in Italy ‘flicorni alto’ to ‘contrabasso’ are the ordinary deep brass instruments, normally in upright form.

Orchestral uses of the flugelhorn include Respighi's Pini di Roma(representing the ‘buccine’ of a consular army), Stravinsky's Threni, Vaughan Williams's Ninth Symphony and works by Tippett. Tim Souster's The Transistor Radio of St Narcissus (1982–3) is a substantial work for flugelhorn and live electronics which uses the instrument over a range of three and a half octaves, and the same composer's Concerto for Trumpet, Live Electronics and Full Orchestra (1988) employs the instrument for the solo part in two of the movements, ‘Beach’ and ‘Dawn’.

The flugelhorn has been used extensively in jazz in the 20th century. Several players, particularly Miles Davis, have used it in addition to the trumpet, but others have developed the idiom of the instrument in its own right. Chet Baker, Thad Jones and Clark Terry are notable American players, while London-based players such as Harry Beckett, Kenny Wheeler and the lesser-known but highly respected Henry Lowther have established distinguished reputations for their flugelhorn playing.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

R.T. Dudgeon: The Keyed Bugle (Metuchen, NJ, 1993)

E. Tremmel: Blasinstrumentenbau im 19. Jahrhundert in Südbayern (Augsburg, 1993)

ANTHONY C. BAINES/TREVOR HERBERT

Fluitje van een cent

(Flem.).

See Pennywhistle.

Flute.

[concert flute, cross flute, German flute, transverse flute] (Fr. flûte, flûte traversière, flûte allemande, flûte d’Allemagne, traversière; Ger. Flöte, Querflöte; It. flauto, flauto traverso, traversa). Term used to refer to a vast number of wind instruments, from the modern orchestral woodwind to folk and art instruments of many different cultures.

See also Organ stop.

I. General

II. The Western transverse flute

BIBLIOGRAPHY

JEREMY MONTAGU (I, II), HOWARD MAYER BROWN/JAAP FRANK, ARDAL POWELL (II)

Flute