Alto Flute ~ A Beautiful Instrument for Beautiful People

Until Theodore Boehm’s development of the modern flute, the alto flute struggled to gain any recognition. The added size of the instrument’s diameter and length (which is what gives the flute its lower sound) meant that until Boehm’s system of rods and keys the instrument was too big for human hands. Theodore Boehm was possibly the first flautist and composer to fall in love with the instrument and bring it into the hands of both flautists and composers.

The alto flute has a beautiful and highly expressive tone that extends a fourth lower than the standard concert flute. The instrument is strongest in its first two octaves. Above this, the alto flute’s tone starts to become thin and doesn’t have the same brilliance as the concert flute. While this can be seen as a limitation, some composer’s choose to deliberately exploit this pale and delicate colour. It wasn’t until Stravinsky and Ravel that the instrument found its way into larger orchestral works. Today it is common practice for orchestra flautist to double on piccolo, flute and alto flute.

The alto flute is a transposing instrument. This allows flautist to swop between the different flutes without needing to relearn any fingering. Consequently, the instrument is pitched a fourth below what it is written. As with the concert flute, the lowest note of the instrument is set in stone. The highest note may vary from player to player. The important thing to know is that the high you push the instrument the more challenging it becomes to play. Generally speaking, the pitches will become sharp, unstable and limited to a fairly loud dynamic. Composers can take the below range as being relatively safe with the crotchets denoting areas that some performers will be willing to venture into but that other performer will avoid.