A solid keyless flute in excellent condition, well-maintained by its previous owner and played enough to be nicely settled in. The tone is responsive across the registers, with a full-voiced bottom D. Construction is three-piece African blackwood with silver ring fittings and thread-wrapped tenons. The flute comes with a plastic pistol-style case.
About the Maker
Casey Burns has been making Irish and folk music flutes since 1981, based out of Kingston, Washington. His designs draw on the acoustical models of 19th-century flutemakers including Rudall & Rose and Boosey (Pratten). Over a career spanning more than twenty years, he completed over two thousand instruments.
The Small Hand flute is a particularly significant part of Burns's legacy. Beginning in 1985, he pioneered early small-handed versions of the Pratten flute, sensitive to the needs of players who found traditional wooden flutes difficult and taxing to hold, and continued to iteratively improve this design over the following decades. The approach involves more than simply moving holes closer together. By working within the bore geometry, Burns was able to reposition the tone holes to better fit smaller hands while preserving tuning and voicing, using careful undercutting to maintain second-octave response.
Burns has since retired and is no longer taking orders.
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