Introduction to Native American Flute Making
A Description and History From an American Indian Flute Maker
Oct 26, 2008
Haunting Native American flute music is well known in today’s recording world. What isn’t quite so well known, is the story behind the instrument. John Stillwell, who specializes in Native American flute making , takes time to introduce musicians to the woodwind he’s worked with for a decade.
What is a Native American Flute?
The Native American style flutes John fashions are classified as two-chambered duct flutes. When a player blows into the mouthpiece on the first chamber, known as the slow air chamber, their breath is decelerated and sent out through a duct beneath the “bird”.
This device, often carved to resemble a bird due to the flute’s association with birdsong, focuses the player’s breath over the sound hole, or splitting edge, in the second chamber of the flute. The two chambers are divided by a solid piece of wood called a plug. This design appears to be unique to North America.
History of Native American Flute Making
Archeologists have unearthed fragments of several styles of Native American flutes and whistles. John’s research indicates that the two-chambered duct flute he crafts today was first documented in the early 1800s among the Northern Ute tribe.
John comments, “These early flutes were fashioned from river reeds by removing all but one of the nodes inside. The craftsman then made a hole on either side of the remaining node and a duct was carved into the reed between the two holes. The player would use his finger as a block to cover the channel and direct air against the edge of the sound hole. The fingers of the other hand were used to cover the tone hole.”
Slowly, knowledge of these flutes spread from the Great Plains to tribes across North America. But due to oppression and tribal deterioration, the Native American flute almost vanished by the middle of the twentieth century. Fortunately, a roots revival in the 1960s sparked new interest in the instrument.
Modern Native American Flute Making
The Native American flute of today bears little resemblance to the more basic flutes that inspired it. During the last half century, the instrument underwent a rapid evolution. Traditionally, flute makers crafted flutes for specific players by measuring their fingers, hands, and arms. John explains, “The length of the flute might be measured from the shoulder to the wrist. The placement of tone holes was measured by the length of a finger joint.” The flutes sounded beautiful individually, but weren’t tuned to any particular scale.
Things changed as more people took notice of the Native American flute. John says, “As the instrument gained in popularity, flute makers evolved from tribe members making instruments for themselves to people like myself who make instruments commercially. Little by little, a mode one pentatonic minor scale settled in as a universal standard. And for some reason, F sharp became the flute’s defacto key. The flutes are still made in many keys, of course, but a good percentage of the music you hear played on Native American flutes in commercial recordings is in F sharp.”
John describes the Native American flute’s scale this way, “A pentatonic scale consists of five notes. If you play any five black keys on the piano in succession you're playing a pentatonic scale. What makes a pentatonic scale so nice is that unlike a diatonic scale, all the notes and combinations of notes sound good together. There are no 'sour' notes to worry about.”
Due to the drastic changes this instrument has seen in such a short amount of time, musicians will encounter several styles of the Native American flute. They will find Plains style flutes, Woodlands style flutes, five holed flutes, and six holed flutes. In the next article, John Stillwell sheds light on the varieties of flutes and what those variations mean to the instrument’s tone and musical potential.
Quotes taken in conversation between Suite101.com and John Stillwell, and his web site.
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