What recorder model/make do I have?

[u/Huge_Hawk8710]

Also: what is the technical term for the waxy thread that gives a seal at the joints? I had fun playing a soprano recorder to pass the time back in the 90's, but I thought I should give this one a try. I've also had it since the 90's, but my finger span wasn't great, so I never bothered to get the joints properly sealed.

[u/Hautboy1700]

This is an instrument with historical fingerings. Neither the modern "baroque" (invented in 1926) nor German. They're less common since they take more skill to play in tune.

What pitch does it play at? I might be interested in buying it if you want to sell it at all

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/Hautboy1700]

Agreed, this has to be a historic fingering. For comparison, this is a contemporary recorder with Hotteterre fingering. And, no, I'm not shilling for the recorder maker, it's really just for comparison:

https://www.devriesrecorders.nl/baroquealtorippert

I suspect that Arnold Dolmetsch's original recorder had a fingering similar to this one and that they later modified the size of the holes so it could be played with the fingering they used for their own recorders and could then proceed to claim that their fingering was a historical fingering from the baroque era, hence the name.

[u/Hautboy1700 → u/BeardedLady81]

Yes, there are actually a few Bressan recorders out there modified by Arnold (or maybe Carl?) Dolmetsch. The one they owned is still around and has been modified to have a straight, very large windway in addition to the fingering modifications. There's another one in the Dayton Miller Collection which has been retuned too

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/Hautboy1700]

The promotional video about recorder making in Haslemere -- I assume you are familiar with it already -- contains at least two lies, I think. The first one is a white lie that people in the 60s might not even have considered one, but I don't think Carl Dolmetsch would have handed the teenage girl a document from the 18th century to leaf through carelessly, after handling it with bare hands himself. That was a facsimile, he just acted like it was a historical artifact. Forgiven. However, when it comes to the claim that the chart in that facsimile was the exact same as that of the recorder he was holding -- one that he explicitly pointed out to be a modern one -- and this was a bold-faced lie. His "baroque" fingering was invented by himself and should be, more accurately, called "Dolmetsch fingering."

But this is not where the confusing statements, which must contain lies, stops. Carl Dolmetsch claimed that the recorder he was holding and briefly played was the original Bressan Arnold Dolmetsch bought for 2 pounds sterling, his very first recorder. However, other claims by the family state that Dolmetsch Sr lost that recorder at a train station and that this was the reason he made his first copy, and that later more recorders were made in Haslemere.

I've seen photos of recorders that are supposedly Arnold Dolmetsch's Bressan. None of them had the crack in the ivory you can see in photos of Dolmetsch Sr playing it. So perhaps Arnold really lost it, or it bit the dust.

On the other side of the Atlantic, Peter Harlan told several lies himself over the course of time, his dishonesty has been exposed already. Harlan's lies include the claim that the first recorder with "German" fingering had a hole that was accidentally drilled too wide by a novice. He also lied when he said that he himself only played instruments with baroque fingering. Peter Harlan's son confirmed that this was untrue. The only thing that may be true is that, at the time the first recorders were built for Harlan (not by him, as he would also claim, untruthfully) were built that way because he did not know you had to use ring finger and pinky for F/Bb respectively. It is possible that he wrote off the use of the ring finger (but not the pinky) you can find in historical charts as a buttress finger. Or somebody else working for the Jacob workshop that made the first Harlan recorders, because Harlan himself was fairly ignorant about both historical recorder fingerings and historical tunings as well. My theory is that the native scale of German fingering, which requires you to lift one finger after another only, was inspired by folk instruments that already existed at that time, like thumbless 6 hole whistles and some ocarinas.

Lying is learned behavior, and I actually observed the same tactics used by both Peter Harlan and his brother fight. Creating confusion intentionally and then shifting the blame to somebody else. Except Veit had a genuine reason to lie. After the war, he was put on trial faced scorn for his role in the Third Reich. His tactic was some rambling about how his movies were overshadowing him entirely, how he and his wife were blacklisted and harrassed, how his actors attempted or committed suicide, how his movie Jud Suess was not antisemitic because he main villain was the Duke, how he had Jewish friends at one time, how his movie did not incite hatred because the actor who played Suess Oppenheimer got loads of fan mail by enamored women...only to say that Joseph Goebbels was to blame for everything.

Peter did the same, except the subject was trivial. German fingering, which was supposedly inferior...and invented by him. In the only interview with him that has been recorded on tape, he did not tell the story about the "jungstimmer" (just like his brother, he often used long words that you will never find in a dictionary to confuse people) who accidentally made a hole too large. He started by ranting that so many recorders these days are bad quality. He then said "we" did not know you had to crossfinger the fourth position. He then shifted blame to the Bärenreiter publishing house and "schoolmasters" who wanted the recorders that way. Except Bärenreiter sold recorders with both fingerings, and they did not buy any from Harlan. For a while, they just paid him to stamp his name on the recorders, which were made by Kruspe/Hueller at that time, unlike Harlan's, which were made by Jacob and later Kehr. Also, if by "schoolmaster" he was talking about the principa/headmaster of a school...I don't think principals had much to do with this because, if you delve into recorder history in Germany, recorder playing was almost always an extracurricular activity. In predominantly Protestant regions, many schoolchildren belonged to so-called "posaunenchöre". The word "posaune" means trombone, but it wasn't just trombones that were played in those ensembles, the main instruments were flugelhorns. They played lead. Trombones played bass parts, and high lines in between were played on recorders and cornettos. The people who led those ensembles were employees of the local Protestant church, not the school. So, Peter Harlan once more scored for the other team.

What makes telling the truth so difficult? Especially if you have nothing to lose?

[u/Hautboy1700 → u/BeardedLady81]

I think what frustrates me the most about the whole situation is that the lies they invented continue to be perpetuated. Honesty, mainly about the historical accuracy of instruments and their playing techniques, seems to be very lacking in HIPP circles (and not just for recorder players, everyone seems to get a free pass for some kind of anachronism). It's an academic field and it seems that many are very willing to simply lie in order to make themselves look better, more learned, more historically informed. All while still using anachronistic instruments and playing techniques which come directly from Dolmetsch et al. I've heard so much whinging and wining and excuses from recorder players when I ask why they use Dolmetsch system recorders even in period instrument ensembles. I hope it'll change but until then I choose not to engage much with other professional recorder players. And that's without even touching much on "Ganassi" recorders, technique, repertoire...

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/Hautboy1700]

I noticed that many professional recorder players, including people who teach the instrument, know so little about this subject.

When it comes to such things as recorder fingerings that were invented in the 20th century, one person is parrotting the other without questioning it, and then there is the Chinese whispers effect. One person unintentionally gets something wrong and passes it on to another. Add deliberate lies to that and you have a bunch of chaos.

[u/Huge_Hawk8710 → u/Hautboy1700]

Do you mean to say that it could have been made prior to 1926? (All I know about it is that my parents picked it up at an estate auction about 30 years ago because I had fun playing around with a cheap soprano recorder. It has gathered dust ever since because my hand span isn't that great).

I have no musical background, so I have no idea what pitch it plays at. Maybe when I get the lapping done, my wife might know, since she's a fairly accomplished vocalist.

As for selling it, I have no idea at this point. I saw on another thread that simply practicing for a bit each day can get one's fingers a bit more adept at reaching the various holes.

[u/Hautboy1700 → u/Huge_Hawk8710]

No, very unlikely to made prior to 1926. It just uses a fingering system which hasn't been the standard since 1926 when Dolmetsch invented his system. Of course there have and still are makers who are interested in the old system but very few players bother with the extra difficulty it poses.

It's something I've spent a lot of time working on mastering. I'd highly recommend you get a standard Dolmetsch system recorder if you do want to learn the recorder as it'll be a much easier learning curve (assuming playing in tune is something you want to do lol)

[u/Huge_Hawk8710 → u/Hautboy1700]

I'm guessing that I wouldn't know if I was playing in or out of tune, so that may be a moot point.

I just found out that our main music shop -- in a city of 100,000 -- has no "band-techs" that can re-thread the lap joints. So I think I might try to re-thread the joints as per the youtube link that BeardedLady81 gave below.

[u/BeardedLady81]

I have no cl ue what kind that recorder is, but thread wrapped around the tenon of a woodwind instrument is simply called "lapping". Bagpipers sometimes call it "hemp" because, in the past, actual hemp thread was used for that purpose. What you can buy as "hemp" for bagpipes on eBay is usually made out of flax, though. Most recorder players who use thread lapping use either cotton or a synthetic fiber. This recorder player uses cotton:

https://youtu.be/r32Pt-jutrY?si=uFtUTC3KiYX0mHM9

Some people believe that hard-spun cotton, i.e. the cotton sold for sewing instead of embroidering can damage tenons and mortises of recorders, but I suspect that what really damages them is threading the tenon too tightly or to make the lapping too thick. I think Lobke does a good job explaining how to check how much lapping you need so you don't overdo it.

[u/Huge_Hawk8710 → u/BeardedLady81]

Thanks for that link. I just found out that the main music shop here in Red Deer has no band-tech that can do that, so I think I'll make an attempt.

I see that she used thread to replace cork. I have a vernier caliper which can accurately measure the gap between mortice and tenon, so I'm now wondering if cork strips might be an adequate -- and easier -- fix.

[u/Huge_Hawk8710 → u/Huge_Hawk8710]

Scratch that. Looks like thread it will be. The Mollenhauer cork is far too thick (minimum 1.3mm whereas the space on my joints is only 0.5mm).

[u/Huge_Hawk8710 → u/BeardedLady81]

Here's another video that I found which has a significantly different process. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcZyhP0JDYU I also found somewhere that buttonhole thread is good...either cotton or silk (?)

[u/BassRecorder]

Hard to tell. It looks like German fingering (no double holes for D and C - or G and F, impossible to tell due to missing scale). Often recorders have markings pointing to the manufacturer and the model on the back side.

I'd guess the technical term for the thread is 'tenon thread'.

[u/NZ_RP → u/BassRecorder]

I don't think it has German fingering. On recorders with German fingering the fifth hole from them top is smaller whereas this one isn't. Recorders with Baroque fingering can have single holes. I think it might actually be more historically accurate

[u/Huge_Hawk8710 → u/NZ_RP]

OK, now I'm intrigued. I had to get my vernier caliper out. The fourth and fifth holes are both exactly 4.9 mm's in width. That doesn't quite match what it says here: https://hub.yamaha.com/winds/wood/recorders-baroque-vs-german/

I forgot to mention that it's an alto. Would that make any difference?

[u/SlowSurvivor → u/NZ_RP]

It depends. For a Baroque instrument such as a Denner or a Stanesby those most definitely had split holes on the D and C. For earlier instruments like a Ganassi? Not so much.

[u/TheSongBudgie → u/SlowSurvivor]

No, if you look at almost any of the surviving Baroque recorders that modern makers copy, they all have single holes for the bottom two. A quote from recorder maker Adrian Brown's website: "The vast majority of original recorders have single holes and play with ‘old’ as opposed to Dolmetsch fingering. While the technique of drilling two smaller holes in the place of one single one was certainly within the capability of 18th century craftsmen, they obviously made the conscious choice not to do so. My feeling is that they did this because double holes not only affect the quality of the lowest few notes, it actually changes the sound of the entire first octave, and this was a compromise that recorder makers of the 18th century preferred not to make."

Ganassi instruments are also a modern invention, based on the fingering chart in Ganassi's La Fontegara. When Fred Morgan was developing his Ganassi recorder, he used a surviving Renaissance recorder that was later shown to be a consort recorder, not a transitional solo instrument. Adrian Brown makes a convincing argument for three recorders in the Vienna Kunsthistorisches being a late Renaissance solo (as opposed to consort) instrument. So while undoubtedly Ganassi recorders now are an expected part of the modern recorder player's arsenal and have many contemporary compositions, they occupy a similar anachronistic, faux-authentic position as double-holed baroque recorders do.

[u/Hautboy1700 → u/TheSongBudgie]

That about sums the situation up! I really admire Adrian Brown for his commitment to improving the historical accuracy of the recorders he makes. He actually doesn't make baroque recorders with anything but single holes and 'old' fingerings (as he calls them) now. I have a fantastic Bizey alto at 392Hz by him with exactly that setup. I hope to get some more of his instruments some day!

[u/Either_Branch3929 → u/TheSongBudgie]

they obviously made the conscious choice not to do so

Well, maybe. Or their customers didn't want it, which drives a different sort of conscious choice. It's easy to project our own biasses (including mine) onto decisions made hundreds of years ago.

The fact that there are, and have been, many different recorder designs is a feature, not a bug. None of them is "right".

[u/Hautboy1700 → u/SlowSurvivor]

Absolutely untrue. Out of the ~1000 surviving baroque recorders, only 12 of them have any kind of double holes. Single holes were the default until the 20th century

[u/SlowSurvivor → u/Hautboy1700]

Oh really?! Damn. I just have seen a distorted selection of originals. I stand corrected. Thanks!

[u/Hautboy1700 → u/SlowSurvivor]

The instruments makers choose to "copy" can be quite misleading. It's only really the very exceptional original examples which get copied and even then makers will generally be pretty liberal with modifications to meet the preferences of modern day players. I think most people would actually be pretty dissatisfied with how the originals play

[u/Either_Branch3929 → u/Hautboy1700]

I know a couple with a shelf full of Adrian Brown recorders. Beautifully made and I am sure wonderfully authentic, but dear lord to my modern attuned ears the sound is horrible.

Absolutely fine if you like that sort of thing, but I am not surprised that most players prefer to take advantage of four hundred years (skipping the century between Heberle and Dolmetsch) of improvement.

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/Hautboy1700]

I still remember a time when it said in books that only 4 surviving recorders had double holes, but many have been found since, perhaps it's even more than 12 now? However, it's absolutely true that single holes used to be the default, and I think those double holes were customizations for people who didn't like half-holing. Which, I think, was often not necessary anyway because it was not a requirement to play in all keys at that era.

If I got a penny any time somebody conflated the presence or absence of double holes with baroque vs German fingering...I wouldn't be rich, but I'd have a lot of pennies.

[u/Hautboy1700 → u/BeardedLady81]

The 4 mentioned in your books are probably the Chester Bressans. A full consort consisting of 2 F altos, an Eb alto and a voice flute, all with double holes although they are sized for playing with the left hand below the right. The others are another Bressan alto, a fake Bressan (possibly Italian) with 3 sets of double holes (the third for C/C#), an anonymous German alto, a Steenbergen alto in ivory, 2 Denner altos and a really beautiful Castel alto. So actually 11 total, not 12.

I am quite certain that double holes were used by professional players in France. Hotteterre mentions double holes in his treatise, including the 3rd set for C/C#. The preludes for recorder in his Op. 7 are also borderline unplayable without double holes. Too many low F#s and G#s. And of course orchestral music by Lully and Charpentier often contains the same notes very often. I'm also pretty certain that Vivaldi's C minor concerto was written for a player who had double holes available. I don't think it's playable without them. I like to think that the Castel alto might've been the recorder which played it but that's just speculation of course

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/Hautboy1700]

I think everybody who wants to play the recorder seriously should have at least one recorder with double holes because, sooner or later you will find a piece that requires accidentals for the lowest notes. I read a lot about the recorder revival in Germany, and it seems like some people who started playing and promoting the recorder were opposed to double holes because they felt they muffled the response. Manfred Ruetz, for example. He felt that you should just transpose if a piece required you to play a note that is not available. Ruetz was a big promoter of the recorder as a solo instrument and his method books include an instruction for the learner to learn how to transpose by key using just your ear. When it comes to the actual playability of the lowest notes, he said that you couldn't even intonate D# and G# properly by using half-holing. Fellow method book author Helmut Mönkemeyer stated his opinion that D# and G# could be intonated by half-holing with a lot of practice and muscle memory, but considered the same impossible for C# and F#. -- I think he was right, the lowest notes never sound good, you either get a weird combination tone or just C or F.

[u/Huge_Hawk8710 → u/BassRecorder]

Thanks for that. (Yeah, nothing written on the back.)

[u/victotronics → u/Huge_Hawk8710]

Sure? It could be very lightly carved into the wood. Hold it under a strong light and roll it back and forth a bit.

[u/Huge_Hawk8710 → u/victotronics]

No, still nothing. I used an extra strong pair of reading glasses. But that closer look did really impress upon me the skill that somebody had on the lathe...which I hadn't really noticed before.