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Some more photos from the Aberdeen FluteFling weekend November 2024 See the blog post about the weekend here. Click on the photos to enlarge. Credits: Linda Harkness, Gordon Turnbull; captions to follow.
The Aberdeen FluteFling took place 1-3 November 2024 and featured workshops with Claire Mann, Freya Rae and Laura MacKenzie, plus Dougie Pincock in conversation with flute maker George Ormiston.
Aberdeen FluteFling musicians celebrating a fine day of music together. Photo (c) Linda Harkness
Thanks to all participants, guests, tutors, organisers and venues including Ruthrieston Community Centre, the Blue Lamp and Rishi’s Indian Aroma! FluteFling will return to Aberdeen in November 2025.
The weekend opened with a lively session in the upstairs lounge of The Blue Lamp in the Gallowgate. Thanks to Lewis Brown for providing the venue and continuing to support live music in Aberdeen.
The Friday night session at the Blue Lamp (c) John Crawford
It was interesting to find ourselves sharing the facilities with a Halloween party; some of revellers in fancy dress got lost on their way to the big downstairs lounge. Re-directing them Claire Mann said:
The Saturday workshops at Ruthrieston Community Centre this year were something very special with all three of our first all-female tutor line up teaching in Aberdeen for the first time.
The teaching resources provided by the tutors delivered an intriguing mix of traditional and contemporary music from Scotland, Ireland and Sweden for participants including some wonderful and mesmeric countermelodies.
During the day Flute-maker George Ormiston had a pop-up space that allowed people to try out various models of his instruments and there was a constant flow of people in and out all day.
Dougie Pincock demonstrated the importance relaxation in a flute player’s daily regime.
Dougie Pincock finds a quiet moment to rest during the Saturday workshops (c) John Crawford
In Rishi’s Indian Aroma Freya provided an important lesson in nutrition for flute and whistle players and made sure she had a snack for the train journey home. (c) John Crawford
Saturday evening saw a return to The Blue Lamp for some essential rehydration and work on what had been learned during the day.
Flutes in full flow (c) John Crawford
The session warms up… (c) John Crawford
Laura MacKenzie (left) introduces a Stateside tradition to Scotland — of flute players linking arms to make a chain. (c) John Crawford
Pipe tunes on the whistle (c) John Crawford
Three flute players on their other instruments: L-R Rachel (clarsach), Claire Mann (fiddle), Freya Rae (fiddle) (c) Kenny Hadden
The Saturday session in full flight (c) John Crawford
Whistle and flute from Claire and Freya (c) John Crawford
A fine brunch at “Cup”, in little Belmont Street, delivered on Laura’s need to sample the vegan breakfast including haggis and restored the remainder of the survivor’s for the Sunday session. Altogether a more sedate outing than Friday and Saturday but still good craic and tunes!
The Sunday session always has a more relaxed vibe (c) John Crawford
More pipe tunes flying off the whistles (c) John Crawford
More photos from the weekend can be found here.
What did people say they enjoyed about the weekend? This is some of the feedback we had.
Loved the mix of ornamentation, technique and tunes. Every tutor had a very different approach and I took a lot which I’m excited to use to go further with my playing in future.
Another well organised and valuable weekend. Thanks to all concerned. Oh and thanks for the rain free weather!
Inspiring… Will always recommend
Enjoyed it lots. Would certainly recommend it to others, and look forward to the next one! Thank you!
[I learned] that the flute playing world takes on many shapes and styles and no one should turn their back on new forms and ideas. The sharing of knowledge is a great aspect of the flute playing fraternity.
After drawing breath, the team are now looking towards making the 2025 Edinburgh event a success. The event will take place 4-6 April 2025, so look out for news of tickets going on sale. We’re also making early plans for Aberdeen 2025.
Please let us know if you have any specific ideas or suggestions for future events. As always, make sure you are signed up to the mailing list to hear about it all first before tickets go on general sale.
About the author: John Crawford is a long-co-organiser with FluteFling. John enjoys exploring the forgotten pre-revival Scottish flute manuscripts that reside in online libraries and collections, such as this Scottish fife player’s manuscript from 1799.
Dougie Pincock (flute) and Dierdre Graham (clarsach) performing for Scottish Folk Day 2024.
Traditional flute players from Scotland and beyond have contributed to a video project to mark Scottish Folk Day — 23 September 2024.
As members of the Traditional Music Forum who are organising the event, FluteFling wanted to mark the success of The FluteFling Collection tune book, which will shortly be going into a second print run.
Claire Mann performs for Scottish Folk Day 2024.
For the event, the contributors were invited to make a video of one of their contributions to the book, highlighting some of the range of material and styles of playing the flute from a Scottish perspective. Featuring whistles, wooden flutes and Boehm system flute, the videos reflect the wide range of ideas and influences at FluteFling events.
The resulting videos were put together by FluteFling supporter Peter Saunders and can be found on his Scottish Flute Channel on YouTube.
FluteFling thanks the video contributors: Sharon Newton Creasey, John Gahagan, Kenny Hadden, Niall Kenny, Rebecca Knorr, Davy Maguire, Claire Mann, Orlaith McAuliffe, Tom Oakes, Dougie Pincock and Gordon Turnbull.
The FluteFling Collection was the first collection of music for traditional flute players in Scotland to be published for about 150 years. Published in 2022, the organisers invited previous tutors to contribute to the book, which contains over 100 tunes from some of the leading flute players and teachers in the traditional music scene.
There are still a handful of copies of the book available, from our online shop or in person from a FluteFling event, such as Aberdeen in November. Plans for a second volume are currently being explored.
Organised by Scotland’s Traditional Music Forum (TMF), Scottish Folk Day is running in tandem with European Folk Day, held on the same date, which has been conceived and coordinated by the European Folk Network.
Scottish Folk Day will take place once more on Monday 23 September, celebrating the country’s lively traditional music scene, and offering a platform for musicians and artists at every level to showcase their talents. The event gives the public the opportunity to connect with the vibrant folk scene in Scotland and right across Europe.
The next FluteFling event takes place in Aberdeen 1-3 November.
It seems that there is so much more on for flute and whistle players to attend these days and it is great to see that the inaugural Alex Green Weekend will take place in Aberdeen 1-3 March. The weekend celebrates the NE whistler with an impressive lineup of concerts and workshops organised by The Elphinstone Institute, which is part of the University of Aberdeen.
Featured performers and tutors are Cathal McConnell, Mary Bergin, Fred Morrison, Dougie Pincock, Claire Mann, Tom Oakes and Kenny Hadden in a range of events, some of which are free to attend.
It’s a good chance to see and hear so many contributors to The FluteFling Collection – five of those mentioned are included. You can get your copy here or catch Kenny Hadden over the festival weekend.
Tickets are on sale through Aberdeen Performing Arts and at the time of writing this is the best way to find out what is happening.
Update 2 February: The full programme is now available on The Elphinstone Institute website.
Alex Green had a unique and authentic style of playing, which has been described as “spit-staccato” (I’m sure there must be a better and more attractive descriptor — maybe someone who knows NE Scottish dialects can suggest one). A highly influential and generous musician by all accounts.
Alex Green passed away in 2017 and has since been inducted into the Scottish Traditional Music Hall of Fame. You can learn more about his life at Hands up for Trad.
His album Whistle O’er The Lave O’t has an accompanying video:
In Scotland when the clocks are turned back in October, you know you’re getting deep into Autumn, with darker days and longer nights. Which makes the thought of being indoors with others to play music so much more inviting, as it was for the first FluteFling outing to the Granite City since 2019.
Niall Kenny takes a group at the Saturday workshops (c) Gordon Turnbull
Niall Kenny and Munro Gauld had previously taught at FluteFling in Edinburgh but this was the first time Tina Jordan Rees had taught with us, so it was a departure from our previous outings. Indeed, this was the first time that none of the core tutors were teaching.
This year we were based at Ruthrieston Community Centre, with sessions at The Blue Lamp (Friday and Sunday) and at Cults Bowling Club (Saturday). The latter was unusual for us and made necessary by the lack of available venues in the city, a problem we found when organising the Edinburgh weekend in May and part of a wider problem across the country. However, we were made very welcome and had the space to ourselves.
Storms Babet and Ciarán had battered the NE of Scotland and made travel plans for many a bit tricky but we were all there to enjoy a well-attended event — the highest numbers we have had for the Aberdeen weekend.
The Friday night session at The Blue Lamp in Aberdeen. (c) Malcolm Reavell
With familiar faces gathering at the Friday night session, we eased ourselves into remembering what these gatherings are all about. Where else can you be in the company of such great flute players and fellow aficionados without apology? Digging out the musical gems from the back of the mind, sharing knowledge and news together. It was an informal way to warm ourselves up and reorient ourselves to the flute world.
FluteFling at Ruthrieston Community Centre, Aberdeen (c) Gordon Turnbull
The Saturday venue at Ruthrieston was new to us and well-scouted by John Crawford, who once again had done a great job to ensure that a FluteFling weekend could go ahead. Sadly, John wasn’t able to attend in person until the final session, but we hope he is on the mend and in good fettle for the next outing. Kenny Hadden was of course on hand throughout the day and Coralie Mills returned to the front desk to ensure everything ran smoothly from registration to packing up and all things in between.
Tina Jordan Rees leads a workshop. (c) Gordon Turnbull
Once again, we rotated three groups around the three tutors so that everyone got a range of different perspectives and focus. The longer breaks were a great chance to catch up, try out flutes and clarify teaching points. We were joined just before lunch by flute maker George Ormiston, who was great company and had brought some of his flutes and a whistle for people to try.
George Ormiston during on the breaks between workshops (c) Gordon Turnbull
We were struck by the fact that almost all of those attending the weekend were playing modern flutes and only a handful of older flutes were being played. It’s a sure sign of how flute making has come on in recent years that so many high quality instruments are now available to musicians. We didn’t do a survey, but as well as numerous Ormistons, there were examples by Aebi, Gabriel, Windward, Lehart, Thomson, Wilkes and certainly others. Maybe next time we should do a survey.
Munro Gauld (L) and Dougie Pincock (R) in conversation. (c) Gordon Turnbull
The talk at the end of the day was an interview with Munro Gauld led by Dougie Pincock. The focus was Munro’s work in exploring some of the vast archives of Scottish traditional music, in particular rediscovering the lost music of the Gàidhlig Highlands.
In particular, Munro stressed the importance of connecting the music to place, people and story. This roots the music in history and directly connects the present day musician and listener to people, events and emotions of the past, giving it an additional depth and heft that might otherwise be missing. Munro went on to describe how we can all do this for ourselves, digging where we stand. It is clear that there is much to be unearthed and brought to light, and that many were clearly inspired to do so.
Personally, I felt that there was possibly a natural synergy in rediscovering forgotten Scottish music on flutes, an instrument long forgotten in Scotland, now becoming remembered.
I have been aware of Munro’s work for a while and his talk was originally going to be at Edinburgh in 2020, which of course fell foul of Covid. For those who were not there on this occasion, the interview was recorded by Peter Saunders for The Scottish Flute Channel on YouTube and will be published in due course.
The evening session was slightly out of town, where Cults Bowling Club made us feel very welcome, giving their space over to us entirely. Lots more tunes, some Bb flutes and an A flute as well.
The Saturday session at Cults Bowling Club (c) Gordon Turnbull
Gordon Turnbull (L) and Peter Saunders (R) playing Bb flutes. (c) Chris Cracknell
Overall, there was a good turnout from Aberdeen and the surrounding area, but people had also travelled from Inverness, Stirlingshire, Dunbar, Edinburgh, Perthshire, Glasgow, Lancashire, Germany and Sweden. It was particularly delightful to finally meet Joel Hagen from Gothenburg, who had been trying to attend a FluteFling weekend since 2020. Joel plays with the Swedish group Jaerv, which are definitely worth checking out. As hoped, he treated us to some Swedish tunes, while Chris Cracknell introduced us to some German tunes as we made common cause with the flute as a lesser-known instrument in other traditions.
The Sunday Survivors’ Session at The Blue Lamp (c) Gordon Turnbull
The Sunday Survivors’ Session was well attended, with two sittings. Making the most of the daylight for driving meant that I only briefly saw John Crawford to thank him for the successful arrangements, and was literally heading out of the door when Peter arrived with George Ormiston and Munro, fresh from interviewing for the Scottish Flute Channel. From conversations with Peter, I think we are in for a treat over the rest of the winter as the interviews are published.
Thanks to everyone who helped to plan the weekend and ensure that it ran smoothly, in particular John Crawford, Peter Saunders, Kenny Hadden, Coralie Mills, Lorna Aucott, Dougie Pincock and George Ormiston, plus of course the three fine tutors themselves. Thanks too, to all of the venues for accommodating us so well.
Munro has since shared a link on Facebook to a blog on some of his work. He writes:
Here is the second blog of research from the An Cuinneachadh project looking at C18th music connected with Fort Augustus. This episode focuses on the then owners of the land at the southern end of Loch Ness – The Lovat Frasers. Their story is “colourful” and encompasses bigamy, treason and beheading, as well as Royal recognition and great honours for victory in the battles of Britain’s emerging empire. These events were captured at the time by music and song (the social media of their day). Playing these reels, strathspeys, marches and Gaelic songs helps us journey back 250 years to get a sense of a very different Scotland …
The blog is available in either English or Gaelic.
The next FluteFling Weekend will be in Edinburgh to celebrate our 10th Anniversary 19-21 April at the Heart of Newhaven Community. We’re already making plans and I’m sure it will soon be upon us.
Wintertrad, led by FluteFling supporter Tom Oakes with Shetland fiddler Ross Couper, is 24-26 November in Edinburgh, again at the Heart of Newhaven Community and around Leith Walk. Highly recommended, with great concerts, workshops and sessions. Flutes are a big focus of course.
Tradwinds afternoon workshop on Saturday 2nd December 1-4pm. Come along to work on Scottish tunes and techniques for flute and whistles with Gordon Turnbull. Some experience is needed, but it is a mixed and supportive group, teaching material supplied in advance. Fisherrow Community Centre, Musselburgh.