Intermediate/Advanced NAF workshop

Native American Music Award winner Scott August is coming to the Bay Area and will be giving an Intermediate/Advanced NAF workshop in Napa, CA

If you feel you've reached a plateau with your Native American flute playing this workshop is perfect for you. Learn the secrets to spicing up your NAF playing and improvising. Make the leap to the next level.

Learn the tricks that make you sound like a pro!

• Vibrato control
  
• How to make your flute chirp
  
• Advanced ornamentation including trills and turns
  
• Tonguing techniques for more expressive articulation
  
• Flutter tonguing
  
• How to improvise like a pro

Intermediate/Advanced NAF workshop
Date: May 10th, 2008
Time: 1:00 pm Class will be 90 minutes long
Place: 793 La Salle Way, Napa, CA, 94559
Cost: $40

Class size is limited. To reserve your space send an email to Cedar Mesa Music or take your chances and just show up.

Flute Wraps

Some of my best friends belong to the Tucson Native American Flute Circle, TNAFC. I've talked about Keith Stanford before and profiled one of his flutes. Another friend of mine is really two people, Ed and Fran Pendrys of Juniper Flute Accessories.

Juniper Flute Accessories makes tasteful flute stands and bags. They also make really nice flute wraps. Something you won't find on their website for some reason.


Here is an example of one of their wraps on a Geoffrey Ellis flute.


They do really nice bead work on beautiful leather. All of this is done by Fran on a small loom. She doesn't do a lot of them since, as with so many people in the Native flute world, she wants it to be fun -not a job.


I consider myself very fortunate to have a few of these great wraps. They look great and really dress up a flute. If you're interested in one email them through their website.

Sandhill Crane flute

Here are some images of a Sandhill Crane flute by Greg Jones


The body is made of lacewood.


The block and mouthpiece are made from rosewood. Note the celtic inlay of rosewood too.


The carved head extremely well done. This flute is in the key of Bb and has a sweet, clear tone that carries well.

Sandhill Cranes are the most common crane in the American Southwest with their distictive red head. They are found all over the U.S., Canada and even Seberia.

Greg Jones can be found in Oregon. He does not sell flutes directly but my understanding is that you can possiblly get one by contacting The Flute Case store. I have also heard rumor that Querencia Woodwinds might begin selling them this summer. If you have any interest I would suggest you contact them.

Scott August Signature Anasazi flutes

Cedar Mesa Music and Scott August are proud to announce the Scott August Signature Anasazi Flute. These professional quality instruments are made by Geoffrey Ellis of Earth Tone Flutes and are perfect for both beginning and advanced players. Ideal for concert stage, recording studios or just nooding around alone as you discover your true Kokopelli.

Scott and Geoffrey worked closely together to construct a flute that had the distinctive warm, low sound that Scott strives for in his recordings while still keeping ease of playing in mind. Several prototypes were constructed and extensively tested. The final designs were then field tested by members of Scott's beginning Anasazi flute class before Scott and Geoffrey made their final decision. The result is a warm, resonant low tone with a silky smooth response.

To satisfy both the collector and the everyday flute player these flutes will be available in two lines

The Scott August Signature Ansaszi Flute
and
The Scott August Anasazi Flute Series


The Scott August Signature Ansaszi Flute
Shown above, this is a limited edition flute. Only twenty five flutes will be offered per year, each year will it's own distinct design. Made of eastern red cedar The Scott August Signature Anasazi Flute is tastefully accented with a crushed turquoise Cedar Mesa Music logo and Bore Rings in a style reminiscent of Chaco Canyon jewelry. Each flute will be signed by Scott August, Numbered and come with a Certificate of Authenticity, a bag and maintenance kit.

Available in the keys of Ab and A these flutes will be made to order to accommodate both right and left handed players. See below for prices and availability.

The Scott August Anasazi Flute Series

Also made of eastern red cedar the Scott August Anasazi Flute Series is a more affordable version of the Signature flute accented with a wood burned Cedar Mesa Music logo and Bore Rings. Each flute will come with a bag and a flute maintenance kit.

Available in the keys of Ab and A, with other keys to be anounced, these flutes will be made to order to accommodate both right and left handed players. See below for prices and availability.



The Scott August Ansaszi Flute Series

Prices and Availability
These flutes will be available starting April 21th, 2008

The Scott August Signature Ansaszi Flute:
Price: $350.00 One of 25 Signed and numbered flutes. Keys available: Ab and A
Comes with a certificate of authenticity, a bag and maintenance kit

The Scott August Anasazi Flute Series
Price: $235.00. Keys available: Ab and A. Other keys to be anounced.
Comes with a bag and maintenance kit

How to order
To order your flute send the following information to Cedar Mesa Music

• Name
  
• Address
  
• City, State, Zip
  
• Phone
  
• Email
  
• Which Key?
  Tell us which hand you place on the bottom holes –right or left?
  We don’t need a deposit

Once we get this information you’ll be put on the list. It’s “first come first flute...”


© Cedar Mesa Music

Anasazi flute class review

I know the posts have been a little light lately, but I'm hoping to start posting more frequently. To start off I thought I'd show some photos from the Anasazi flute class I gave earlier this month for the Inland Empire Flute Circle. All the photos were taken by Barbara Garliner, the IEFC's de facto official photographer.

The class met in the future home of the Dorthy Ramon Learning Center, a non profit group that is dedicated to saving and sharing all Southern California’s American Indian cultures, languages, history, music, and other traditional arts.


The class was made up of about eight very brave people as the Anasazi flute takes a strong will to learn to play for most people. We've looked at this flute in great detail in earlier posts so I won't go into that here.


Everyone had to get a flute for the class and some did not have them very long before class day. A few chose to maker their own. A double challenge.


The first thing we did was to talk about the embouchure, or lip position that the player needs to learn to play the flute. Unlike the NAF the vast majority of people can't just pick up an Anasazi flute and get a tone right away. It can take days, weeks, even months of practice and the embouchure is extremely important.


Each member of the class got to try it out for themselves and I was able to tailor my comments to every one's individual needs.


In addition to the homemade PVC Anasazi flute we had a professional maker of Native American style flutes, Rich Halliburton of Querencia Woodwinds. Rich and I are good friends but I don't know what other "woodwinds" he makes besides flutes. His NAF's however are very nice and one of his flutes won top prize at last years Oklahoma Flute Festival. John Stillwell was also at the circle meeting as was Steve Meier a budding flute maker who was there to debut some of his flutes.


Here is a photo of Michelle. She is in the military and if I remember correctly was a captain in the navy. Not many women can play the Anasazi flute due to the long length of the bore. In the photo she is playing an Ab (G#) and if she was smaller and could not reach the finger holes of this key she could try one in the key of A. I know of a maker that is planing to make some Anasazi flutes in Bb so that more women can play them. Coincidentally, I've been doing some digging lately into the original Anasazi flutes that were found by Earl Morris in "Broken Flute Cave" and it turns out that they are reported to have been in the key of Bb so these shorter flutes will still be authentic to the prehistoric ones.


Here's a photo of Ernest Siva giving the Anasazi flute a try. Ernest is a elder of the Morrongo tribe and grew up on the Morongo Indian Reservation located in the San Gorgonio pass. The culture of this area had flutes very similar to the Anasazi flute but shorter and with a narrower bore and only four holes. Several of these are in a museum in Riverside and Marvin and Jonette Yazzie of Yazzie Flutes have made recreations of them. They are really hard to play and the pitch class of the scale is still a mystery.


Speaking of Jonette Yazzie, here is a photo of her playing an Anasazi flute. Her playing position is not the best but as she is not that tall she found that holding the flute a little to the side was the only way she could reach the bottom finger holes. Like Michelle (shown above), Jonette is playing an Ab.


We also looked at a recreation of a Hopi flute that was in use as recently as 120 years ago. These flutes continued to be used after the Anasazi flute apparently fell out of use about A.D. 1250, which coincides with the great migration out of the four corners area and, some believe, the appearance of the kachina cult.


At the end of class I showed everyone some prototypes of some Anasazi flutes by a maker new to these instruments. I handed them out to the class to get some feedback on how they played for beginners. We'll look at these Anasazi flute in greater depth in a later article.

If you're interested in trying to learn to play one of these flutes I'm giving a class in Northern California on April 26 as part of the Northern California Flute Circle Spring Gathering Festival. To find out more here.