Instrument: 1-key flute in ebony with ivory rings and silver key
Maker: Jouve, Hentz á Paris. He was active from 1802-1820 as a instrument dealer and publisher.
Pitch: 425-435
Sounding Length:
Total Length:
Embouchure size:
Restorer: Mark Leone & Jon Cornia
Notes: A beautiful 1-key flute marked Jouve, Paris. We know Jouve to have been a music dealer and publisher. He contracted with someone else for his flutes. A likely maker is Baumann who used this same key hardware on some of his flutes. Another possible maker is Jean Baptiste Roche (maker and dealer). There are Roche instruments with very similar details but Roche could also have bought them from someone else.
I bought this from a Vichy auction in unrestored condition. The biggest issue was that the barrel had very serious cracks. As it turned out, the wood was extremely thing and the tuning slide was not metal on metal as we would normally expect. This slide had a metal tube which went directly into a very thin wooden tube. A very delicate situation. It was in multiple pieces until restored by Mark Leone. He also did other repairs and Jon Cornia made a new ivory ring for the missing ring on the head. The result is a virtually perfect looking and playing flute.
It came with two middle joints. The surprise was, that they were both the same size but one had a thin crack from top to bottom. Clearly this had cracked when the flute was new and Jouve replaced the joint. The cracked one is now also fully repaired thanks to Jon Cornia.
The flute plays very well at a nice low pitch. It has a slightly flat, but strong, low D. Generally the sort of sound we expect from the 1-key flutes of the second half of the 19thC in France.
Demonstration recordings:
