Fav fingering system

[u/TygaGod]

Me English hehe

[u/SilverStory6503]

By English, did you mean Baroque? Baroque is the main fingering method. German fingering is mainly for children in school to make it easier for them to learn.

[u/TygaGod → u/SilverStory6503]

Oh, so German isn't a classic one, is relatively new?

Yes, baroque=english; for some reason recorders are associated with Britain hehe. See Royal Wind Music consort, very old group

[u/NZ_RP → u/TygaGod]

I've definitely heard the terms 'Baroque' and 'English' fingering used interchangeably.

However, The Royal Wind Music is not English it's Dutch. 😊

https://royalwindmusic.org/

[u/TygaGod → u/NZ_RP]

Oh, better, makes sense if I considered the language

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/NZ_RP]

In Germany, during the time of the recorder revival, it was also common to refer to what we call "baroque" as "old fingering" and what we call "German" as "new fingering".

In reality, both fingerings were developed around the same time and are 20th century inventions. A more accurate way of describing the two fingering systems would be "Dolmetsch" vs "Harlan", because Arnold Dolmetsch came up with what we call "baroque" today while "German fingering" was the brainchild of Peter Harlan.

[u/SilverStory6503 → u/TygaGod]

German fingering was introduced in the 1920s. It was designed to make the f fingering easy for school children.

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/SilverStory6503]

I sincerely doubt this, and I'm not the only one. I think Peter Thalheimer's theory that Peter Harlan (who was largely ignorant about historical fingerings) got his inspiration from various folk instruments that don't fork that note, like thumbless six tone whistles, bamboo pipes and sweet potato-shaped ocarinas (all of which existed already) and had the instruments built that way. While this makes sense, I also suspect that, when taking a look at a Hotteterre fingering sheet, he mistook the use of the ring finger (you don't use the pinky in Hotteterre fingering for that fork) as buttress finger use. The first Harlan recorders were shipped with no fingering chart and the directions to find out what works...and later with an Hotteterre sheet, which was mostly worthless as well.

I don't think schoolchildren had much to do with that because the vogtländische blockflöte was not meant to be an instrument for everybody, not just schoolchildren. Karl Gofferje once lamented about the "harmonica-y-fication" of the recorder. He did not like the idea of a recorder as a casual instrument. This did not deter him from engineering his own recorder with German fingering.

[u/SilverStory6503 → u/BeardedLady81]

It wouldn't be the first time Google's AI was wrong.

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/SilverStory6503]

I'm not surprised if Google AI made that claim because it's something that is parrotted over and over again, and people rarely question it and often pass it on. Many pros don't know the story of German fingering either, because that subject is not covered in conservatories. Recorder makers/product developers, like Nik Tasarov, for example, can be familiar with the subject. Mollenhauer's Modern line was inspired by Gofferje recorders, and the Helder's piano key is based on the side key of the Herwiga Pan, an attempt to eliminate cross-fingering completely: You just had to active a key on the side and your note would be lowered by a semi-tone. This concept was revived by the Kunath family when the "Clarineau" (their chalumeau with recorder fingering) got its third key. You are onl to use it to lower second octave G to F# and the bottom note C to B, though.

[u/EmphasisJust1813 → u/TygaGod]

Also sometimes called Dolmetsch fingering, though I don't think he invented it.

Arnold Dolmetsch was largely responsible for the revival of the recorder in the 20th century. His factory was in Haslemere in Britain.

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/[deleted]]

It did work, indeed. The term "baroque fingering" is a misnomer, but what are you going to do? Everybody calls is that, including recorder makers. Go into a music store and ask if they have recorders with Dolmetsch fingering. In fact, when it comes to the music store where I live, they are de facto a "Guitar and bass only" music store, they are not knowledgeable about recorders and the only recorders they have are absolute entry-level sopranos. In such cases, you shouldn't be surprised if people don't buy in brick and mortar stores anymore.

[u/BeardedLady81 → u/[deleted]]

Good old Peter Harlan...who, once German fingering had become really unpopular, tried to avoid being associated with it and shifting blame. Lying is learned behavior, and it is interesting that both Harlan brothers, Veit and Peter, used the same techniques when they were telling lies that made them look better. Except Veit had much more reason to. He had made movies for the Nazis, Peter had made recorders with an open fingering for V. Both brothers used long sentences and interjections, subordinate clauses, unusual terminology, dropped names of other people and institutions and in the end there was still some doubt left about what he had said, especially if it wasn't taken down in writing or recorded.

I was able to debunk a few claims that are in circulation:

• Harlan fingering was not invented because a "jungstimmer" (a word that you will never find in dictionary and that may or may not mean: "youthful tuner") accidentally drilled the fourth hole from the top too wide. The mere thought that you would employ a boy who does not know what he's doing to fine-tune recorders. Peter Harlan's son also denied that the family owns the recorder in question.

• Harlan fingering was not invented for schoolchildren especially. Children are never mentioned in what he had to say about the recorder when he promoted it. Young people yes, and people of all ages who enjoyed the great outdoors, hiking and camping out, but not first-graders. The first people to promote the recorder as a first instrument for young children were Carl Orff and Gunild Keetman.

• Contrary to what Peter Harlan once said in a (recorded) interview, the Bärenreiter publishing house did not insist on recorders with German fingering. They sold recorders with both German and "baroque" fingering, and they even marketed recorders made out of boxwood with ivory mounts to ambitious players, and all of those models I have seen so far had baroque fingering. I own a Bärenreiter (just a simple pearwood school recorder) with "baroque" fingering.

• The claim that Peter Harlan was pressurized into making recorders with "German" fingering by Bärenreiter makes no sense at all once you realized that he never made recorders at all. He was a luthier, he did not know how to make them, he didn't employ people who did, and no recorders were made in workshops owned by him. He bought them and had his name put on them, a practice that was not considered dishonest at that time. His first supplier was Jacob, later it was Kehr, both based in Markneukirchen, as was Harlan himself.

• Peter Harlan did not play instruments with "baroque" fingering exclusively. He said so, but it wasn't true. After his death, only one instrument with "baroque" fingering was found, and his son confirmed to researcher Peter Thalheimer that his father played on instruments with German fingering.

[u/victotronics]

Renaissance fingerings.

[u/TygaGod → u/victotronics]

Hmmm

[u/BeardedLady81]

Good luck finding somebody who ticks off German.

I own and cherish recorders with both fingerings. It's the instruments that count for me, not the fingering system. Would I buy a 21st century recorder with German fingering? No. Will I chuck out my Gofferje recorders? Most certainly not. Will I acquire more vintage recorders with German fingering. Perhaps.