Introduction

The flageolet as described by Mersenne appears to have been introduced into England in the early 1660s, almost certainly imported from France at the time of the return from exile of King Charles II (reigned 1660–85). The king was responsible for introducing many French customs to England, including fashions and musical compositional styles: the newly-developed Baroque recorder was similarly imported from France in 1673. Anthony à Wood noted that the violinist John Banister played at Oxford on 11 January 1665/6 ‘upon a little pipe or flagellet in consort which hath bin about seven yeares in fashion’ and the English diarist Samuel Pepys described his own playing of the instrument in the 1660s, a matter to which we shall return later in this chapter. Organologically, the flageolet remained in the form described by Mersenne.

Pedagogical Material

The flageolet has long been associated with amateur musicians and, as such, it has been the subject of tutors or books for self-instruction since the seventeenth century. The publication of such tutors – the term ‘tutor’ will be used throughout this volume to include methods, treatises, preceptors and other manuals for self-instruction – gives a valuable insight into the popularity of this largely amateur instrument over the centuries, and it is noteworthy that many treatises were published in England in the late seventeenth century yet few in the eighteenth, preceding a resurgence in the early years of the nineteenth century. Some tutors note that it is possible to dispense with the aid of a teacher, although, as we shall see, teachers of the instrument were in practice.

The principal lists of flageolet tutors published between 1660 and 1800 are contained in Thomas Warner’s An Annotated Bibliography of Woodwind Instruction Books (1967), Patricio Portrell’s Répertoire de musique imprimée (1670–1780) of 2007 and the British Union Catalogue of Early Music (1957). Both Warner and Portrell list tutors which cannot now be located, and, while the existence of these tutors is significant, from the point of view of detailed study of flageolet technique the importance of unlocated tutors is negligible. Meierott gives histograms showing published treatises according to date; there are discrepancies, however, his figures differing when compared with currently located treatises (see Table 1).