Most of the developed world's flutists today play on an instrument made of metal, descended from an invention of 1847 by the German goldsmith and flute virtuoso Theobald Böhm (or Boehm). Since World War 2 nearly all the world's flute manufacturers have built this type exclusively.

Yet in earlier times, hundreds of different designs for the flute were used. Each one reflects the ideas and taste of a certain time, place and individual maker, just as pieces of music do.

Today the "baroque" flute (a wooden transverse flute with seven open fingerholes and one silver key) has once more become familiar in concerts and on CD. But as yet only a few of the many eighteenth-century models, and still fewer renaissance, classical, and romantic ones, are being heard again. Of course there's a big difference between any kind of historical flute and the modern flute, so while a newcomer finds all older types unfamiliar, experienced players can still discover differences almost inspiring between one historical instrument and another. Many of the special qualities of particular models turn out to be precisely related to music written for them. For instance, some of Bach's music was composed to exploit the special sound and tuning of the Quantz flute.

It's this variety in original instruments, and in how music sounds on them, that brings us to make more than 20 different models from c.1540 to c.1815, and to keep exploring and learning more.