eh...To tell the truth, Prokofiev's Sonata is a very versatile piece. I feel that each instrument that plays it makes it its own. It doesn't have that Violin quality to it through the whole piece where you feel like you are playing the Violin on your flute or your clarinet. Personally, I am not a fan of that piece on clarinet. I don't like playing it on that instrument. I love playing it on flute, though! To each his own I guess. I don't want to tear the envelope to shreds!!

-Dennis

the Prokofieff was actually written for flute first, then done on violin, etc

Yes, I understand that...my point was that eventhough it WAS written for flute...when a violinist plays it it sounds like a violin sonata..not a flute sonata rewritten for the violin. That's how I feel about the Franck, you can really tell that the piece was written for the violin. I am also not saying that I always dislike this. It is all dependent on the piece, of course. Maybe it's the transcription that I have that makes it just blah to me. I will always love the Khachaturian Concerto for Flute, but will be the first to admit that when a flutist plays it...it sounds like a violin with a flute timbre to it. I believe the reason I love this piece is for it's romantic quality in the second mvt. The technical parts are great, but even the more romantic segments in each movement add to its niceness. I just don't "feel" that with the Franck. All-in-all...I'm not looking to be an orchestral flutist. I am not looking to be a classical star. I want to play the music that I love (whether it's classical, celtic, pop, or even country for that matter) and have fun doing it (and then maybe be a star in that respect). If playing the flute got so bad that someone said here's a gig, but you have to play the Franck Sonata on flute, and I actually DO it...I have then lost the joy that I get out of playing flute, and have succumbed to everyone else's views. Then it becomes a JOB and not a PASSION. If you're not passionate about the flute, and you're doing it for who knows what reason whether it's your parents wishes, you found a flute on the side of the road for 20 dollars with some magnificent headjoint , or it was your grandmother's dying wish...you ought not be playing. Apprectiating the flute, its music (whether good or bad) and the people that play it help all of us to become better and learn off of each other.

I think what I want to be famous for is not being perfect. I want to be able to go play a concert somewhere and play all of my F#'s with my middle finger, use my thumb Bb for everything...I want to be learned, but independent enough to do things my way, and still get praise.

As a side note, I am not upset at all actually. Everyone has their own opinions, and they should be shared whether or not others agree. As Dotted said...the point of a forum is to gain the knowledge from other people, and challenge the things with examples that you disagree with. It isn't to ask for free sheet music every 3 posts. People have allowances and get jobs to make the money to pay for their music. Let the composers make theirs too...Everything that people have sent me to practice on, or things that I like especially well...I buy. Not out of a guilty conscience, but out of respect for that composer that spent months working on something that I love, but seems to not make any money because people aren't kind enough to actually go the extra distance to support them. Sorry, that was completely off-topic, but needed to cite examples of why things shouldn't be done certain ways. Anyway, hope I have provided some salient points, and a time waster for you!

-Dennis

very good Dennis, more young flute players should think like you, you will need to be diverse to get anywhere in the music world, most who sit around waiting to win an audition spend a lot of $$$ and don't always win..

I no longer bill myself as a "classical" flute player, I have done too much theater, studio, pop music etc.

I buy. Not out of a guilty conscience, but out of respect for that composer that spent months working on something that I love, but seems to not make any money because people aren't kind enough to actually go the extra distance to support them.

Funny you should mention this. A dear friend and I were discussing music and illegal copies etc. the other day. He told me that several years ago Stephen King threw out a challenge to people who are against illegal downloads etc. The deal was, he would write 1 Chapter a week for a novel. You could download the Chapter completely free and IF you liked it, he asked that you donate a dollar through his site. He made a significant amount of money on this project, and showed to an extent that although people could download for free they would still pay for something they liked.

I wish there was a lot more sheet music/cd's/books that are like this. (Although books are not so much of an issue for me, I have a pretty extensive library). It would be nice if publishing houses would allow the first page of a piece or an excerpt to be downloaded for free, and then if you liked it you could pay for the whole piece. I HATE buying a CD for example and only liking one song on it. BLEH.

I am always scared to take the risk and buy a $15.00-$20.00 piece to find out after I have practiced it that I don't care for it.

you can find some of this on Ebay, look under flute sheet music and you will see

At least with books and music, many reputable sites (like Amazon, and a lot of author website I've browsed--plus many music stores provide sampling of CD's) provide this service--samples of all the songs on a CD, or the first chapter of a book.

sheetmusicplus.com has sample pages for some selections--at least enough to give a true picture of the difficulty level.

Judy

one reason not to use copies is that fact they real music won't blow off your stand during a concert!

I've actually had that happen during a flute choir performance I was part of. Luckily I had enough memorized to get to the next set of rests, and then grab the music off the floor. That's never fun though, even if it doesn't affect your ability to play.

LOL...never happened to me. I love in my flute choir class (where there are 20-25 flutists) we all play so the 4 or 5 parts are split between 20 flutists and then a couple altos and a bass...LOL talk about overkill! The graduate student let me play her Alto on one...it was a Pearl Alto believe it or not, and it was quite nice to play! At least hers wasn't freaked up before a couple months was up!

And I have to comment that I believe that if authors set up their own sites for stuff like Stephen King did...they would all make more money. I like the fact that I can sample something, and then CHOOSE to purchase it. Just like previously said, if I purchase and then don't like it, that frustrates me. My hard earned money was wasted on something I won't really ever enjoy. The bad thing is recordings of pieces. If you listen to the excerpts on iTunes (which I don't purchase from anymore because they are awful to the artists) you hear the SAME part of the song in each of the 150 versions they have for download. I would like to hear a little variety to get more of a feel for a piece. I think I am done for tonight...tah tah...

-Dennis

one reason not to use copies is that fact they real music won't blow off your stand during a concert!

I am not saying that using copies is okay or anything, but you can get heavy weight paper so that doesn't happen. I prefer to have originals myself and have the piano part (if there is one) with it. Friends sharing music to see if the other one likes it, I think is okay, as long as they are going to buy an original copy later on of it. Just my two cents.