I may get a chance to play an Amadeus AF700 next week.

I currently play a mid 1977 vintage DeFord open-hole, silver, B-foot flute, and I'm interested in upgrading. The DeFord seems to be "intonation-challenged". It's due for a shop visit, but I don't have a feel for whether that might help it's intonation. It has at least one pad that's really bad and maybe needs a head-joint cork. I'm thinking it deserves better than big poofy felt pads, but probably not high-tech professional pads.

Anyway, I was wondering if anyone would comment on the Amadeus flute, and maybe how it might compare to the DeFord. I'm thinking the Amadeus might be an improvement in intonation, but otherwise a sideways step rather than really an upgrade.

Another flute I'd like to play is the Haynes Classic Q2. I can't imagine spending more than a few thousand dollars for anything much higher-end than that.

I have seen a few hand-made Haynes professional flutes on ebay lately, but usually they are older than 1980 (i.e. intonation-challenged?), and of course might need an overhaul as purchased.

I'm only somewhat fixated on Haynes flutes - my last flute teacher played a Haynes, I think. I'm having trouble locating ANY pre-professional flutes within casual driving distance. I may be headed for Boston or New York at some point.

Thanks in advance. I promise to reward the forum with recordings of Telemann Fantasia No. 1 really soon :-)

Jim

I can't comment on the whole DeFord thing, thought I hear they make a decent basic student model flute.

I played a couple of Amadeus flutes last year, one was the 600 and the other was a 700.
The 700 had a headjoint that was not fitted to the body, it was a bit big and almost got stuck. The flute played/responded nicely, and its scale wasn't way out of whack.
The 600 had a headjoint that responded differently, though they were both 'the same' as far as specs on the flute. But the shape was obviously different to the eye, as was the overcutting. I couldn't evaluate undercut or the chimney height, but the difference in response was quite obvious.
My friend's student was looking for flutes, and was planning on just buying a nice Yamaha as a step-up from her ancient Artley, but her playing style/embouchure favored the Amadeus, so she bought the 700 Amadeus.
Anyway, both HJs were nice, but do play a few and look carefully at the embouchure hole.

Well, for better or for worse, I played and purchased the Amadeus. There were two available and one had a notably better headjoint - much easier to play high notes and and more depth to the low notes. I couldn't tell much difference between the bodies.

I also got to play a Jupiter diMedici 911 flute with inline G and a B foot. The Jupiter didn't really do it for me. It may have had some leaks and had trouble with the low notes. The embouchure plate didn't fit me well either. It felt like I was covering too much of the tone hole. I will say, the mechanism on the Jupiter was quieter than the Amadeus, though. The Amadeus mechanism feels like there's a lot of clunking going on.

There may be a couple issues to resolve with the Amadeus. I asked that the plugs be removed, and when one of them was, the pad retainer and pad popped out from under the key. Fortunately they had a technician on site who reassembled them. I also discovered once I got it home that the low B key roller was loose and it's screw/rod may be bent. Possibly related to the replaced pad, it seems a little finicky on the low notes now. I plan to play it for a week or two and pop back in for a quick adjustment. I guess the lesson learned there is that I played mostly with body X and headjoint Y. In the end I left with body Y and headjoint Y. I probably should have taken body X (the one without the pad popping incident.

I also took the time to compare the intonation of the Jupiter vs the Amadeus. I'll post the results once I get them plotted. The Amadeus seemed to be better, but the data will tell.

Here'e another dumb question: Does anyone ever have trouble with the shape of the embouchure plate? I didn't notice any trouble while at the shop, but tonight I seem to have an irritated spot on my chin. I'm wondering about having the embouchure plate shortened or rolled a little at the bottom.