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Try it out and maneuver to suit your hands until you’re comfortable and the tone holes are properly covered. I’ve marked with red the part of the finger that should cover the tone hole on the first three fingers of the right hand. Something which may have eluded them before.
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It may enable petite players to take on the big Irish session flute. However it is indeed possible to become comfortable with this style of fingering. You may miss the control that the classical grip brings. Musicians trained in the classical style will definitely find this grip awkward. Importantly, it does not contort the fingers in doing so. Piper’s grip allows the player to cover the tone holes in the flute with minimal effort. So how does the piper’s grip work and how does it help smaller handed flute players? I use a grip version somewhere between the classical grip and the piper’s grip myself when playing the flute as it’s the way I was taught. This applies to both my beginner Irish flutes and my more advanced Irish flutes. Named after the way pipers would hold their chanters and more recently the way whistle players grip the low whistle, the Piper’s Grip might be just the solution for those players who are having difficulty with the physicality of the Irish flute. No two cases are ever alike but what I will always initially advise people who are having trouble using the classical grip on any of my simple system Irish flutes is to try out the so called Piper’s Grip. Many of the enquiries come from petite handed flute players who find the extension needed in their fingers can be too great or the angle is awkward and painful for their fingers and wrists. I get quite a lot of emails and phone calls regarding the Irish flute and the difficulty classical flute players and indeed former whistle or recorder players have when it comes to the large Pratten style keyless Irish flutes I sell.