TERRY RILEY VESSEL FLUTE MAKER |
 Terry Riley
lives and works in London, England, and is dedicated to making and
promoting vessel flutes as both educational and professional wind
instruments.
Using ancient vessel flute principles, his designs are based on pre-Hispanic Central and South American instruments, with modern innovations. Currently, Terry is further exploiting the potential of the 4-hole system by joining together vessel flutes of different sizes. He makes use of press-moulding to ensure even thickness, then cuts and reassembles so that the two chambers will play 4ths or 5ths apart. The chambers can be played individually or in harmony with each other, giving the performer a fully chromatic range over one and a half octaves. The latest range is now in the catalogue. Terry's latest instruments are particularly suited to playing early gemshorn and cornamuse music and this has resulted in a degree of interest from early music enthusiasts. |
ABOUT TERRY
Terry Riley
developed an interest in pottery musical instruments shortly after
majoring in ceramics at the Central School of Art in London in 1970.
He experimented with replicas of some of the smallest South American vessel flutes and ocarinas and began producing his own variations in 1974. During 14 years of teaching all aspects of pottery, he continued his research into the history of pottery musical instruments, refining his own work, to achieve the sweet, clear tone of South American and Chinese vessel flutes |
| Vessel Flutes in Action "In 1994 Reg Presley of "The Troggs" asked me whether I could make a replacement ocarina following  accidental damage to
the one he used in "Wild Thing." The replacement had to be
unbreakable and loud enough to be played with a rock band. I worked
on an epoxy resin copy of the original red plastic ocarina and eventually
perfected an instrument which was capable of being played as loud as a
trumpet.short clips can be found in Video Clips Two years later, Michael Copley of the "Classic
Buskers" commissioned |
| The Process of Making "I use clay quarried from the edge of Derbyshire's Peak District. The clay is press-moulded to a specific thickness to achieve the uniformity required for concert pitch. At the "leather hard" stage, I individually hand tune the instruments, keeping the tone slightly flat to allow for shrinkage to concert pitch during the firing. From quite early on I was drawn to the amazing potential of the 4-hole system which gave a full 8-note scale. The addition of thumb holes provides a full 15 note chromatic scale. I then fire to earthenware temperatures, leaving the inside of the vessel flutes unglazed and slightly porous to achieve the sweet clear tone of the ancient instruments. My ongoing research is presently leading me to a closer study of Central American whistling bottles and in collaboration with my great friend, John Langley of Songstone Studios, I am developing a 7-hole virtuoso instrument with a fully chromatic range of one and a half octaves. |
me to make a set of five realistic latex trout
with ocarina inserts to enable him to play Schubert's Trout Quintet at
"The Barbican," London. This led to a number of requests
from gifted amateurs for other "serious" vessel flutes.
Most recently, a Plymouth busker out-performed me by playing a perfect
Mozart Clarinet Concerto on one of my own virtuoso B flat vessel
flutes."