Free Flute Sheet Music

Tune of the Day: Hardiman the Fiddler

The earliest appearance of this slip jig under the name “Hardy Man the Fiddler” is found in Francis O'Neill's Music of Ireland, published in Chicago in 1903. There are several tunes with the name “Hardiman” (of which “Hardiman the Fiddler” is probably the most famous). Collector David Taylor (1992) suggests that they honor the historian James Hardiman, author of Irish Minstrelsy (1831).

Similar slip jigs can be found in earlier manuscript copybooks, such as the one by Stephen Grier from County Leitrim, dating from around 1883.

Tune of the Day: Overture from The Marriage of Figaro

Le nozze di Figaro, ossia la folle giornata (The Marriage of Figaro, or the Day of Madness) is a four-act opera buffa (comic opera) composed in 1786 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte, based on a stage comedy by Pierre Beaumarchais. Although the play by Beaumarchais was at first banned in Vienna because of its satire of the aristocracy, considered dangerous in the decade before the French Revolution, the opera became one of Mozart's most successful works.

The overture is especially famous and is often played as a concert piece. This effervescent number does not make use of any thematic material from the opera itself, but captures the essence of the work superbly. Mozart is said to have intended to insert a slow interlude, in the old Italian tradition, just before the recapitulation, and to have omitted it only because he hadn't time to write it down; he thus reunited the two parts of the Allegro, giving the piece a lively, genial character throughout.

Tune of the Day: Largo by Scherer

Here is the relatively slow second movement of a Sonata in G for three flutes written by Johann Scherer in the 18th century.

Tune of the Day: Study in B major by Karg-Elert

This waltz-like étude is the twenty-first piece from Sigfried Karg-Elert's 30 Caprices: a “Gradus ad Parnassum” of the modern technique for flute solo.

Tune of the Day: The Swaggering Jig

This 9/8-time jig is taken from Francis O'Neill's collection The Dance Music of Ireland, published in Chicago in 1907. “The Swaggering Jig” is a member of a large family of melodies, which as a matter of fact includes a few other slip jigs sharing the same title. Various sets of words have also been set to these tunes over the years, for instance by the band Dervish from County Sligo.

Tune of the Day: A tempo di Gavotta

The fourth of five movements in Handel's Recorder Sonata in C major, this is the only movement in the sonata which is explicitly dance-related. In fact, its title means “in the time of a gavotte”, with reference to a French folk dance of moderate tempo that was very popular during the Baroque era.

This movement has a quite unusual structure: it's made up of three sections of increasing length (4, 8 and 34 bars), each with repeat markings.

Tune of the Day: Allegro by Scherer

This is the third movement of a Sonata in G for three flutes written by the 18th-century German composer Johann Scherer.

Tune of the Day: The Dove

Today we propose étude No. 20 from Italian flutist and composer Ernesto Köhler's 25 Romantic Studies, Op. 66.

Tune of the Day: Tea in the Morning

This slip jig is taken from Francis O'Neill's collection Dance Music of Ireland (Chicago, 1907), although it had appeared in other publications as early as 1864. O'Neill obtained the tune from Irish collector Patrick Weston Joyce, who had noted it in 1853 from James Buckley, a Limerick piper.

Tune of the Day: Le rossignol en amour

François Couperin was a French composer, organist and harpsichordist of the Baroque period. He was known as Couperin le Grand (“Couperin the Great”) to distinguish him from other members of the musically talented Couperin family.

Couperin's harpsichord music is the dominant portion of his output, and one of the most impressive keyboard legacies in Western music. The individual pieces are grouped into 27 ordres, a term Couperin coined, apparently to distinguish them from the older suites. “Le rossignol en amour” (literally, “The Nightingale in Love”) is taken from the XIV ordre, and is an excellent piece to play on the flute, as the Composer himself wrote:

It is not necessary to adhere too precisely to the beat in the Double above; one must sacrifice everything to appropriate expression, to the clean execution of the passagework, and to softening the accents marked by the mordents. This “Rossignol” can be performed with the greatest possible success on the flute, when it is well played.

Tune of the Day: Duet in D major by Hugues

This is the very first duet from La scuola del flauto (The School of the Flute) by Italian composer and arranger Luigi Hugues.

Thanks to Paolo for contributing this piece!

Tune of the Day: Study by Karg-Elert

Today we propose the twenty-second étude from Sigfried Karg-Elert's 30 Caprices: a “Gradus ad Parnassum” of the modern technique for flute solo.

Tune of the Day: Will You Come Down to Limerick?

In Irish Folk Music: A Fascinating Hobby, early-20th-century Chicago-based collector Francis O'Neill remarks:

An uncommonly fine tune of this class [i.e. slip jig], in three strains, obtained from John Ennis, is “Will You Come Down to Limerick?” Simpler versions are known to old-time musicians of Munster and Connacht, and in Chicago. Ennis had no monopoly of it, for it was well known to Delaney, Early, and McFadden. As an old-time Slip Jig it seems to have been called “The Munster Gimlet,” a singularly inapt title; but when it came into vogue by its song name, we are unable to say.

John Ennis was a Chicago Police patrolman, piper and flute player, originally from County Kildare, Ireland.

One of the earliest appearances of the tune is found in the second volume James S. Kerr's Merry Melodies, published in Glasgow around 1880.

Tune of the Day: Andante

This Andante is the third movement of Bach's Flute Sonata No. 5. It begins with an extended introduction by the continuo instruments (usually harpsichord or cello), and once the flute enters with its spacious theme, the bass line repeats fairly steadily. After a variation on the theme in the melody, the final section essentially repeats the movement's opening measures.

Tune of the Day: Menuet by Scherer

This Menuet and its accompanying Trio constitute the closing movement of a Sonata in G major written for three flutes by Johann Scherer, a German composer of the 18th century.

Tune of the Day: The Cuckoo and the Nightingale

This birdsong-like piece is étude No. 22 from Italian flutist and composer Ernesto Köhler's 25 Romantic Studies, Op. 66.

Tune of the Day: The Rakes of Westmeath

This is quite an old tune, dating back at least to the first half of the 18th century. Under the title “The Rakes of Westmeath”, it appears in several collections from that era, the earliest being Burk Thumoth's 12 English and 12 Irish Airs (London, 1746).

Westmeath is the name of a county in central Ireland, now part of the Eastern and Midland Region.

Tune of the Day: A Baroque Rondeau

This Rondeau for solo flute is taken from Michel Blavet's Premier recueil de pièces (“First collection of pieces”). As you have probably already guessed, this piece is in rondeau (or rondo) form, that is, it is made up of a refrain and a number of episodes (only two in this case, but there could have been more). During performance, the principal theme of the refrain (A) alternates with the episodes (B, C, etc.), creating an ABACA pattern. For obvious reasons, the refrain appears only once in the sheet music, so it's up to the performer to play the various sections in the right order.

Tune of the Day: Duet in G major by Hugues

Here is the second duet from La scuola del flauto (The School of the Flute) by Italian composer and arranger Luigi Hugues.

Thanks to Paolo for contributing this piece!

Tune of the Day: Study in E-flat major by Karg-Elert

This 7/16-time piece, to be played as fast as possible, is the twenty-fourth étude from Sigfried Karg-Elert's 30 Caprices: a “Gradus ad Parnassum” of the modern technique for flute solo.

Tune of the Day: The Humors of Ballymanus

This 9/8-time jig made its first appearance in O'Farrell's Pocket Companion for the Irish or Union Pipes, published in London around 1805.

Ballymanus is a town in County Wicklow, Ireland, and was the birthplace in 1775 of William Byrne, the famous “Billy Byrne of Ballymanus”, a leader of Wicklow men in the Rebellion of 1798 against the British.

Tune of the Day: Larghetto

Here is the third of the five movements of Handel's Recorder Sonata in C major. It is not to be confused with the first movement, which is also marked “Larghetto”. This piece features a very clear and simple melody, and is excellent for experimenting with Baroque ornamentation.

Tune of the Day: Allegro by Scherer

This is the first movement of the second Sonata for three flutes by Johann Scherer.

Thanks to Joyce Kai for contributing this piece!

Tune of the Day: Trills and Appoggiaturas

This is étude No. 17 from Ernesto Köhler's 25 Romantic Studies, Op. 66. As the title says, it is intended to be a study in ornaments and grace notes, with particular attention to trills and short appoggiaturas (also known as acciaccaturas).

Tune of the Day: Roudledum

This slip jig is taken from Francis O'Neill's collection The Dance Music of Ireland, published in Chicago in 1907. Although that seems to be the earliest appearance of this specific setting, this is clearly a member of a family of tunes which has been around since the first half of the 19th century.

Tune of the Day: Nocturne No. 21 in C minor

Though this is listed as the last of the 21 nocturnes of Chopin, it was chronologically his 13th. For those attaching superstitious significance to that numbered position, they will not find this an unlucky piece in any sense. The only problem with this posthumous nocturne actually concerns numbering: in many editions it is not numbered at all, while some refer to it as No. 21 or No. 20a, and some other as KKIVb No. 8

Thanks to Melissa for suggesting this piece!

Tune of the Day: Duet in D major by Hugues

This is the third duet from La scuola del flauto (The School of the Flute) by Italian composer and arranger Luigi Hugues.

Thanks to Paolo for contributing this piece!

Tune of the Day: Study by Karg-Elert

Today we propose the twenty-sixth étude from Sigfried Karg-Elert's 30 Caprices: a “Gradus ad Parnassum” of the modern technique for flute solo. The quintuplets should at first be practiced as if they were made up of two sixteenth notes followed by a triplet; later, the five notes must be equally balanced.

Tune of the Day: Yellow Legs

The earliest appearance of this slip jig, under the title “Cusabue Ord” (probably a mangled version of the Irish “Cosa Buidhe Arda”, meaning “Long Yellow Legs”), is in O'Farrell's Pocket Companion for the Irish or Union Pipes, published in London around 1805. The tune was also notably included, as “Cogue in the Evening”, in the mid-19th-century manuscripts of collector James Goodman, who attributed it to the famous 18th-century uilleann piper Walker ‛Piper’ Jackson from County Limerick.

Tune of the Day: Andalouse

This charming piece for Flute and Piano was written by French Romantic composer Emile Pessard. With its use of characteristic modes and rhythms, it captures the sound and spirit of flamenco music, which has its origins in Andalusia in the south of Spain.

Thanks to Jessica for suggesting this piece!