Our Flute Visit from Laura McDougall

On February 8th, we had a visit with Laura McDougall.  She was a musician from the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra.  She plays a woodwind instrument called the FLUTE!! 



Laura McDougall



We have flutes too but, our flutes are different because her flute is metal and ours is plastic.  Another difference is that she blows across her mouthpiece while we blow in.  She told us that flutes used to be made of bone and wood, but now they are made of metal because it makes the sound louder.  She told us about a flute made from platinum and it cost $50 000!! That is a lot of money!  She didn't use a platinum flute though.

A few other interesting facts she shared were:

-Seasame Street inspired her to play the flute when she saw a musician play on the show.

-There are four families in the orchestra;  the woodwind, percussion, brass and the string family

We have tried 3 out of the 4 families here at school!

She played some songs for us on her flute and told us a story about a man who fell in love with a nymph and she turned into a reed that he ended up cutting to make a flute out of.  The song was pretty.  We also listening to a cd with flute sounds and we compared it to the sounds of a bird.

At the end some students played a short song and then she played the same song on her metal flute! It sounded nice and a little different from ours.