ALTUS Japanese Handmade Flute | A11

ALTUS

For over 30 years, Altus has hand-crafted flutes that embody the ideals of vintage inspiration and modern technology. Created by Master Flute Maker Shuichi Tanaka, each Altus flute reflects his passion to combine the finest playing flutes with the finest materials and artistry. The meticulous design of the Altus flute and its acclaimed Altus/Bennet scales offers excellent intonation, carefully tuned harmonics and balanced registers. The masterfully hand-sculpted headjoints and precision tubings produce the remarkable sound of the Altus flute.

Standard Series

Through the careful selection of materials and the Altus dedication to handmade craftsmanship, the Standard Series achieves an unparalleled balance between performance, quality and affordability.

Standard Series flutes feature handmade silver-plated mechanisms well-known for their hardness, strength, and durability without sacrificing exceptional fluidity and feel. The extruded body tubes maintain a standard thickness and include drawn tone holes and the Altus-Bennett scale.

Other standard features include stainless steel springs, French-pointed keys, and a gizmo key. Each flute comes in a French style leatherette covered wood case with a zippered, fleece lined cover and a shoulder strap.

What We Like

In terms of sound, we find Altus flutes to be extremely malleable, colourful, and offer great projection and evenness throughout the registers. Perception of sound is subjective though so you will need to try them and see if they suit you.

What is not subjective is how good their mechanism is, and it is one of the best there is. You really need to run your fingers over these keys yourself in order to appreciate it. Unlike a lot of other companies that have switched over to a pinless mechanism over the years, Altus never did, and we believe it is because they simply never found a reason to. They have absolutely perfected their mechanism. It is quick to respond, light, silent and if setup properly and looked after well, stays in adjustment for an extremely long time. It completely satisfies even some of the most technically demanding and proficient flutists in the world, and best of all, they’ve included the same design on all their flutes - from their entry level professional quality flute, the A9, all the way up to the venerable model AL II. The only thing lacking is a fancy name to help market it better. Oh well, you’ll just have to try it and see for yourself.