Story of the Flute
make use of the piccolo; he introduces it with dramatic effect in Iphigenie en Tauride (using it right up to the top G′′′), where we have double trills on two piccolos—as afterwards used by Weber and Meyerbeer.
Hitherto the flute had been used in a fitful manner, chiefly to produce special effects and for obligatos, but with Haydn and Mozart it becomes a regular and indispensable member of the orchestra, being frequently combined with other instruments and no longer almost exclusively confined to solo passages. Haydn evidentlyHaydn had a great predilection for the flute, and has written largely for it, using it much more freely than any of his predecessors. In fact, the wind instruments were only beginning to be understood by composers—as Haydn remarked pathetically to Kalkbrenner, "I have only just learned in my old age how to use the wind instruments, and now that I do understand them, I must leave them." Many of Haydn's symphonies have very prominent solo passages for the flute; especially in the slow movements. In a symphony composed in 1788 (Biedermann's ed. No. 3), the andante movement contains quite a long solo for the flute accompanied by two violins only. As the Esterhazy band included only a single flute-player (Hirsch was his name), Haydn often only uses one. Sometimes the flute is only introduced in a single movement, and is the only wind instrument used in that movement.
In The Creation we find several graceful flute solo passages; and in the lovely introduction to the132
