Flute circle

Flute circles typically meet periodically to engage in educational and recreational activities surrounding the instrument.

[1] This use of the Native American flute in community music is notably different from traditional uses of the instrument for courtship, hunting, or ceremony.

[5]: 21–25 Facilitation forms include traveling ensembles, showcasing, segmenting, and general conducted improvisations — techniques that are shared with other community music structures such as drum circles.

However, Mary Jane Jones argues in her thesis that flute circles have particular attributes not found in other types of community music gatherings: If the goal of flute players is to express themselves through a Native American-based musical means, it could be argued that they should be able to do that just as effectively through drumming or dancing.

For people who feel that their voices are inadequate or are hindered from singing traditional Native songs because of their inability to speak their ancestral language, using the breath to produce sound through a simple cylinder may serve as a satisfying substitute.

The data for years prior to 2016 were gathered on March 13, 2016 from historical WFS and INAFA web pages provided by the Wayback Machine.

The data roughly agrees with the Jones thesis, which reported 115 flute circles on the INAFA roster in 2010.