I stumbled across this amazing flautist, Sir James Galway:
http://www.jamesgalway.com/home.htm and the above embedded video was of his flute playing of my fav song (I think most people's too) from the movie Titanic.
Having just started my first flute lesson in August 2011, I decided to at least complete a month's worth of classes before buying my first flute. After about two months of lessons, I've decided to get myself a flute to practise on at home. Then I found out that flute can be quite expensive. Upon further probing, it is expensive as it is hand-made, especially the intricate parts of the instrument.
I am deciding between Yamaha YFL-211 and Yamaha YFL-221, they have only slight differences in feature/characteristic, namely the Split-E mechanism that makes it easier to play the High E note.
Been reading the forums/blogs/anything I can get from Google about the reviews/advices and I think my flute teacher is right, they are both okay for beginners and can last a long time. I'm partial to Yamaha, having played a Yamaha piano for the greater part of my youth, I guess it's a personal preference, and the reviews of the Yamaha student flute has been good, from what I could see online. My teacher's first flute is also a Yamaha students flute and he refused to sell it to me as it has sentimental value.. haha.
Will be flute shopping in the next two weeks and I hope to get my flute by my upcoming birthday. Oh, I'm already past 30, so I stopped counting my age from that point onwards. lol
My take on my first flute lesson in my other blog: http://suesanctuary.blogspot.com/2011/08/new-passion-kinda-crazy-though.html