Jack Moore Shop

Jack Moore was a highly-respected flute maker from Elkhart, Indianapolis (a centre of musical instrument making in the USA). He worked with flute masters such as William Bennett, Tom Green and Bick Brannen.

Jack's schooling as an instrument maker began while he was still a schoolboy; he fondly used to speak of how he would go to the Armstrong factory after school where his father worked, and that he would join his father on the bench to produce components for instruments. Jack continued to work at Armstrong, and ultimately rose to become the foreman of the Armstrong Heritage Division (the Heritage flute was the handmade flute built by Armstrong).

Jack Moore's work was and remains legendary; the statement widely made in the flute industry was "Jack can build anything". When at Armstrong he was involved in building Murray system flutes (the Murray system is the logical culmination of Theobald Boehm's work, though it has never really caught on due to its complexity. It makes a number of pieces which cannot be played, playable!). Jack built the prototype Murray flutes at the point in time that Armstrong was thinking of putting them into production.

Jack’s flutes are characterised by a blend of functionality and practicality which one rarely sees in other instruments. Sound-wise, these are very different to other American flutes, while Jack's attention to details on the mechanics was extraordinary; he can almost certainly be credited with putting the WIBB scale on the map.