Too Many Flutes (4) - Traverso

Before I took up the Western Boehm system silver (plated) flute, I reasoned that it would be easier to play a baroque flute. I love baroque music, and I particularly love the soft, round tone of the baroque flute, which gradually supplanted the recorder during the eighteenth century in Europe. Wooden baroque flutes, copies that modern craftspeople make of old flutes that are in collections and museums, are, as they should be, very expensive. But a Japanese company called Aulos, which makes recorders, also manufactures baroque flutes out of resonite, for much less money.
I bought one.
On the scale of frustration, the Turkish Kaval and the Peruvian Quena are 10 on the scale (most frustrating), the Chinese flute is 4, and the Indian flute is 3. I rather expected the baroque flute to be easy to play. Boy was I wrong. Getting a decent sound out of it was difficult (indeed, I didn't make much progress in that direction till I had played a Western flute for a while), and playing in any key except D major turned out to be cumbersome. The instruction sheet that came with the flute warns that F natural is out of tune, and you have to turn the flute lower the pitch. It also sounds fuzzy, as do other very common notes like C natural, B flat, and so on.
When I listen to contemporary musicians playing the baroque flute, such as Stephen Preston, whom I met at Wildacres in the summer of 2016, I'm astonished at the apparent ease with which they play. I would say that I don't know how they do it, but I do know how they do it: they practiced like crazy when they started out until they mastered the instrument.
That being said, an expert musician can play passages faster on the baroque flute than on the Western keyed flute, because you don't have to move anything mechanical except your fingers.
Incidentally, on a trip to Ireland I fantasized about buying an Irish wooden flute, thinking to add to my collections of instruments that I can't or don't play (including a metal G clarinet that I bought in Istanbul), but they cost up to a thousand euros, and that seemed like a bit too much for a souvenir.