0d.3 Fingering, and the half-hole
Cover the holes cleanly, play sa and the notes above it, and use a half-covered hole for the notes in between.
On the South Indian flute, sa is made by closing the top two holes. That is worth knowing before you open any fingering chart, because on a North Indian bansuri sa is the top three — the same chart read on the wrong instrument puts every note in the wrong place. The notes that fall between holes are reached by covering a hole partly, which is where the ear does the work.
Work through these
Cover each hole with the pad of the finger, not the tip, and check by sound that nothing is leaking.
A leaking hole makes a note that is flat and thin rather than absent, so it slips past unnoticed and is hard to unlearn. Lifting one finger at a time and listening is how you find the one that is not sealing.
Play sa by closing the top two holes, and confirm it against a drone.
This is the South Indian fingering, and it differs from the North Indian one on purpose. Checking it against a drone the first time removes any doubt about which instrument you are holding.
Venu — the South Indian flute · ReferencePlay upward from sa by lifting one finger at a time, and listen to each note against the drone.
The notes that come out are the ones your flute is built to give, and they will not all be the ones the raga wants. Hearing which are right and which need adjusting is the point of doing this slowly.
Cover a hole about half way and hear the pitch fall between two of the notes you already have.
Half-covering is how the flute reaches notes that the holes do not provide, and the exact amount is different on every instrument. The ear settles it, never a diagram.
Blow harder on a fingering you know and hear the note jump to the octave above.
The same fingering gives a higher octave when the air stream is faster and narrower, which is how the upper range is reached at all. It also explains why an unsteady breath changes the note and not only the volume.
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Links last checked 30 Aug 2026.
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