[ANNOUNCE] Freeman Tweaked Sweetones, eBay or direct to you

Whistle
1

Greetings, fellow C&Fers.

In my ongoing quest for the advancement of tweaking science, it gives me great pleasure to announce that I’ve got tweaking Sweetones down. I’m consistently happy with the results and able to produce them with a reasonable amount of labor.

So now I’m ready to share them with the world. I’ve put a tweaked D and a tweaked C on eBay. As these sell, I’ll put up more whistles as quickly as I can, and I’ll replace the links in this post to match current auctions.

Tweaked Clarke Sweetone D Whistle Irish Penny
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=624&item=2517442196&rd=1

Tweaked Clarke Sweetone C Whistle Irish Penny
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=624&item=2517443357&rd=1

(edit) Or, send email to jerry@tcenet.REMOVETHISSPAMBLOCKER.net and we can do business directly. (Remove from the email address the capital letters and one period so it’s …tcenet.net)

Best wishes,
Jerry

P.S. Here’s the description from the auction:

This whistle is new and unused except for voicing and testing, and comes with fingering chart and sheet music for several simple tunes.

It is customary for serious musicians to make special modifications and adjustments (“tweaking” or “voicing”) to bring out the full musical potential of this traditional Irish folk instrument.

The windway, mouthpiece interior and, if necessary, windcutter blade edge have been tweaked by Jerry Freeman to:

· Fine-tune the airflow so the instrument produces more musical sound and noticeably less “breathiness” for a given amount of air blown in,

· Create an optimal amount of “back pressure” so the whistle is more receptive to subtle breath control. This produces a more expressive and responsive instrument. The sensation is that this whistle “sings.”

· Reduce the amount of air needed without sacrificing volume.

· Improve the strength and stability of the lowest notes, which tend to break into the upper register too easily on many of the factory run whistles.

· Make the whistle tunable by enabling the mouthpiece to be moved up or down on the body.

These adjustments make the whistle even easier to play than the mass-produced untweaked Sweetone, which, even without these improvements, is widely appreciated as being one of the most easily played whistles in the world.

Because it is so easy to play and one of the better in-tune whistles, the Clarke Sweetone is considered to be the best whistle for every beginning whistler.

This tweaked Sweetone preserves all the qualities that have made the instrument so well-loved, while minimizing those that might be thought undesirable and releasing the full potential of this whistle’s authentic voice.

Both beginning and established whistle musicians will appreciate this instrument.

Enjoy your whistle!

2

Hey Jerry,

I am interested in getting one of your tweaked Sweetones. Is it possible to just order one from you without having to do the Ebay thing? (Auctions give me high blood pressure :laughing: )

Thanks!

3

Hi, LimuHead.

I’ll send you an email. Anyone else with the same question, you can email me at:

jerry@tcenet.REMOVETHISSPAMBLOCKER.net

(Remove the part in all caps and one of the periods so it becomes …tcenet.net . That’s so that webcrawlers looking for email addresses won’t find this and bury me with more spam.)

Best wishes,
Jerry

4

Thanks Jerry!

5

Jerry, Congrats!

Terrific stuff. Can you tell me how well these babies are in tune with themselves?

And is the sound quality affected at all? (There is room for improvement on the Sweetone sound, I’ve always felt…)

Good luck with this, I think I may be getting one.

6

Hi, Bloo.

They are respectably in tune with themselves.

That’s one of the things that attracted me to the Sweetones as a project. The conical bore’s effect on the relationship between the registers is obvious when comparing a Sweetone to a typical Gen-type whistle. You don’t see the flattening of the higher notes of the upper register. Also, as I mentioned in another thread, new C Sweetones are better in tune than the older ones were. The new Cs are as well in tune as the Ds now.

As to the effect on the sound quality…

Yes, the sound quality does change when I tweak them. The most obvious effect is that they become less breathy. In addition, there are two more effects:

  1. The sound becomes more focused, and the overtones become cleaner somehow. The complexity of the sound becomes more of a musical complexity and less of a breathy, muddy, not well-defined sound.

  2. As I mentioned in the description, the back pressure has been adjusted so that the whistle becomes more expressive and more inclined to “sing” for you (and less demanding of air). That changes the sound in the sense that you have more control over nuances. There’s more you can do with each note.

The overall result is that it seems more like a musical instrument and less like a toy. It retains what I would call a “tinwhistley” sound (it is after all a true tinwhistle) but to my ear, it becomes more interesting, more subtle, and more versatile.

When I pick one of these up and start to play it, I don’t tend to put it down soon and pick up another whistle. I’ve several really excellent whistles that I’ve tweaked up, competing for my attention. I find that when I pick up one of the tweaked Sweetones, I get drawn in and want to keep playing it.

Best wishes,
Jerry

7

edit

8

Jerry,
how is it going with your Jerrytones? Any satisfied customer feedback already? I can’t wait to get mine…

Best,

9

Hi, Bloo.

I’ve emailed you a progress report. Thanks for asking.

Best wishes,
Jerry