I recently traded a Kerry Songbird to Ronaldo for one of his soprano Ds and at least from my standpoint, I got the better end of that swap! Hopefully he’ll be able to better deal with the Songbird’s demands than me. I was considering a complete review, but since StevieJ has already done ‘THE’ Reyburn soprano D review that has set the standard, and several others have recently provided their input, I’ll try and keep this relatively short but hopefully add a few things that may be useful.
Let me say first that I use the word ‘convert’ in the topic header because I’ve always been an advocate of a ‘pure’ sounding whistle with no chiff or breathiness and thought that’s all I wanted. When Ronaldo first offered the trade, I was skeptical because of the reviews mentioning the very tonal characteristics I was staying away from, but after playing it for ten minutes, I changed my mind. I absolutely love the sound and character of this whistle.
If you’ve read StevieJ’s fantastic review, you’ll know what this whistle is all about. If you haven’t read it, please do yourself a favor and go to http://www.chiffandfipple.com/reyburn/reyburnhigh.html. The Reyburn soprano D is a superior instrument if you’re looking for a tunable whistle with a very nice trad sound, good volume, excellent craftsmanship, perfect accuracy, easy playability, great tuning slide and one of the most comfortable mouthpieces in the business. And it’s less than $100.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS TO OTHER REVIEWS:
This isn’t ‘additional’ since StevieJ mentioned it in his review, but I just wanted to verify that one of the most impressive characteristics of the Reyburn is the ability to totally avert clogging during a lengthy session. Pretty amazing. Some whistle brands I’ve had (or have) claim to have a ‘specially engineered’ mouthpiece to prevent clogging, but can’t back it up. But the Reyburn backs it up…or at least hasn’t clogged on me yet.
I prefer the Reyburn’s tuning slide design over any other I’ve used so far. Unlike others I’ve had, it’s a very tight fit and holds position extremely well, yet allows for easy adjustment. And it’s not bulky looking like most other designs.
On the slightly negative side, Drew (drewcifer) brought up a noteworthy point about responsiveness. He mentioned that the Reyburn lacks a ‘crispness’ in its response and I can somewhat agree. Don’t get me wrong…response is plenty fast…but it does lack some of the crispness I like to hear found in other whistles when doing ornamentation. On the positive side of this, I don’t get the ‘finger pops’ I get with some of the crisper sounding whistles that I don’t particularly like to hear. There are always trade-offs, and with so many good things about this whistle, I’m not going to worry about it, although I thought it worthy of mentioning.
I was extremely impressed with the packaging and attention to protection Ronaldo uses for shipping. After all, these aren’t $3.00 whisltes. He uses a very strong cardboard tube that’s 15.5" long x 3" in diameter and the whistle rests centered in the tube amid plenty of newspaper to hold it in place. There’s no way the whistle will be damaged unless the delivery truck runs over it.
There’s very little to complain about with this whistle and it’s become my main session whistle. It’s wonderful to be able to get through a 3hr session without constantly having to remove clogs. I like Ronaldo’s whistle so much I’ve ordered a C body. I’ve had many e-mail conversations with Ronaldo and he’s a wonderful, dedicated person to deal with and I wish him only the best. As I mentioned in another post, for those who like the Generation trad sound and want a higher end instrument that’s nearly flawless, this may be the ‘sleeper’ soprano D you’re looking for. Give the Reyburn a try and I doubt you’ll regret it.
[ This Message was edited by: DRC on 2002-08-27 12:38 ]
