Just took delivery today of a brass Copeland C from Jim Rementer, was overjoyed to find that the fipple head is swappable with my older brass Copeland D. This gives me a choice on both instruments between the walled airway provided with the C and the unwalled on the D. The unwalled airway is more mellow in tone and whistle-like, with less air requirements and feels like better consistency in tone across the octaves, while the walled airway has more low end and the pop of an O’Riordan. It also seems to me that the overall intonation accuracy and ease of playing in tune is better with the older unwalled fipple.
I’ve been waiting for this whistle since April, so glad to finally have it! Its really a nice instrument.
Wow, very interesting Michael, I’d never thought to try that. My C/D heads are indeed swappable, I mean one fits the other’s body and vice versa.
I haven’t tried playing them this way yet as it’s not quite 5am here, and I don’t think my neighbors would appreciate it. I’ll give it a try in the next few days and report back.
Loren
[ This Message was edited by: Loren on 2001-12-25 07:00 ]
On 2001-12-25 10:16, JessieK wrote:
Loren, what were you doing awake at that hour?!?
> Jessie
Umm…actually, I was listening to Van Halen on my mini-disc player. I couldn’t sleep, and I figure if you’re gonna be awake, you might as well be REALLY awake, know what I mean? And the cradle will rock! Oh yeah baby!!
Now, if I could just figure out the rest of “Eruption” on the whistle…anyone got the ABC for that? Chris Laughlin maybe? Or perhaps you’ve worked out a little Satch? Maybe a little Surfing with the Alien? Heh heh.
Another new Copeland C discovery, I wanted a C whistle primarily to play D minor session tunes (some of the Paddy Fahy tunes, for example). When the new whistle is properly tuned to a C scale and consonant with a C drone, the bottom and octave D’s are quite noticeably sharp relative to a concert D drone. Taking a lead from my Uilleann pipe tweaking methods, I found that I can get a much more in tune D by partially taping the bottom hole with electrical tape. The result for me is a much more useful whistle.
I think if you do the math, calculating the frequency of the D in a C just intonation based scale vs. an equally tempered concert D, it works out that the D in the C scale is indeed a bit high.
Just thought I’d pass the info on in case anyone else is fighting with their C whistle…
Jessie