Yesterday I received my new Syn in the mail. It was not equal to its predecessor in my opinion. I brought it to session and played them both, and was underwhelmed by the newer model.
To my delight, though, there was a woman visiting from Duluth, MN, and she thought the whistle was great and bought it off of me on the spot. Total time in my possession? Five hours.
I hope she doesn’t have major buyer’s remorse. The whistle came with a very poor finish which, if I was thrilled with the sound or feel of the instrument, wouldn’t be an issue for me. She’s a relative newbie at it but was able to make it sound nice enough for two scales. I’m supposing that it was worth what I (and she) paid for it, but it wasn’t that “Oh geez, this is a really good whistle” that I had with the older one.
There were two models of Syns–well, two models I know of, anyway. I have one of each.
His first version had very high backpressure and had a distinctive “ring” to the sound. The second version had less backpressure, an easier high octave, and a purer sound.
Visually you can tell them apart as the second version has a longer slimmer mouthpiece on the fipple.
I think both are quite good, each in their own way, and I’m glad I have both. They are both keepers.
I haven’t had a chance to try a Black Diamond yet, but I am interested.
Aside from the longer beak, the newer one I got and sold quickly has some finish which came pretty badly chipped. The older model – as far as I know – doesn’t have a coating that chips. Also, the new model has an interesting decorative ring while the older model is plain.
Yes, I did notice the difference in back pressure, and it was a feature I really liked in the first one I had. In fact it was the primary reason I wanted a new one.
That is curious, because I had the opposite experience. My first Syn from the original batch was not perfectly finished and was somewhat rough across both octaves. Erle sent me a replacement (along with unsolicited additional keys in a set) - these are the newer ones with the decorative rings - and they are terrific. I don’t remember if you tried them at the NE Gathering but I like the D, C and Bflat set very much as did apparently LE McCullough, from whose grasp they had to be rescued.
For the record, I also have a Black Diamond C which is really terrific; haven’t tried the D.
Not necessarily true. I’ve had three syns go through my hands (not funny) and the first was as you describe with no decorative ring. This was when he had just started selling them and he only made the D and C I believe. I asked for other tubes and got, I think, the first set of tubes all the way down to the A. This whistle head had the decorative ring and acted much like the original whistle which had lots of backpressure, it seemed like a cross between a Chieftain and a Susato. I then got his newer model when he had made changes as you have described and it also had the decorative ring. I like the older model as well. Although, I have begun to like the Humphrey (Black Diamond seems to be a close substitute) type whistles and gravitate more towards them.
My Syns were of the newer type I like the higher ones a lot (Eb and E) but the rest were so so and then I traded for a Water Weasel Eb and I already had a Cheiftian E so it is all good.
