After recommendations from an experienced whistler friend,reading previous posts from Peter Laban,and hearing posting on CLIPS AND SNIPS, I decided to chance an OAK from SHANNA QUAY. it arrived this morning,and on first impression i was immedietely impressed by the weight and solidity of this instrument in comparison to other ‘GENERATION’ types. The tone is sweet,with a bit of chiff-happily no ‘buzz’ that has been mentioned by other posters on this board.It takes less air than some other whistles,octave breaks are pretty smooth. i haven’t tried any third octave notes yet(probably not recommended anyway), but reached a sweet sounding top ‘b’ without any squawking.I,m also happy to tell that i haven’t secumbed to numb lips or solvent/plasticizer poisoning from the mouthpiece, as has recently been mentioned by a couple of people.All in all, a great whistle for the money, especially as steve Power threw in a free offer DOOLIN i piece.
I picked up an Oak for the car a week ago and I like it too. I did find that my lips were inexplicably numb after playing it. What is that about?
FJohnSharp…
Oak is aware of the problem and will most likely replace the whistle if you contact them at info@musicsales.com. I purchased two Oak Ds about a month ago that have the same problem and they’re sending me two new whistles, no questions asked.
Denny
On 2002-07-09 23:25, FJohnSharp wrote:
I picked up an Oak for the car a week ago and I like it too. I did find that my lips were inexplicably numb after playing it. What is that about?
I had the same problem with my new Acorn. What’s the deal? What causes it?
[ This Message was edited by: blackhawk on 2002-07-10 10:06 ]
Thanks for the info.
This is a bit OT but not by much…
I have an Oak D that someone gave me around 20 years ago. I removed the mouthpiece a month or so ago. Boy, what a job that was! Anyway, I took it off because it was badly chewed and the whistle sounded like a jet engine. I couldn’t do anything with the mouthpiece so I took the one off my Little Black Whistle and stuck it on the Oak after stuffing the crevice under the windway with blue sticky tack. The result was amazing. It’s got that great pure Oak sound and is easy to play all the way to the high B. It’s almost as easy to play as my Sweetone.
So, if some of you have numbing Oak mouthpieces and don’t qualify for factory replacement you might want to try the LBW mouthpiece. You can get them at the Whistleshop for about $3 (I think)
Mike
Semper ubi sub ubi. – Grouchus Martius
I did the same to my Feadóg. There was a thread a while back (?) about the evolution of Feadóg fipples. Mine has the “bump.” For some reason, it’s ok on the lower octaves but 2nd octave wise…it’s a hit or miss. Maybe it’s just my lips 
… but I’ve switched to the LBW fipple. Much easier to blow with.
Peace.
Kind of on that same “note” (couldn’t resist) of making Oaks and many other whistles sound better, I have a friend here in town who owns a music store and has started selling Oaks. He always gives me nice discounts, so I picked up an Oak C a couple days ago. Got it home and it was absolutely terrible, barely playable. Very scratchy, raspy, breathy, squeaky, etc. Horrible. After trying various amounts of sticky tack in the mouthpiece which didn’t help a bit, I used a trick Thom at The Whistle Shop made me aware of that turned it into an excellent playing and sounding whistle very quickly and easily.
I cut a piece of a thin guitar pick to fit precisely over the fipple blade (same width) and secured it place with a very small dab of sticky tack. It immediately played cleanly, clearly and easily in both octaves. Pretty amazing transformation. It still wasn’t quite perfect, so I moved the piece of plastic in small increments in and out of the air window until I got the playability I wanted. It now sounds and plays wonderfully with excellent balance through both octaves. The second octave is particularly clear and sweet. It’s still very slightly breathy in the 2nd octave, but it isn’t heard in recording or by listeners. As I understand, this is basically the same thing Cillian O’Briain does with his tweaked “Improved” whistles, plus he fills the mouthpiece bowl with something like wax to smooth out the upper registers. Filling the bowl usually decreases the volume, so I’m pleased this wasn’t necessary with my Oak C. BTW, don’t cut the guitar pick piece too long so it extends past the top of the mouthpiece. The piece I cut is only about 1/4" long. It needs to be low profile.
Depending on the whistle, sometimes the plastic piece has to be placed on the underside of the blade. You just have experiment, and I’ve acheived good results both ways with different whistles. Sorry about the long post but I just thought the guitar pick trick may be of interest to those who may not be aware of it.
Denny