OK-- after being dissappointed many times by Generation whistles, I have finally made a “good Generation.” How did I do this you ask? Well let me begin by saying this: in my opinion, Generations don’t sound as good as they used to for the simple reason that they currently are designed DIFFERENTLY than they used to be. I discovered this by watching L.E. McCollough’s video tutorial which shows his old blue/nickle Generation D whistle up close several times. What I realized after looking at this video and then looking down at the newer Generation I was holding is that the head is made differently-- most noticeably, the bump or bulb on the fipple blade was smaller on L.E.'s than mine, plus some other small differences. This got me to thinking. I then took out my best cheap whislte by far, a brass Generation Bb and I noticed that this head was designed like L.E.'s. I then compared this with my other Generation Bb – a nickle one (which I had never really been happy with) and noticed that this Generation has the newer styled head. I must have lucked out when I bought the brass Bb and gotten an old one that had been sitting around a while. I don’t know why I never noticed these differences before.
It then became clear to me that I would never get a much sought-after “good Generation” D unless I got an old style one–and I had no luck on that front. So I went into Plan B. I decided that I would compare other whistle maker’s heads with the head on L.E.'s old Generation (and the head on my great Bb) and see which maker came closest. I decided that the Oak D looked the most like the older style Generation head. Perhaps, not coincidentally, the Oak was also the best sounding cheap whistle I had. However, it didn’t really sound like a Generation-- probably because of the heavy tubing they use. So I took off the Oak head and put it on a spare nickle Feadog body I had laying around. Instantly, it improved and sounded more “Generationy”. I happily played this whistle for a long time, but it was still not %100 what I wanted. I don’t know why this took me so long to try, but I finally just put the Oak head on a brass Generation body and WHAMMO-- there it was! The sound of a “good Generation.” I am now completely happy with this whistle. and, out of all my D whistles (Copeland, Burke, Thin Weasel, Rose, Sindt) it is my favorite and easiest to play.
I thus heartily recommend that, instead of wasting money ordering Generation after Generation trying to find a good one, you just make one like I did!
Tres
Atlanta, GA
Mike