If you think about it, we in the whistlin’ community are indeed fortunate. If we played guitars or pianos or violins (ok fiddles for you folk oriented out there 
)we would not be able because of costs, to have the large variety of instruments and sound that we can with the humble whistle. Further, if you had a special want or desire in an instrument it would be difficult or impossible to have a high end guitar or piano made to suit (unless your pockets were dragging on the ground).
Well we have many such ‘treasured resources’ in our midsts. Mack Hoover has made over eight whistles for me. So naturally when I had a special “request” for a whistle, He was the one I turned to for the challenge.
I was having a hard time with my Generation Bb whistle. That last hole on the bottom was just far enough away from the other to where I had air leakage issues with the normal fingertip grip I was using. I asked Mack via e-mail if it was possible to make a Bb whistle with shorter hole spacing for easier playing.
Well two weeks later Ive got one pretty whistle in my hands which not only succeeds on the spacing, but has a tone that is to whistles what hot fudge is to an ice cream sunday. I apologize to you all for the lack of a clip or pictures. My computer skills are about non-existant along with a lack of technology, ie; no mike, no camera etc…
I didn’t really specify what exactly I was looking for in my back and forth with Mack, but after having made many other whistles for me Mack delivered just what I wanted because, like any chraftperson that knows what you like, they give you that.
Mack knows that I like my whistles with a modest volume and pure tone. This Bb whistle has beautiful pure tone with about 80% of the volume of a stock Gen Bb on the bottom end and moved up to 90% or thereabouts in volume up in the second octave’s upper end. The tone, while pure still has a resonance which is very pleasing, especially considering that the volume is modest.
Describing the whistle, it’s a Blacktop fipple on an aluminum recycled ski pole tube. The alloy is shiny and smooth with just the right texture for good grip. The tone holes are perfectly centered and spaced. Even the last hole is not too difficult of a stretch. The bore size is a rather large 11/16" which makes it slightly larger than a stock Gen Bb. This no doubt helps with the hole spacing and also the rich tone.
The volume on this wide bore whistle is kept in check by the size of the window on the blacktop fipple. The curved windway exit is only about 1/4" wide with a similarly small distance to the labium blade. For those of you who are not familiar with the Hoover Blacktop fipple, they are made of acetal plastic (delrin) and are quite nicely finished and comfortable on the lips. They do have a narrow airway exit so the waxed dental flossed trick workes wonders to keep the airway clean and clog resistant.
The tuning on this particular whistle is very accurate to my ear and even has a nice flattened seventh with the oxx-ooo fingering. (that wide bore thing again) Anyone who plays many Hoovers knows that this is not the type of whistle that one ‘leans into’ for volume unless you want to play in the third (or forth!!!???) octave. Hoovers need a gentle touch on breath control and this one is no different.
So I just wanted to communicate how nice it is to be able to have a person make a whistle for you who you can communicate with and have your whistle “taylored” to what you are looking for. There will of course always be a place for and a need for the larger “production” high end whistles in our community, but sometimes the greatest ‘treasures’ are right in our midst
Robert, DreamOgreen