I just tweaked my Gen Bb last night (yay! my first home tweaking attempt, I feel like a “real” whistle-player now) and I think it went OK. There weren’t too many plastic bits in there but it did sound better after. However, the low to high transition is different. It is now easier (and this is NOT good) to get that middle no-man’s land buzz sound, which is neither the high nor low note. So basically, if I hit the notes right on my tweaked Gen, they sound better than before, but it’s easier to hit them wrong.
My question is what does a RUINED whistle sound like? I hear people say they tweake theirs and ruin it. What do they mean? Does it not play, or play worse, and if it plays worse, what does that sound like?
It’s a little like hearing a rattlesnake for the first time. No-one really has to tell you what it is.
Sometimes the mouthpiece gets cracked or broken, or you can’t get it back on the barrel. Sometimes the whistle will develop squeaks and squawks, or get quiet, or won’t sound at all, or the “balance” goes to pieces ( the note frequencies go off in unfortunate directions ), or something like that.
Actually, on a scouting trip there was a rattlesnake in the bushes, and I -had- heard rattlesnakes before. I tried to tell the other kids to stay the hell away from the bushes because it was a rattlesnake, but they laughed and said it was probably a child’s toy or something… (Huh? Think people, you’re in the middle of the woods on a trail only used by hikers… and you think a wind-up top is more likely to be in the bushes than a rattlesnake?)
Granted that a rattlesnake does sound a lot like loudly, rapidly rustled leaves, and in fact there’s another snake that imitates a rattlesnake’s rattle by whipping its tail around in dry leaves (and if it was one of those, that would explain why nobody got bitten… at least, I didn’t hear of anybody being bitten…)
All of which goes to show, people are not particularly prone to knowing what a rattlesnake sounds like the first time they hear one (unless they see it as well). Having one rampage through your camp, however, will sensitize you to the sound, but then they become dinner. Or did. I’m a vegetarian now, but if forced to kill a snake in self-defence there’d be no reason not to eat it, I think.
Okay. Back to whistles. What -does- a ruined whistle sound like?
I semi-ruined my first whistle (feadog, MK II) by trying to tweak it… It will still play, and sounds beautiful up until the high F#… then it sounds absolutely rotten! Grainy, raspy… just horrid!
All of which goes to show, people are not particularly prone to knowing what a rattlesnake sounds like the first time they hear one (unless they see it as well).
Oops. Sorry. I forgot that modern people generally lack a sense of self-preservation.
Having one rampage through your camp, however, will sensitize you to the sound, but then they become dinner. Or did. I’m a vegetarian now, but if forced to kill a snake in self-defence there’d be no reason not to eat it, I think.
There’s a big difference between dead and dinner. There’s no reason not to eat it? From my own experience, I found the sight of a headless, skinned, and gutted, snake crawling in the pan to be rather off-putting. Others might not be so affected. More power to 'em.
From my own experience, I found the sight of a headless, skinned, and gutted, snake crawling in the pan to be rather off-putting. Others might not be so affected. More power to 'em.
For some reason, I find it ironically amusing that a vegetarian of the past 16 years (myself, that is) is less put-off by the idea of skinning, cooking, and eating a rattlesnake than (presumed) meat eaters who eat stuff that’s been through the same process on a daily basis…
EditPS: Crawling? We hung the snake by the tail until all the blood had drained out and it was quite still… it certainly was not moving when it was cooked. While it may not toxify like deer meat, it’s still probably a bad idea to leave pooled blood in the flesh of any animal, and if it’s hanging long enough to drain, I’d be suprised if it could still move…
–Chris
[ This Message was edited by: ChrisA on 2002-06-28 13:33 ]
EditPS: Crawling? We hung the snake by the tail until all the blood had drained out and it was quite still… it certainly was not moving when it was cooked. While it may not toxify like deer meat, it’s still probably a bad idea to leave pooled blood in the flesh of any animal, and if it’s hanging long enough to drain, I’d be suprised if it could still move…
My companion, who was possessed with the desire to eat the snake, did not use your technique – more’s the pity. Also, he simply boiled it whole. It might have been better sliced, as someone above suggested, then breaded and fried.
Snakes that have been headless for 15 or 20 minutes have been known to rear up, rattle, and strike when the bed of the pickup they had been thrown into was vibrated. I’ve known some men, and their dogs, who found that most disconcerting.
I have a Bb Generation whistle. I removed its head. It was off for over an hour and when I put it back on the the whistle bites even worse than before!
Here’s what I did with my Gen Bb, which plays nicely now with good clear sound, good accuracy and especially nice in the upper registers. Requires very little air and I can easily get a strong, accurate clear hi D (3rd octave). It’s actually a nice sounding, easy playing whistle now.
If you can locate a Clarke Sweetone C, which is historically terribly innacurate and basically useless, buy one, remove the fipple, toss the tube, get yourself a 1/2" copper coupling at your local home improvment store and retrofit the Sweetone fipple to the Gen Bb tube. If you have a reasonable degree of ability and a few tools, you’ll be able to figure out how to do it. I use the word “retrofit” because it does take a little work, but worth it. If you want to try it and need help, let me know. By the way, if you have a Books-A-Million near you, they sometimes sell Sweetones in what they call their “Nature” section where the wind chimes, etc are located. They were $3 each. Not all stores carry them.
Keep in mind with the Sweetone fipple, you’ll need VERY LITTLE air, so you can easily overblow the lower octave. But once you get used to it, this combination works well.
What -does- a ruined whistle sound like? 
