Has any esteemed whistlist any experience of a…
svirel?
To those who don’t know ( me, me, me) they look like
http://www.kuznya.raznotravie.ru/instruments_e.html
linked to
http://www.kuznya.raznotravie.ru/instruments/svirel.html
I fancied making one for a present to welcome a
Russian person to our neighbourhood, but know
nothing about them - other than the above.
Plans or photo’s or URLs muchly appreciated 
Thanks
I wondered–“a Russian whistle” ? 
No bloody Zaporozhian nor Zahidnik way – them Catsap don’t play winds 
Svirél’, sopílka, dudá (etc.) slightly different things, with no clear-cut definitions (depending on the geogr. area) and thusly widely confused.
All, anyway, vertical flutes from Ukraine which is acknowledged by the author you link to–not Russia.
He seems to depart from the original designs by the extra holes to make it chromatic. The old folk instruments are diatonic, and many I think are not even Major tuned. It’s often like roughly equal holes about equally spaced, like on quenas, NA flutes, etc.
From the pictures, those the artist made are of the type with a full duct windway and a window. There are others much akin to the Andean Quenas (just a blade cut at the top, and you got to use your chin, else upper lip, as a “plug”). Others yet have a separate window, but you still got to “focus” the sound with your lips.
Basically, the svirél’ you spotted is quite modern (and little authentic), built as a whistle, except the window is turned down (great to evacuate the juice, esp. if you chew tabakey in concert…).
Detail pictures of the blade show he followed the standard recorder (and many wood whistles) window design.
Also, and that is “trad” awright, there is no mouthpiece “duckbill”: it’s flat, so you press your lips against the top, not around. The “new design”, har-har, of Calmont low whistles often advertised on eBay UK seems quite much the same.
Make it alto or tenor, and you’ll get a… zubívka. 
For more info, see this excellent page :
http://home.att.net/~bandura.ca/VMfolkBook/index.html
PS: You might make sure your Russian neighbour is Russian, or Bielorussian, or Ukrainian, or whatever else. Just in case you’d have to build a balalaika 
Btw, what’s his last name? Ethnic roots often coded there…
Zub, great site, thanks!
Excellent site. Thanks.
The Russian is a woman from Moscow,
who is marrying my friend and next door neighbour
next month.
They have known each other for a year or so,
visiting each other in their own countries several times,
and decided to make it permanent.
They both like various trad’ music from
round the world, and play a couple of instruments.
I thought an instrument ‘from home’ might be
appropriate so she might be able to join in/share
and make more friends/settle in etc.
Ok–forget the balalaika
–for some reason, it’s a lads’ instrument. When taking up strings, women I saw more often with the Domra.
Here’s one http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2567440010&category=10179
Also, I guess you could make a whistle, and enhance it with some wood burnings in the fashions described on that Ukrainian woodwinds page.
A drone whistle in C or G would fit Russian trad. music quite well, could be fun.
This woman, you say, is from Moscow. The “Big Village” has little true natives, most people just “going up” to the capital city. It could be interesting to know where she’s from precisely–remember Russia is a huge patchwork of varied cultures and ethnics, eventhough people abroad to think of it as something monolithic. Maybe the Soviet image.
Zub, i have a dvojanka from Slovakia. This is 2 whistles joined by metal bands. One has holes, the other is a drone. There is no “duckbill” and, if i remember right, the voicing window is in the underside, like a Calmont’s. It’s made of that white wood you see everywhere behind the ol’ iron curtain, stained with acid to make nice folksy patterns. The holes are same size, same spacing. I’m not sure if this is meant to be played as an instrument or hung on the wall, since i got it in a tourist shop.
I know there are single whistles too, and some groups play them, but i haven’t seen any up close.
Unfortunately in Slovakia, the Communist government had spent a lot of effort to preserve folk culture, so folk culture became associated with the Communists. Once the Communists were out of power, everything just died. There are a few dance groups holding on by the skin of their teeth, but there’s no real preservation. So the few people who play traditional instruments usually make their own, unless they have old instruments in usable shape. I was able to buy a fujara (huge long thing, looks like a bassoon, but it’s played overblown so sounds high-pitched - wonderful instrument) from a guy who makes and plays them.
That’s not me in the pictures, just random web pictures courtesy of Google:
Glauber! You lucky dog!
I’ve always wanted a fujara – a marvelous, eerie, haunting sound – but the few instruments I’ve seen for sale in the States have been priced too high for my pocketbook. I may look into ordering one from a maker in Slovakia someday, but would prefer being able to see/play before I buy (you know how it is).
Anyway, having been laid off isn’t conducive to additional instrument purchases, so it’ll be a while. Hope the makers are still around by the time I’m back in the ranks of The Employed. . .
Nice to see that others here dig the fujara, though. Cool piece of wood, that.
Glauber, just the opposite in Ukraine.
The Soviets pursued the task of de-Ukrainization, which began under Catherine II.
This went through the suppression of a whole culture, in a 60 million people country as big as Germany. Well, ca. 75 million, but that was before the "revolution. Unquote.
Hence, all vernacular musical instruments were treated in disdain, at best. Everyone with a balalaika, or a button accordeon.
Some were eradicated on the grounds they were 1) Ukrainian 2) played by the richer people. Most Ukrainian folk instruments thusly disappeared–plain f*** vanished–trace lost, as un-PC.
Some survided mostly thanks to the Canadian Ukrainian community.
Just try and look for a trad woodwind in Soviet “folklore”. Part is due to an imperial will to destroy national cultures, part to the Russian complex about “Western” music, i.e. German symphonic music.
Just wearing the Ukrainian trad. embroidered shirt could send a man to the Gulag. Wearing it is still a political statement up to the Kiïv parliament today.
It got me nearly beaten up a few years ago, i.e. years after you guys thought Soviet Union to be old story. The Russian empire survives…
Don’t wonder why I loathe priests and eagles–whether Roman, Austrian, or the Russian double-headed vulture, and keep wary of the bald one. I mean priest, of course… Empires are evil.
Now, let me please put back me red-painted ping-pong ball over me nose and pretend the usual Gallic self 
Zub, wild stuff. So many ways to be wrong!
I think as a generalization, in countries that see themselves as powerless, the government tries to preserve the folklore as a way to say “we may not have money or guns, but we have nice traditions”. In countries that see themselves as powerful, the opposite happens, the folklore stuff is steamrolled by the drive to be modern, to seize the future. My own country (Brazil) is in the first group, where “we may not have money, but we have football, samba and interesting food”. Slovakia was in a desperate need to assert its uniqueness being part of an unequally divided country called Czechoslovakia.
Food I didn’t know, but music for sure, and certainly not samba alone.
Nordeste rocks. Even “classic” Brazil rocks, from Villa Lobos to bossa nova.
As for Slovakia, good thing some managed to preserve their trad music claiming politically correct pretenses, when a few miles east, another music got… laminated? Pity you seem to say youth rejects it now, but it may come back just like with Portugal and fado, once rejected as “Salazarian” but revived in modern form since Madre Deus and others…
Thanks, Zub. That’s right, similar thing happened with our “brothers across the sea” (Portugal).
Yeah, Slovak youth is not interested in trad music, but there are a few exceptions, like the band Elan (the guy who leads it married a trad dancer, and he finds ways to put some whistles and other things in the music). Great band.
In Brazil, people just never took the government seriously.
In the end, much is lost, but much survives too. If it wasn’t for the Irish in the US, Canada and Australia, Irish trad music would probably have died too.
There’s a large Ukrainian church very near where i live, by the way, beautiful! I haven’t been inside, but even the doors are impressive. They have a big monument to the victims of the Soviet oppression. Better stop this before this turns into another political thread.
Zubivka didst scribe
For more info, see this excellent page :
http://home.att.net/~bandura.ca/VMfolkBook/index.html
Well I made a The Floyara (Floyarka)
from http://home.att.net/~bandura.ca/VMfolkBook/index.html
Using the picture on the right, and the measurments there.
It sounds like a flute
So if you’ve always fancied a go on a flute,
but can’t get the hang of the awkward position,
try the floyara. If you can get a flute to make a noise
it’s easy, and it plays just like a whistle re fingering.
PVC is cheap to try - 3/4" pipe is what I used.
Literaly 10 minutes to make.
Thanks again Zub’
Wow! You’re fast.
The measurements seem odd… what kind of a scale does it give you?
xxxxxx = B
xxxxxo = D
xxxxoo = D#(Eb)
xxxooo = E
xxoooo = G
xooooo = A
oooooo = A#(Bb)
Which, I think, is nearly a blues scale, but somebody will have an opinion on that no doubt
It flips into a second octave quite nicely.
Don’t sharpen the end too much.
It’s easier to get a sound if the edge is a bit blunt
rather than very sharp.
I used 1/4" dia holes.
Sounds surprisingly ok.
If I’d have used a % based on 43, 50, 58, 68, 73, 83%
then the holes would have been too far apart at
258, 300, 348, 408, 438, 498mm.
Even my low Bb doesn’t stretch that much.
Does it overblow to octave? Or is it stuck in one register?
It’s an interesting scale…
I wondered if their was a Bandura mode (a very flexible Ukrainian string instrument) which matched–they would have played together.
No Ukrainian modes match, beside a weird “chromatic Phrygian”, which could just as well be called Locrian…
Check this out: http://www.geocities.com/kozulich/modes.html
a comprehensive compilation, rather
However, you probably have cross fingerings which would give you a more complete scale, from D to d’ at least…
Hmm, imagine you bring your tube to a session
D@mn!