Silkstone Ace

Anyone have any experience with this whistle. It looks great and I’m just curious how owners feel about it. I don’t hear much about these, and it seems like I should . . . I have the pvc high C in British Racing Green, which is a very smooth silky sounding C whistle, that I like very much.

http://www.silkstone-whistles.com/

Looks great,but it sure is expensive :boggle:

yes it is.

Paul Hayward, the maker, is a very nice guy. I think his whistles are overpriced, but they’re also very good. The D whistle i reach for most of the time is my silkstone alloy (aluminum), which i bought from Wanderer on eBay on a lark. I was sure i was going to be overbid, but ended up getting it for a great price. I even told Wanderer he didn’t have to go on with the sale, but he sold it to me anyway.

I guess i should post my 3 D whistles on that other thread:

  • Silkstone alloy
  • Humprey widebore in Werkmeister III tuning
  • Wooden Syn ironwood prototype

great choices there Glauber :slight_smile:

Matt:

Very nice looking whistle, but the price…OUCH. he does make some beautiful instruments.

I have a D+ Ace, and it’s definitely nice. The whistle is good-looking, finished well, and feels very solid. It’s a bit louder than his other models, and has a nice full tone, clear rather than breathy. It takes slightly more push to play than the others, but not any more air volume. It’s, well, not buzzier, but maybe more vibrant-sounding than most – you can feel it in your fingertips. It plays smoothly, and is great on the high notes.

That said, I still usually prefer my Silkstone alloy more than the regular PVC or Ace. The Ace sounds at least as good, but I don’t like the feel of the mouthpiece quite as much. I find that it dries my mouth out after I’ve been playing a while, almost like one with a wood fipple plug does. I mostly use it for tunes that have lots of notes in the top of the second octave or a note or two into the third, since it sounds better than most whistles way up there. It’s also great for songs with long phrases – I find I don’t have to take breaths as often as usual when using it.

So, in summary – great whistle, but not necessarily that much greater than the maker’s less expensive models, except in a few specific situations