The “flutophone”?
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=935768309&category=624
Some kinda Chinese whatzit..
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=935709370&category=624
“Increase your lung power while you charm snakes!”
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=935624933&category=624
There’s also a didgeridoo that’s promoted with “As heard on Survivor”. Oi!
I wonder how in the heck you play that Chinese thingy?
Redwolf
I’ve still got one of those “Flutophones” from when I had to take music class in 6th grade.
They were made by Trophy, and despite the fancy name are nothing more than recorders… and crappy ones at that. 
They still make Flutophones. For those with truly serious WHOA who simply MUST have every fippled instrument in existence, you can buy them in the gift shop of Cracker Barrel restaurants.
They have a sort of ocarina type tone, and only play one octave. If you have some one octave tunes you like, these are actually sort of fun. Nostalgic too, if you ever played one as a kid
On 2003-01-06 01:31, Redwolf wrote:
I wonder how in the heck you play that Chinese thingy?Redwolf
Redwolf, how many times should one remind you one doesn’t play with food? This extends to Chinese crokery. 
On 2003-01-06 01:31, Redwolf wrote:
I wonder how in the heck you play that Chinese thingy?Redwolf
See:
http://trfn.clpgh.org/free-reed/history/birth.html
http://www.asza.com/isheng.shtml
“Thingy” indeed! If it weren’t for the sheng, the accordion might not exist! Speak respectfully of it!
John, married to an accordionist
Re: flutophone:
This looks like what I used to call a Tonette. I remember playing these as a child in music classes, in the 1960s. Not nearly as nice as a recorder, and playing much of anything based on overtones was not possible.
Info on the Sheng
http://www.asza.com/isheng.shtml
On 2003-01-06 01:31, Redwolf wrote:
I wonder how in the heck you play that Chinese thingy?
You cover holes to sound the notes. I have a related instrument from Thailand, called a kaen, which actually sounds very good, though its tones are soft.
On 2003-01-06 09:35, dhigbee wrote:
Re: flutophone:This looks like what I used to call a Tonette.
The Tonette and Flutophone are two different brands of German-type recorder, which have been mass-produced to introduce elementary students to wind instruments. The Tonette was marketed by a band instrument company, which hoped to interest students in music, so that they would then join the school band, and thus instrument sales for the company would increase. Tonettes, for whatever it’s worth, are available online at http://www.terrifictoy.com/store/tonette.html
The Flutophone:
The Tonette:
Somewhat similar to the tonette and flutophone, except older and even funnier looking, was the Fitchhorn Song Flute which I believe served the role of the classroom recorder in the '40s. Short, bulbous in the middle, with the finger holes set in two short arcs of 3 and four holes respectively. It’s really a ramped little thing to try and play - even worse than a high G whistle.
I looked at some of the other offerings of the guy with the ‘snake charmer’. Bigges and wierdest collection of imported junk instruments that I’ve ever seen.
The sheng is a great instrument, heard it played on Silk Road with Yoyo Ma. I hear it takes a while and a great sifu to learn the dang thing, but I like the sound.
Eck! It reminds me of my last performance… This older woman got all excited when she heard me play, and she came up and asked me if it was a Tonette I was playing… I said “No Ma’am, it’s an Irish Tinwhistle.” and then she asked if it was fingered the same way as a Tonette… I replied that “it had a similar fingering system to the Recorder, but they were not the same instrument.” Her reply was: “so, it’s like the Tonette then.” She kept persisting… Finally, after answering all her questions about pricing and where I got my whistles (er, as she called them, Whistle-Tonette-type instruments), ect. I relented and said (Heaven forbid!) that Yes, they must be like Tonettes.
sigh I guess that there are sometimes you win, and other times you don’t.
The flutophone is what everyone in my school who was interested in band learned to play on. You wouldn’t believe the torture of 30-40 6th graders who have never played instruments before and are all gathered in a small room blowing & shrieking & squilling simultaneously on those flutophones. I remember it vividly as I was one of those kids. Today, I’m thankful for that little plastic instrument.