As the last thread that I started kind of got out of hand (Future of Celtic Whistles), thought I’d ask a new question that pertains to preferences that folk have in how six-hole wind instruments can be played. I started off building six-hole crosswind flutes, and love the sound. Recently, I’ve been building copper whistles, and have tried several ways to give the whistles that “flute” like sound quality.
I’ve gotten some degree of success in doubling up the copper thickness, to give me a longer ramp, and I allowed for some “chamber” space to provide a slight degree of depth. The longer ramp seems to help in transitions between the octaves, but not sure if the combination provides any sound nearing what a crosswind type produces.
I’m not complaining, as I like the sound of the whistle, but I was just curious if any folk with Chiff and Fipple have ever tried to make this type of cross-pollination between embouchure and whistle head before.
Ever looked at a Quena? The sound to me seems to be about halfway between that of a flute and a whistle.
Unfortunately, I think a lot of the flute sound comes from the embouchure. The built in embouchure of a whistle does limit some of the control over tone color that the player has. This is especially true of the higher pitched whistles. Low whistles IMO have a more flutey sound in general.
Yes. Years ago when I was wondering around the streets of San Francisco. Beautiful sounding instruments. Unfortunately, one has to do a couple of things to make the tones come out right. There has to be a thumb hole, and the end of the barrel really DOES have to be closed off slightly.
I tried making a ramp for the whistle that went from out-to-in like the Quena, with the whistle channel and chamber. One would think that would work, but … alas … I ended up having to scrap some copper on that experiment.
But you’re right, the Quena DOES have a beautiful, flute-like sound, and I have several that I bought in my … wandering days.
Still, it’s sort of nagging challenge for this old systems engineer to see if some that flute sound can pass on to the six-hole whistle design. I might look into the Quena idea again. Thanks Craig.
As usual, you’re probably right Paul. As you know, with the whistle that I sent you, I put in chamber depth just before the ramp. It helped, but since that time, I’ve also bevelled the inside copper to give it more of that airy sound. Check out my two samples on my website to let me know if you think it makes a difference from the one that I sent you.