Here is an instrument hybrid for you to raise your eyebrows at!
Several years ago when I first started making whistles, I had a conversation with a friend about how impossible it would be to make an accoustic whistle you didn’t need to blow. I figured I could come up with a way to do this, and made a bet. After lots of toil, frusteration, cusword invention, and pepsi product consumption, this was spawned.
I knew little about the Uilleann pipes at the time, and my construction shows it. It plays very well, though, and both octaves are achievable. I have a keyed whistle body as the chanter in these pictures. I devised a “stop key” to stop the fipple sounding while warming up, or playing staccato. I had made a set of drones for it, but… gave up before I got them to work properly. It does take a lot of air, and could use some better bellows, if anyone is interested in donating
I had no idea what forum to post this in, as I do not know what the best way to calssify this is.
Thanks for the kind words! I have one video of me playing “O’Sullivan’s March” at its debut at a local coffee shop. However, I was breaking it in then and my playing is not quite quite up to what i would like. I’ll try to add it here, though, once i get a little more time.
It fingers just like an ordinary whistle (except fot the extra keys to play accidentals F. nat and B b). I need to get/fabricatend more relaible bellows to bring out its true playing potential. I would consider making another, PM if interested.
I was trying to make something like this last year -but not as sophisticated as lordofthestrings’. I almost got it to work before I realised that I should really be getting on with my piping practice. The idea was to use a whistle with narrow bore uilleann drones - I figured that these drones would not be too loud for the whistle. I used a connecting piece with a very narrow air passage to reduce the amount of air getting to the whistle. I think this is the key to getting the thing to work, but it involves a lot of trial and error to get the air pressure just right especially if you want to keep the octave jump. But I think it’s an idea worth pursuing. Good luck with it!
I thought I would put a word in here for the equally imaginative efforts of Daniel Bingamon too. The BagWhistle is not quite the same idea but there may be points in each design worth combining.
