I’m wondering if any of you have thought of some of these whilst you have been playing your whistles. For example, I have heard the sound of the Overton/Goldie whistles described as
“The Cosmic Drainpipe”.
This means nothing to one who has not played these whistles, but might make perfect sense to someone who has. Similarly, when I played the MK Pro, my overwhelming thought for a long time was that the tone was akin to
“Dried Onions”.
After considering this for a while, I realized that this descriptor is not only unhelpful in describing the MK’s tone, but it is also relatively abstract, as I can’t even put my finger on why this comes to mind. Never the less, it does.
Do any of you have examples of something like this?
When I think cosmic drainpipe, I am reminded of this slow air (forgive me for posting something with Titanic attached to it, but since this was never in the movie maybe that sort of redeems?). This is probably an over exaggeration of it. Anyways, cosmic drainpipe sounds like the loon sound effects you hear in a movie, echoey, “haunting”. Kinda like singing in a shower through a tube in my opinion. As an MK player as well you won’t get to hear this effect as I find MKs have a bit more buzz and woody sound like a flute. Hopefully my weird descriptive imaging is somewhat helpful to you now.
To hear a proper drainpipe, sampled to Fairlight synth: http://youtu.be/SNrgNllOxMI around 7:06
Whether it’s cosmic or not is up to the listener i guess
A “proper” drainpipe. That’s really funny. Why not use a real drainpipe? (Blue Man Group!) Actually, Bernard Overton got the sound down pretty well and our fearless king of Internet tinwhistle journalism described it just as well.
Yeah, the Fairlight seemed to define the sound of 80’s music. It was the ultimate show of decadence in the “my studio is bigger than your studio” wars of the era. Isn’t it curious that people would spend $50,000 for a computer based synthesizer to replicate the sound of a $100 low whistle. Yes, I know it was really great at reproducing things like the sound of wind rushing through a pipe in a building sized pipe organ - and it was less expensive than those and a bit more portable. The shakuhachi sounds were all the rage. Weren’t they? Still…I guess it led to the current technology we enjoy in software based synthesis, digital recording and so on. No less relevant today than a resonator guitar I suppose.
Fairlight’s latest product is an iPhone app. We’ve come so far.
Yes, as some would say, “Talking about music is like dancing about architecture”. What else do we have? Do we just keep on dancing? Yes.
The reason for this is because I have heard a person describe two whistles, and call one of them flutey, and talk as though the other one is the polar opposite. Then I’ve heard somebody else describe those same two whistles, and switch them around and say the opposite one is flutey, and the other one is not. I’ve heard overtons, burkes, MK’s, all called flutey. Oh, and clarke originals (Huh?! Flutey how?) ! None of them sound like an irish flute to me, at all. Perhaps there are some slight characteristics which might be a little bit linked to some aspect of the flute’s sound (which varies more than any low whistle in the first place), but I really don’t think it’s enough that it would make it an overall “flutey” sounding instrument, or that any low whistles sound flutey.
I have never heard any recording where it is difficult to distinguish whether it’s a flute or low whistle being played. If there are any flutey low whistles out there, I haven’t heard them yet. Although I know that an irish flute can get a sound more similar to some low whistles, than a low whistle can get to some of the sounds a flute can produce. However, not enough that a difference can not be heard, or that the whistle is itself sounding like a flute.
Beyond my thoughts on low whistles not being flutey, the real reason it isn’t a helpful term is because it seems every low whistle is called flutey by somebody, and non-flutey by somebody else. There is no real standard of saying what it a flutey low whistle and what isn’t, so it’s not a term that has really carried much weight with me as a descriptive quality.
Really, I find most all of the descriptive qualities hard to go by, for me. Save for things like “Clear” , or “smokey” , which I can follow a bit better and are clearer descriptive terms, in my opinion.
“Smokey” is actually a pretty good example of what I’m talking about. “Smokey” generally means that the air is filled with gases, carbon particles, and other particulates produced by the combustion process. For someone to say that a sound is “smokey” requires that person to have an abstract idea of what “smokey” would sound like.
Alternately, one could describe Nat King Cole or Bing Crosby’s voices as “smokey” as their smoking habits certainly influenced the sound of their voices, making them deeper. If you have a whistle that sounds like Nat King Cole, you might describe the sound as “smokey”.
The definition of “smokey” is determined by one’s frame of reference. If several people agree on the name of a sound quality, it can be used successfully as a descriptor, but it will continue to not have meaning to those who have not heard examples of said sound quality.
It’s like color. We all agree on what “red” is because a group of color scientists had a summit and determined that a particular range in the visual spectrum would be called “red”, and we point to objects falling into this range and tell our children “red”. Then someone decides that “red” is not descriptive enough and they make up a new word: “Amaranth”. That means nothing to everyone else. So that person must spread the gospel of “Amaranth” until enough people know what it means so that it gets made into a standardized paint chip and someone paints their bedroom using it. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Shades_of_red)
I suppose that any sound descriptor is going to have the same issue. Even “clarity” is relative on a whistle. If one has sampled a broad range of whistles, they might have a very good understanding of where a particular whistle falls in that range. However, a person who has only played a few whistles will not have this understanding, and a “clear” whistle to them might be someone else’s “smokey” whistle… or “dried onions” whistle.
Huh. I always thought of Nat King Cole’s voice as “velvety”. Or was that Mel Torme?
But then, my Copeland brass low D sounds that way too. Kinda’. I’ve always hated “pure” vs. “trad”. Pure what…flute? Is that simple flute or Boehm? Trad starts where? Feadog, Walton or Gen? Does tweaking improve or damage “trad”?
I agree with Feadoggie about talking about music. It’s like fighting for peace, or connecting law and order.
I’ve suggested a lexicon before and am still nursing bruises from that thread. But at least it does cause folks to talk about playing more and that is what keeps forums alive right?
About the “fluty” or “flutelike” moniker, I usually hear it applied to Low Whistles which have a tone which is as far as possible from that of a flute.
If a Low Whistle sounds a lot like a recorder, somebody will slap the “flutelike” moniker on it, for sure.
It depends on the contest, in this case people are usually referring to a Hornbostel–Sachs 421.121.12 class aerophone not a 421.221.12 one. Hope that clears things up.
On topic, I’d say that the whole thing is like reviews of wine. Many words to describe it, few that are useful. Bright and buttery are two that I have heard for flute and whistle (although bright seems close to being useful).
It would be interesting to see a list of useful terms as well.
I have two low whistles at the moment: a Chieftain V3 and a Gonzato Low-Tech. To me, the Gonzato is distinctly “reedier,” and also “flutier” in the sense of Irish flutes, which have a “reedier” sound than Boehm concert flutes. What does all that mean? When you listen to (some) Irish flute music, you hear a kind of “buzz” in the sound, and that’s what I’m describing as “reedy.” Some players, notably Joanie Madden, can get this same sound out of a Boehm flute. The Chieftain, in contrast, is noticeably breathier, with a decent amount of chiff, and an overall timbre that I’d describe as “metallic”. As far as that goes, I guess it’s closer to cosmic drainpipe.
So there’s reedy, flutey, buzz, and metallic. What could be more non-helpful than that?
I can only assume the people who use the term “flutey” are making the comparison to a transverse flute, since these are not only in the “flute” family, but have flute in the actual title of what the instrument is commonly called. If they were referring to the family of instruments that whistles belong to, it would be pointless, and akin to calling a mandolin “Stringed-instrumenty” .
)
(search the flute forum for ‘hard dark tone’)