Okay, this may have been answered in the past, but I check in here pretty often and don’t recall a recent discussion of the Quena.
How hard is it to play one of these things? What characteristics do you look for in a good one? Where do you look?
I have seen a lot of stuff online about making these in PVC, but have not gotten around to trying it, yet. Give me some time. At any rate, I just wanted to know what variants on the whistle/flute other folks here are used to.
-Patrick
I like the quena. It has a nice round tone, and the playing position is much more comfortable than a transverse flute.
See the following threads:
Quena is very cool, once you learn the embouchure. I made a PVC one long before I started whistlemaking and even with nothing more than a hacksaw, hand drill and a round file found it to be very easy to make. Took about an hour! Just don’t breathe the PVC dust-- it remains in your lungs forever. Give it a try
The best place to acquire a quena is in Peru. I recently spent a month there (gloat gloat) and haggled for a large one, which I eventually got for 45 soles (about $15 U.S.) The lady who sold it to me probably thought she was ripping me off, but I am happy with it.
I found it hard to play at first, being a whistle player, I never had to deal with emobouchure. A possibly helpfull tip: try relaxing your lips as much as possible. And blowing gently until you get the hang of it helps too. I find it easy to get a nice loud sound out of it now, but it certainly does not sound as nice as it did when played by Peruvian musicians, so I think it is the kind of instrument where you need to practice a lot to get the best tone out of it.
It would be pretty easy to make a quena, if you knew where to drill the holes, and how big to make them so it is in tune. It is really a very simple instrument: a tube with a v-shaped notch at the top, and six, penny-whistle style holes down the front. I would make it out of bamboo, rather than pvc, myself. Good luck…