How To Tweak/Improve Your Whistle Part 2 - Wrapping The Bore
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- Опубликовано: 7 сен 2024
- The 2nd of my series of tweaking videos. This first part was : Blu Tack on The Mouthpiece
COMING SOON
Part 3 : Shortening the bore
Part 4 (maybe) : Weighting the mouthpiece
Part 5 (maybe) : Tuning the toneholes
This channel is all about playing blues and blues based styles on the tin whistle / penny whistle. It's my firm belief that the whistle has been overlooked as blues instrument and it's time to make that right! Subscribe to this channel for more performances and tuition videos.
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I definitely like the blue mouthpiece better, sounds fuller richer, less shrill to me. Cool tweaks, loving your channel!
What an interesting idea!
I tried something like this, but instead of using wire I cut a length of 1/2” copper pipe, split it down the side and crimped it so it was a snug fit around the upper bore of the whistle. I can’t say for sure if it makes a noticeable difference in the sound, but the instrument has a good, solid feel to it now. I think I will add another bit to the lower end of the whistle as well. The good thing about using copper pipe is it can easily be removed or swapped out to another whistle.
Thanks for the suggestion!
Good video. I play them as they come. Each has a different tamber. YOU sound good! I couldnt notice much difference between wrapped and unwrapped. I just like to hear you play. Your voice, when you talk, is wonderful too. Thanks for the videos. PW
Wrapping wire around the top won’t change the sound of a whistle. It’s not changing thickness around the toneholes, so it isn’t doing anything to the column of air inside that would alter the sound. I’d say this is a case of the placebo effect. Unlike with stringed instruments, whistles don’t create sound by the material vibrating. The only way to change the sound is to do something that would alter how the air being blown into it behaves. Attaching something externally away from anywhere where it affects the air isn’t going to do anything. Believing that it does something will make it seem that way, though. 😉
I think the thing is... regardless of you saying it won't make a difference... it does. I went into the studio with my band recently and I don't actually play tin whistle in it, but the clarinet player sometimes does. We had to swap her stock whistle for my wrapped one so she played that instead, because it sounded so much better.
@@BluesTinWhistle Two totally unmodified Generation whistles can sound very very different from each other, so that’s some extremely weak proof. I’ve got dozens of Generations around the house and there is a very wide degree of variability, and it’s widely known that injection-moulded whistles are inconsistent. Take the wire off and I guarantee it will still sound just as different from that other whistle.
You can believe whatever you like, but this is absolute nonsense.
As someone who has played brass and woodwind instruments for over 50 years, I can absolutely attest to the fact that the thickness/density of the tubing can make a difference in the sound of the instrument. This applies to the quality of the material as well. (A tin trumpet is always going to sound like a tin trumpet)
I’ll say this; it FEELS pretty good to play a cheap Generation or Walton with a little more heft to it.
YMMV
I agree -- the mouthpiece mods make sense, and the difference is immediately audible. Wrapping the bore, not so much.
Great info! Thanks! Happy holidays! 🌞🎅🏻🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎄
Thanks. Did you try it?
@@BluesTinWhistle Not yet because I can’t get the material I need right now.
i definitely notice a difference between the red and blue generation mouthpieces, even without modification!
Red have a slightly longer/wider opening for air, but the slot you breathe into is a bit shorter/less tall. Blue are just a hair less long/wide for that slot, but the opening is a bit taller.
it averages out to about the same amount of air to play with, but i find the red to be more precise in the sound it puts out but less sensitive/expressive of any purposeful variation. Whereas, I find the blue is able to wander a bit further from what you may be intending to play - intentionally or not. so, a bit easier to accidentally blow out of tune maybe with the blue, but gives greater freedom to create purposeful variation and accent in the sound you're putting out for the same reasons.
Overall, i found the blue mouthpiece a tad more challenging to pick up when starting off, but worth the effort for the additional expressiveness. There's definitely elements of both that can be changed/enhanced by the bore as well ofc, but that's what i notice from just the mouthpieces and swapping them onto different bore tube types.
Really interesting. I definitely have a favourite mouthpiece even amongst the reds I have, which is kinda weird as you’d expect them to be the same. When I realised I liked Generation I bought a couple new and a load 2nd hand and kept the ones I liked the bed. There’s a real range, both in sound and in how they blow. A couple I didn’t like at all and a couple were perfect. The best seemed to be the ones with the ridge at the back, being an older design when the injection mould itself was different, apparently in the 80 and before, but that may well be nothing to do with the old design but because someone tweaked the mouthpiece before I got to it.
@@BluesTinWhistle It does have to do with the older design. I’ve probably got around 40 of the pre-1980’s gens around the house, and they are consistently much better on average. The only exception to this are the Bb whistles, which didn’t change as much as the other keys when they replaced their injection molding heads in the 1980’s. With newer generations, the really good ones are fewer and farther between (except with the Bb, which are acceptable quality as the norm during every era of their production).
That being said, they’ve always varied from whistle to whistle, even of the same colour, same key, and made at the same time. It’s just the nature of how the plastic sets when going through those machines (I used to work in plastics, so I’m a bit familiar with the subject). I would not attribute any specific qualities to specific colours, but rather to normal variation from whistle to whistle.
Where is your beautiful accent from ? New Zealand ?
What about using a thicker gauge wire, it would hold in place better
Thanks. I did try that, but I couldn't get it to bend enough to hold well. 6mm seems to be the sweet spot.