New style whistle heads

[paddler]

I wondered if the Window depth (if that's a good way to talk about it) might have a discernible effect on Q, the resonance quality factor? If so, is there an optimum, and does it depend on the pitch of the whistle, and maybe the bore diameter and other dimensions of the Window? Is there a maximum depth one shouldn't exceed, for risk of getting stuffy? Or is that taken care of by the fact that there is a way out of the Window "enclosure" via the Ramp?

So many questions! Can't you imagine them coming up back in the cave 30,000 years ago while they're carving mammoth tusks into whistles...

Well, perhaps not 30,000 years ago, but traditional Native American flute makers were definitely very sensitive to these kinds of issues when trying to ensure
that their flutes had a "warble". The link below provides some really interesting information about what a "warble" is and why it was so valued.

I've spent quite a bit of time in the past trying to make true warbling native American style flutes. The relevance to the discussion here is that the presence
or absence of a warble seems to be very sensitive to fine adjustments of window length and chimney height. On a NAF you can move the block around
experimentally to try to get it to warble, but often a good, predictable, warble will depend on building in a kind of tall, three-sided chimney in the front of the
block. This is not that unlike the Great Wall of China feature of the Copeland whistles.

As to whether a warble is a desirable sound or not, that is purely an aesthetic choice. It doesn't seem to appeal to a lot of people who enjoy the modern
aesthetic of NAF music, but apparently, to some traditional native American flute makers the warble was considered so important that they would throw
out a flute that did not warble, as being a dud. The warble was the heart and soul of the flute and an integral part of the music.

In some ways it is not unlike the kind of choices we make with Irish flutes and the importance of being able to play a honking hard D. A flute that won't do that
can seem lifeless and unfit for purpose. But then in a different musical genre, that coarse hard D may sound very much out of place.

Anyhow, I think you might find it interesting to take a quick detour below and read a bit about warbling flutes and what a true warble actually is, in terms of
its spectogram and with sound samples. It may provide some clues as to what can happen as you build a wall around three sides of the window and adjust
the window size.

https://www.flutopedia.com/warble.htm

[Terry McGee]

Bloody hell, Paddler (as they say in Harry Potter, so it must be OK!) That is extraordinary. I'm thinking ululation, as singers in the Balkans (and probably other places) do. Isn't it remarkable a) what attracts us in our various cultures, and b) what a small variation in our instruments might bring. If I got that result from a whistle I'd made, it would be straight into the bin. I am aware that there are now NAF makers here in Australia. Gorgeous!

[paddler]

Exactly, Terry! That is just what I thought. Bloody hell indeed. I am one of the people who really like the warble, but it seems to be one of those
things that virtually nobody is neutral on. People either love it or hate it to the extent of finding it offensive. Kind of like bagpipes, or marmite/vegemite.
But the, I also like bagpipes and marmite.

One surprising thing about playing a warbling Native American Flute (NAF) like that is that you can really lean into the bottom note. It is pretty
apparent in those recordings, but it is even more obvious as a player. It can be so profound that you can feel the resonance in your chest cavity.
There is real power in it, which is somewhat surprising given that the lowest notes are often the weakest/quietest in many modern designs.
I think the feeling is quite analogous to the feeling you get as a player of a good Irish flute when you manage to really fill the flute and get it resonating
on a hard D.

I'm actually quite intrigued to see the role the second partial plays in both the warbling NAFs and the hard D on Irish flutes. It seems to be critical in
both cases, contributing a large amount of energy to the signal.

But this gets back to that "quality of tone" issue. We all know that many different instruments can play the same note, say A, and have it measure precisely 440 hz.
But we are also able to immediately distinguish the A played by a whistle, vs a violin, vs a guitar, or trumpet etc. That distinction largely comes
down to the differences in the mix of partials produced by each instrument. The differences can be shown clearly in a spectogram. So, I think when
you make an albeit tiny change such as this, there is a sense that you are also potentially creating a whole different instrument (from the perspective
of the sound it produces and the musical contexts it supports).

I think this is what you hear in the NAF examples on the page I linked. There is very little in common between the sound of that Belo Cozad Memory
Song played on a traditionally designed warbling NAF and the homogenized/neutered sounds you normally associate with the new-age, hippy, reinvention
of the NAF. It is a case of two different instruments used for two very different musical purposes. A similar thing happens when you take a wooden flute,
such as say a mid 1800s Rudall and Rose, and "improve" it to produce a modern Boehm flute. If you somehow overlook what characteristics of tone are
important for a particular musical context, your improvements can easily end up producing a new kind of instrument that is no longer appropriate for
some musical contexts.

This is something that has intrigued me about whistle design. How much scope for improvement is there? In the context of ITM, is a whistle simply
supposed to sound basically like a Generation, or similar, tin whistle? If we modify it so that it sounds different, will this, by definition, be a step
backwards? Personally, I like the traditional sound of a good, old, generation. I tend to prefer playing my Sindt whistles though ... but only because
they still sound traditional to me.

[Terry McGee]

Exactly, Terry! That is just what I thought. Bloody hell indeed. I am one of the people who really like the warble, but it seems to be one of those
things that virtually nobody is neutral on. People either love it or hate it to the extent of finding it offensive. Kind of like bagpipes, or marmite/vegemite.
But the, I also like bagpipes and marmite.

I'm OK with bagpipes....

One surprising thing about playing a warbling Native American Flute (NAF) like that is that you can really lean into the bottom note. It is pretty
apparent in those recordings, but it is even more obvious as a player. It can be so profound that you can feel the resonance in your chest cavity.
There is real power in it, which is somewhat surprising given that the lowest notes are often the weakest/quietest in many modern designs.
I think the feeling is quite analogous to the feeling you get as a player of a good Irish flute when you manage to really fill the flute and get it resonating
on a hard D.

Yes, I thought of that too, when I looked at the videos. If you could get the power of that bottom note without incurring the warble....

I'm actually quite intrigued to see the role the second partial plays in both the warbling NAFs and the hard D on Irish flutes. It seems to be critical in
both cases, contributing a large amount of energy to the signal.

You'll remember that in the flute, we get that apparent power by moving some or even all the energy up into the partials using jet offset. IE, instead of aiming our air-jet in the general vicinity of the far edge of the embouchure hole, we aim it towards the bottom of the hole. It still sounds the lower octave - we're not overblowing, just favouring the 2nd and to a lesser extent the 3rd partials. The same seems to be happening with these NAFs up to the point of the warble. But then something else seems to kick in. An instability perhaps?

But this gets back to that "quality of tone" issue. We all know that many different instruments can play the same note, say A, and have it measure precisely 440 hz.
But we are also able to immediately distinguish the A played by a whistle, vs a violin, vs a guitar, or trumpet etc. That distinction largely comes
down to the differences in the mix of partials produced by each instrument. The differences can be shown clearly in a spectogram. So, I think when
you make an albeit tiny change such as this, there is a sense that you are also potentially creating a whole different instrument (from the perspective
of the sound it produces and the musical contexts it supports).

Indeed. I seem to remember that musical observers back in Nicholson's day likened his reedy flute sound to "the clarionette, or even the hautbois" (clarinet or even the oboe).

I think this is what you hear in the NAF examples on the page I linked. There is very little in common between the sound of that Belo Cozad Memory
Song played on a traditionally designed warbling NAF and the homogenized/neutered sounds you normally associate with the new-age, hippy, reinvention
of the NAF. It is a case of two different instruments used for two very different musical purposes. A similar thing happens when you take a wooden flute,
such as say a mid 1800s Rudall and Rose, and "improve" it to produce a modern Boehm flute. If you somehow overlook what characteristics of tone are
important for a particular musical context, your improvements can easily end up producing a new kind of instrument that is no longer appropriate for
some musical contexts.

Indeed, we are not free agents here! And remember the flack that Boehm took when he came out with his newly fangled flute. Particularly in his native Germany, where it spawned a whole Reform movement!

This is something that has intrigued me about whistle design. How much scope for improvement is there? In the context of ITM, is a whistle simply
supposed to sound basically like a Generation, or similar, tin whistle? If we modify it so that it sounds different, will this, by definition, be a step
backwards? Personally, I like the traditional sound of a good, old, generation. I tend to prefer playing my Sindt whistles though ... but only because
they still sound traditional to me.

I think looking around at the bewildering number of makers there are out there, and the range of their approaches, there is definitely scope for innovation, providing the end product still meets the needs of the music. And of course, especially if it meets the needs better.

I must say I've never been encouraged to take up low D flute however. And that might be because I haven't experienced a cutting edge (forgive the blade analogy!) version. The low whistles I've experienced could be said to be haunting, but not edgy or powerful. If we could harness the power of the Warbling NAF (having first located and disabled the Warble), I'd look again.

A very, very long time ago, I pressed the now late (Professor) Neville Fletcher as to why whistles, or perhaps it was recorders, were so much weaker than flutes. In his inimitably patient style, he explained that flutes had the advantage that we could control every aspect of jet formation and control, whereas this was all locked in in the fipple family. In the flute, if you blow harder, the note gets louder. In the whistle, it jumps to the next partial. "Ah, but consider this" he went on. "Supposing you built a whistle where the windway and the blade were joined by a resilient body section. When you want to play louder, you blow harder, but also "bend" the whistle to offset where the jet lands to keep it in the current octave. When you have finished with the loud passage, you relax, and the whistle returns to normal settings."

Could bendable whistles enable us to play louder when we know the tune, softer when we don't and really hammer that low D crann at the start of Blarney Pilgrim.

[paddler]

I completely agree with you Terry, on all the points above!

Have you ever looked closely at how Kwela whistle players use their whistles? They insert the whole head into their mouths to the
point where their lips surround the window. Then they use their lips to micro-adjust the direction of the air stream to achieve
precisely the effect that you (and Prof Neville) describe. And this is another example where I have a kind of "wow!" reaction to
the sounds that come out. The music is really exciting and powerful, but all from a very inexpensive, mass-produced, whistle.
There is definitely something to be said about having direct control over the air jet!

Here are a few examples. Look closely at their mouths.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yt0H3tVQk-w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLELXh8LjwU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lmR0tSk2Rs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-q5-iDczeA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuKlbQYf3q0

I wonder if you could redesign a whistle head to make this use of the lips around the window easier? That may be a better solution
than trying to build a fixed structure around the window.

[pancelticpiper]

Well, perhaps not 30,000 years ago, but traditional Native American flute makers were definitely very sensitive to these kinds of issues...fine adjustments of window length and chimney height. On a NAF you can move the block around...

I could be wrong but as far as I'm aware the fipple-style NAFs are post-Contact, in other words can be no older than around 500 years.

The old flutes I've seen in museums are "rim blown" like the Bulgarian kaval. I play kaval and I can play a California Miwok flute, the technique is the same.

The Miwoks and some other tribes continue to make and play their ancient style of flute.

Here are some in museums https://www.flutopedia.com/fcat_anc.htm

[paddler]

Well, perhaps not 30,000 years ago, but traditional Native American flute makers were definitely very sensitive to these kinds of issues...fine adjustments of window length and chimney height. On a NAF you can move the block around...

I could be wrong but as far as I'm aware the fipple-style NAFs are post-Contact, in other words can be no older than around 500 years.

The old flutes I've seen in museums are "rim blown" like the Bulgarian kaval. I play kaval and I can play a California Miwok flute, the technique is the same.

The Miwoks and some other tribes continue to make and play their ancient style of flute.

Here are some in museums https://www.flutopedia.com/fcat_anc.htm

I think the arguments that fipple-style NAFs are post contact are very weak. And in fact, I think an equally strong/weak argument could be made that fipple style
flutes in Europe came from the Americas! Why, well because there are many examples of fipple flutes from the Americas that predate European contact. Maybe
not wooden NAFs, but there are lots of other fipple flutes from the Americas, some of which date back thousands of years and survived because they were constructed
from ceramics. But I think the reality is that humans all over the world discovered this way of producing sound thousands of years ago!

I've been interested in North American rim blown flutes for a long time. I have made some replicas from museum artifacts, and have even written up some
flutopedia entries for a few of them. I spent a lot of time learning to play these replica rim blown flutes in different styles, for example, blown obliquely (like a kaval),
upright (like a shakuhachi or quena), and using an interdental style, in which the rim is placed inside the mouth (kind of like a Persian ney). Interestingly, and
of particular relevance to this thread, I think, is that the interdental style which encloses the embouchure hole, produces a much more powerful sound. It is rougher
and somewhat more shocking to a western ear, but also much more emotionally evocative. If anyone is interested in this I have some sound samples of the same
ancestral Puebloan flutes played in different styles (outside the scope of this thread of course, so PM me).

I did some extensive research with Barry (White Crow) Higgins, who incidentally is also the guy who did the spectogram analysis of the warbling flutes, where we
studied some of the earliest photographs of Hoppi and other Puebloan Indians playing their rim blown flutes, and made close examinations of wear marks on 1000+ year old
ancestral puebloan flutes preserved in museums. We came to the conclusion that those rim blown flutes were certainly played using an interdental style.

But the point, as far as this thread is concerned, is that when you enclose the embouchure (or the window) on flutes or whistles, even partially, you can potentially
make such a profound change to the sound that it becomes almost a different instrument in terms of the musical context it can be used in.

[Terry McGee]

Wow, Paddler, those Kwela players are totally on top of it, aren't they. Now, with just a bit of messing around on the D whistle innocently snoozing beside my keyboard, poking it deeper into the gob (technical whistle term) and playing what they're playing, I can immediately start to feel that increased power and control.

One of the immediate observations is pitch. In the bottom octave, with the beak just inside your mouth, if you blow harder, you jump to the second octave. In the second octave, you hear quite a rise in pitch before it breaks to the third partial. But with it deeper in the gob, you can prevent the rise in pitch, and are rewarded by an increase in power and edginess. And remembering that Kwela is street music, you'd need to come up with something to give the whistles enough presence outdoors. Imagine a New Orleans wedding parade played with baroque recorders. Nah!

Another observation was the dreaded warble which surfaced particularly on the low notes. But maybe this old narrow bore whistle isn't the best starting place.

With power comes responsibility, and Kwela players would certainly need to be on the ball if they are all going to remain in tune. I wonder if in Irish whistle playing we're ready for that challenge. The whistle is such a point & shoot instrument. But if we could harness some Kwela magic and tame it by locking it into hardware (the whistle) rather than limpware (the player), we might be on to something!

[paddler]

I think it remains to be seen whether it is possible to build the hardware to entirely harness some of these effects. I think we would need
to understand what is going on a bit better. I suspect that it is more than simply shading or enclosing the window. I think with some of these
techniques the player's mouth/throat/etc actually becomes a kind of resonating chamber itself and it is the interplay between the resonance
here and that inside the instrument (or perhaps we should say ... the rest of the instrument) that influences the sound. The player's ability to
micro-adjust the shape of their mouth seems critical here.

You really feel this very obviously when you play a rim-blown flute using the interdental blowing approach. The following video demonstrates a
wide range of different blowing styles and their associated sounds. I think you can both hear the power of the interdental approaches, and see
the player dynamically adjusting the shape of his mouth to achieve the effect he wants. When you play in these interdental styles it is not only
louder, but you can actually feel the vibrations within your vocal tract.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nr0d3gE9ktw

[Terry McGee]

I agree - we couldn't expect the hardware to be able to replicate any of the dynamic effects for example. But if it can be shown that there is an ideal, or a minimum or maximum desirable window depth for a particular pitch of flute, perhaps influenced by other factors such as bore diameter, we should know that! And looking around at the enormous range of approaches, clearly we don't, unless there's something else going on at the same time! Now, possibly Tunborough's model could cast some light on it, or we may have to try a few experiments. It wouldn't be too hard to knock up a series of covers of increasing depth for example and see what we learn.

Woah, that kaval player certainly works the instrument hard. But he's a lot closer to the jet than we are with the whistle. And I don't think some of those effects would go down well in the session!

[Terry McGee]

Now, here's another matter that puzzles me, and I'll snitch an image Richard Cook posted that illustrates it nicely. I'm guessing the upper whistle is an older Generation, and the lower whistle a later version. If you look at the ramp on the upper one, you can see it has two distinct slopes, whereas the lower one doesn't appear to, or if it has, it's less obvious.



And in other whistles we see a very short ramp, or a very long ramp. What do we think is going on there? How much ramp do we need? How does that relate to windway height?

[Tunborough]

Can Tunborough's models really shed any light on this? I thought the main output was concerned with tuning of notes, which is something quite distinct from
either of the above.

You are correct, paddler; WIDesigner addresses tuning, and says little or nothing about volume or tone colour. I can tell you that a higher window wall tends to flatten most of the notes, the second octave more than the first, which is not the direction we want to go with for cylindrical whistles.

I recall reading that the wall around the window somehow helped direct the air stream and stabilize the oscillation, and was particularly important on low whistles, less so on high whistles. Can anybody correct or clarify this?

[Tunborough]

What do we think is going on there? How much ramp do we need?

I can attest that we don't need any ramp at all. I have an alto A whistle in PVC that has no ramp: the air stream hits a "vertical" wall at the far end of the windway. It plays just fine. I have a sense that the break between octaves is cleaner than usual for most of the notes, with less tendency to warble, although I have no hard evidence that this is true, or that it's due to the 90 degree ramp angle. This experiment was inspired when I heard about the flauto dolce organ stop: http://organstops.org/f/FlautoDolce.html.

[paddler]

Can Tunborough's models really shed any light on this? I thought the main output was concerned with tuning of notes, which is something quite distinct from
either of the above.

You are correct, paddler; WIDesigner addresses tuning, and says little or nothing about volume or tone colour. I can tell you that a higher window wall tends to flatten most of the notes, the second octave more than the first, which is not the direction we want to go with for cylindrical whistles.

Presumably, a whistle with a tapered head bore, or inserts, could be constructed to correct this extra second octave flattening if there were desirable properties to be obtained from window walls. For example, strengthening the bell note, say.
This might be a direction worth exploring on low whistles.

[Terry McGee]

I can attest that we don't need any ramp at all.

Arghhh, Tunborough. Whistles with no ramp? What blasphemy is this? And on the holiest day of the year? You realise I will have to report you to the Morality police....

After all, we all know, don't we, that in a whistle, you direct air down a windway or duct, until it is then "divided by a blade"? That's common knowledge!

I have an alto A whistle in PVC that has no ramp: the air stream hits a "vertical" wall at the far end of the windway. It plays just fine. I have a sense that the break between octaves is cleaner than usual for most of the notes, with less tendency to warble, although I have no hard evidence that this is true, or that it's due to the 90 degree ramp angle. This experiment was inspired when I heard about the flauto dolce organ stop: http://organstops.org/f/FlautoDolce.html.

Hmmm, that does seem to argue a bit against the common knowledge! And, something you could mention to your defense attorney, flutes have no blade. The sharpest thing a flute has is the angle at the far edge of the embouchure point, and it's somewhere not much less than 90 degrees. And we Irish don't aim at it anyway, we aim at the bottom of the hole. Don't we know nuthing?

It certainly explains why we see such a variety of window and (dare I say it) ramp arrangements out there. This again seems to remind us we are afloat on a sea of unfounded assumptions, supported only on "everybody knows" life rafts. Which are full of holes! We need to make it part of our business to plug then when we find them!