Tunborough wrote:
Thank you, that was helpful. I did skim over that thread before posting, but started a new thread because I wanted to ask specifically about plastic instruments and transitioning from recorder to reeds.
I've now gone back and re-read it, and followed some of the links. I loved listening to Steve Mansfield's rauschpfeife music! Also noticing the references to how very loud some of those instruments are, and how much breath they take, I'm getting a little scared off.
Some more backstory: sometime in the 1980's, I spent a week learning Turkish zurna at a folkdance camp. I kept it up for a few months afterward, but it was so much work to become minimally competent, and it was so incredibly loud! If a shawm or a rauschpfeife is actually that loud, I clearly can't play it in the car without deafening myself and alarming the populace. (I once tried playing zurna out of an eighth-floor window, and people on the street below looked up.)
I may be looking for something that doesn't exist, and I may have to let go of one or more of my criteria: plastic, inexpensive, louder than a recorder but not *too* loud, easy for a recorder player to master without putting in a lot of time.
People on that thread seemed dismissive of Susato's kelhorns, but that seems the thing closest to what I want. Oh wait! I see that they also make plastic rauschpfeifes, which they describe as only "moderately loud." That sounds promising.
I also realized that I know some players of Scottish bagpipes, so I should probably borrow a practice chanter and see how daunting this reed thing actually is.
Again, thanks for the help and suggestions. Keep 'em coming.