I just heard about a new whistle maker on the [Whistlemakers] group.
The maker is Charles Tilbury, Granite Falls Manufacturing http://granitefallsmfg.com/
They appear to be brass and aluminum whistles in High C and D. It looks like he does some custom work. Apparently no low whistles yet.
The website appears to be clean, simple, straightforward.
These look interesting, especially the fact that the brass whistles are completely different in design and manufacture than the aluminum whistles. The aluminum whistles look like (machined) Weasels and Busmans, whereas the brass ones look more like attempted cylindrical Copelands. Interesting. I bet the aluminum ones play well.
Just visited the site and have two issues. First, I don’t see any location for the company; did I miss it? Second, I can’t get the sound clips to play and have had no such problem with clips from other sites. Anyone else have problems with the clips?
Philo
I did
The clips played fine for me.
I could not get the sound clips to play either.
yep: Granite Falls, WA
FWIW: Silverstrand lives in Granite Falls, WA
I was unable to find a phone listing for either the person or company.
Worked fine for me. They are QuickTime…
They played for me, but there was so much reverb abd echo sound that the whistle’s actucal sound seemed lost.
Your milage may vary.
~Barstool
(finally back from Germany - yaay!)
The clips played fine for me in windows media player but likewise there was so much electronic “enhancement” that I couldn’t tell what the whistle sounded like.
Ron
Windows Media Player starts up for me, and it appears visually to be playing the clip, but there’s no sound…
worked for me. Heavy compression and lots of enhancement. The Kesh on the Brass whistle page sounded a little squeaky on high D, but I don’t know if that’s clipping due to the compression or not.
I just heard about his site on the whistlemakers list. I hope I didn’t list it prematurely.
I have Quicktime and it seems to play fine that way.
I think he should have more identification information, the site is very vague on identifying the whistle maker. I know that many whistle players do consider the personality of whistle maker to some extent when buying instruments.
Uh oh, Dan… you and I are in big trouble! 
Is that like ‘character witnesses’ are real characters. 
I like the sound of the aluminum.
That’s it!
I demand raw yum-yum. 
Thanks for posting this, Dan. 
I appreciate everyone having a look at my site. It’s still very new. I plan to fix all of the problems that ppl found. At least I am going to add some information about me and change the sound clips to something a little more robust.
My whistle making is still changing rapidly. The ones pictured there are OK, but not as good as I want them to be. Actually the brass ones play better. The AL ones are hard to voice due to some problems with the way I am cutting the fipple blade. They all are tuned correctly and can hit all of the notes in both registers. The next revision will be much better. They will look different, too. More like a brass Chieftain or Overton. I am planning to sell them in the $25 range.
Thanks everyone,
Chuck Tilbury
Granite Falls, WA
About a month ago I was reading the Chiff board and saw a new whistle maker mentioned, Granite Falls Manufacturing
http://granitefallsmfg.com/ out of Washington state from this post.
I’ve been in the state of Whoa for a little over 6 months now, and quickly succumbed to the clarion call of yet another whistle to try.
I checked his website about the time he was transitioning to a new whistle design. As luck would be with me for once, not a higher price, but a lower price. I decided to take a small chance for about the same price as a tweaked Generation would run. I ordered out one of his new brass whistles and a C body to boot.
Over the past weeks I have been trying it out and have been very impressed. The first thing that caught my attention being a new whistler is that these whistles are extremely easy to play. There is a clear tone, very little to no chiff. The breath requirements are very, light and stays in the lower octave without trouble. Yet it transitions to the next octave with just a little push and the whole upper octave seems just as clear and definite. The first two notes of the third octave are attainable even for me (sorry –can’t quote the actual notes – I play by ear only).
The whistle does have that fipple shape a little like an Overton to my eyes. There are some good photos of it on his page.. The body is a light weight but rigid and very highly polished brass. I did find that using a little Dawn helped me keep down the condensation I usually experience in all whistle fipples. Since doing that, I’ve had no further clogging and the whistle and the C body have been very easy for me to play.
Being a new player I hesitate giving too many impressions of it, by trying to imitate the reviews of the seasoned players that frequent this board. However, perhaps the best recommendation I find revolves around the surprising ease I’ve had getting used to this whistle. I’d be very interested in reading reviews of his work by our experienced readers. For very little money, I think it is a great whistle and a very good choice for those of you who prefer a low maintenance metal instrument. Thankfully I had just also gotten David O’Brien to make me a larger whistle bag, and I was able to make room for this set in my collection. More on the new bag in another few days or so.
It is very tempting to buy one now.
Thank you very much, Kansas! Think I’ll go out in the shop and whomp out another batch! <>