Hello all, I just thought I would post a few observations about two all brass high d whistles I recently aquired. The Jubilee series 3 all brass whistle arrived first so I’ll talk about that one here. The second Is a wide bore brass by Mack Hoover which I’ll post about soon when I get more time.
I hesatated at first to comment on the Jubilee because I had asked Daniel Bingamon to send me one with a slightly reduced volume. The changes neccessary to accomodate that request alters the standard windway dimensions and hence the playing character of this whistle over the normal series three. I’ll try and comment on what I believe would be those things similar in mine to the normal model…
Construction/appearance… The whistle is a slightly wide bore design with a tone tube about one millimeter or so greater diameter the a standard ‘cheapie’ which is 1/2 inch. I sold my Dixon Trad to be able to check the fit but the diameter looks very close to the same to me. The tone holes on my example are extremely well drilled , straight and round. In my e-mail exchanges with Daniel prior to delivery, he explained that he uses better equipment now to drill holes than in the past. The edges are not chamfered on account of the thin wall tubing but were clean on the edges and comfortable. The all brass mouthpiece section was of a slightly greater diameter tube which slipped over the tone tube to create the tuning slide. The fit was quite nice. This type of slide is my favorite as it is normally pretty durable and easy to clean.
The fipple is made up of several sections of brass tube, neatly soldered together. One of the inner tubes has an edge which makes up the labium ramp. The window width on my whistle is fairly narrow. I believe this was Daniel’s attempt to honor my request for a reduced volume version and may not be representative of the standard dimension. (I may be wrong about this though). On the newer versions of this whistle, the beak length and hence the airway has been lengthened. This I presume was done to further straighten out the airflow in the windway and improve the tone. It also increases the back pressure which I’ll comment on in a minute.
The normal finish on these whistle is a sprayed on shellac over a brushed brass. I imagine this would give both a good grip and a more “folksy” appearance. I however, had asked Daniel to send me one with a plain brass finish as I intended to polish it anyway. Although I just bought a digital camera finally, I haven’t figured out how to use it yet. This is a pity because after ten minutes with a rag and polishing compound, the whistle, while nice looking allready, simply gleams… wish I could post a picture… sigh…
Ok enough rambling, how’s it play…
This whistle sounds very nice in the first octive with a very full and rich tone and extremely fast response time even on the lowest note. There is just a hint of breathiness and start of note chiff with a nice medium level volume (about like a standard generation) The back pressure in the first octive is just slightly greater than a ‘cheapie’ whistle. The C-natural plays pretty close to in tune with oxx-ooo fingering and can be played in tune fairly easily with a reduced breath pressure. oxx-xox makes for a stronger note with easier breath requirements if you like to play it that way but that seams like too much work for me .
Around the second octive E and up however the whistle changes character a bit. The tone starts to pick up a bit more breathiness and even a bit of “scratchiness”. In some ways this whistle reminds me of several Feadogs which I have had in the upper range in tone. After playing the whistle for several sessions however, I have found that some of my percieved tone difficulties were partly me not giving enough breath pressure. This whistle with the longer windway length really requires a firm amount of breath pressure. Even if you don’t get a honk or hung up between octives with a weak breath pressure, the tone tends to suffer a bit if you don’t give the whistle what it needs. The volume also gets pretty loud by the second octive G and just increases from there.
Tuning This whistle actually had pretty good tuning. All of the notes could be played well in tune with a little attention payed to breath control. The tuning was a little more variable with breath pressure than some I’ve had. If you like to be able to “bend” the pitch a lot in your playing, then you’ll like this whistle.
Subjective opinions…
This whistle has a nice solid construction with a handsome appearance. The tuning is good, but needs a bit of disipline with breath control to keep it that way. The tone is not in the “pure” catagory, but more interesting with a folk whistly quality that would make a good fit in a rowdy session. The high breath pressure required for a good tone and tuning makes this a challenging instrument to play well. I am finding the challenge enjoyable however and plan on keeping it to both improve my breath control abilities and to play in some louder session oneday. I might also add that the price of this whistle was only 35.00$. I’ve paid more than that on one dinner out. Not a bad value indeed 
Postscript…
I decided to take the chance and try “tweaking” this whistle a bit. Warning, if you try this, you could make the whistle worse, not better. However I took some 600 grit sandpaper and glued it to a very thin wood strip. I sanded down the floor of the delrin windway block slightly in an effort to reduce the backpressure. I tried to match the curve on the stick to the curve of the windway floor. The total amount that the airway height was increased was barely noticable. The result in this case however, was all positive. Backpressure is slightly less and the tone is a little clearer in the second octive. I must say however that I only did this to try to better match the whistle to my preferences. It was perfectly allright as delivered and I did get lucky.
DreamOgreen