Chiff and Fipple Forums

Anybody have any experience of this chap's whistles?

https://anakwhistles.blogspot.com/

He says the heads are ebony but they look like painted hardwood to me.

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I have a low D by Anak and I really like it.
The head on mine is African Blackwood but there are other options.
Over the years I've had a few low D's - an Alba. Donald Gruern, MK pro and now the Anak. Nothing wrong with the other whistles but I prefer the Anak, it just suits me better than the others.

Andro wrote:Anybody have any experience of this chap's whistles?

https://anakwhistles.blogspot.com/

He says the heads are ebony but they look like painted hardwood to me.

[This is not an advertisement.]

Many woods are called ebony these days, and vary in color. It's harder to get the pure black woods, and many guitar fretboards & bridges are now dyed black.

We have to be aware that international shipping for wood items is tricky.

The list of banned woods is always getting longer.

An exemption for musical instruments is supposed to be happening, I don't know where that process is.

The CITES restriction on Blackwood for musical instruments has been lifted at the last meeting, recently, after many years of waiting. The new regime comes into effect internationally mid November 2019.

I haven’t played one, but was interested in them for a while. The research I did at the time led me to the conclusion that these tend to be at the high end of the backpressure spectrum. I know this isn’t objectively a pro or con, but if you like lower backpressure it’s probably not for you. This is why I ultimately passed on them, since my personal tastes go to the other end of the spectrum. They certainly seem well-made, though.

I have a Low C and Low D that I bought direct from them. Plus a high D I bought from someone on the board here. Very nice whistles, though I like the low more than the high ones. If you go to the instagram site, you can see/hear videos of the whistles being played, mostly by the wife, though there are some others also. (I think she does most of the communicating and running of the sales kind of thing.) The whistles truly do sound like they sound in the clips

Aluminium body with ebony head (black, though here and there with brown coloring).

Medium volume, woody/resonant tone, good tuning. (There was a post on these whistles a year ago or so.)