I have seen clips of people who have attached saxophone mouthpieces to flutes, etc., and of the Nuvo JFlute, which offers a detachable recorder-style mouth attachment. Just today I was watching an oboist demonstrating how you could actually play notes on the oboe by using a trumpet-like embouchure directly against the top opening instead of using a reed. All these imaginative approaches got me wondering: Is it possible to play an instrument like an oboe, saxophone or bassoon with a fipple mouthpiece instead of the traditional reed? and if so, how would one attach the thing?

Obviously the results, if any, would probably be more hilarious than useful. But I'm curious. I used play the oboe; today I play the recorder, and there are times when all that extra keywork should would come in handy, if only for my personal amusement....

Swapping a reed with flute mouth piece is going to be problematic since a flute (or fipple style flute mouthpiece) act as an open tube (kinda obvious since there is an open hole!) but oboe reeds, clarinet (single reeds) trumpets act as a closed tube and behave differently acoustically.

One could make a trumpet style mouthpiece for an oboe, and I have played a single reed gizmo for oboe (intended for marching oboes - sounded bad, but given the context probably acceptable).

One can also swap flute and fipple style mouthpieces - Dixon I believe makes some

So if you need more key work think recorder/whistle heads with piccolo or flute bodies. It has been done of course.

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“When a Cat adopts you there is nothing to be done about it except put up with it until the wind changes.” T.S. Elliot

A little off-topic, but one of the instruments I play is the cornett (aka cornetto or zink). It is, essentially, an oboe-type instrument with a little trumpet mouthpiece. It was popular from the late 14th century until the middle of the 17th. It is currently making a bit of a comeback in HIP (historically informed performance) circles. Check out: this youtube video. It's very difficult to play, btw!

Pat

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Pat Plunkett, Wheeling, WV

Here's what you need. The original modern chromatic whistle. Good luck finding one. I've been trying for 12 years now.



As Highwood indicates. What can be done has probably already been done. There are whistle heads for Boehm style flutes available and there have been for many, many years - not to mention vertical embouchure headjoints.

David O'Brien makes a whistle head for a modern piccolo. Nick Metcalf has offered a similar combination through his Ethnic Winds brand.

I have not however seen a whistle/recorder head for a Nuvo Jflute - just the two standard flute head joints. Is it a whole head joint or just a "cheater"? Do you have a link showing one of those?

Feadoggie

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I've proven who I am so many times, the magnetic strips worn thin.

Yes, but they stopped making those 60 years ago. Too bad.

Maybe I could take the plastic mouthpiece from a small tin whistle and attach it somehow. Or attach a bass recorder bocal/mouthpiece combo (though that might require an English horn or larger)....

So? Seems that Rudall, Prowse and others stopped making their flutes 100+ years ago and we still see those being played and up for sale regularly. I've bid on two Orkons already this year. They are merely too expensive for my bank account. They are out there and they do change hands now and then.

Highwood is correct. Reeds and horns are a different acoustic model from the flute and whistle - open tubes versus closed tubes. Optimal bore/length ratios are different too. You won't get a decent working iinstrument from a whistle head on a bassoon or oboe body.

But you can fit a whistle head to a piccolo or flute body. It's no harder than fitting a wooden flute head to a Boehm flute body really. I am sure lots of us have done that experiment. It works...and you get the full chromatic scale. Just try to find a whistle head that matches as close as possible to the bore of the flute or piccolo you are connecting to, make a connector tube that both preserve the sounding length of the keyed instrument and slides into the flute/piccolo and play. That's actually easier than punching four more holes in a whistle to make it chromatic - and easier to finger as well.

Have you tried putting a reed on the top of a whistle yet? That's good for laugh. It'll clear a room fast too.

I found a video with the Nuvo "firstnote" lip plate. Interesting take on the old "cheater".

Feadoggie

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I've proven who I am so many times, the magnetic strips worn thin.

Hmm...I wonder if I could fit the head joint of my plastic alto recorder onto the O-ring seal of the JFlute....or onto their "Clarineo (http://www.blockiflute.com/NUVO-Clarineo_p_63.html)"....That would give me a vertically-held keyed instrument while allowing me to avoid using the lip plate or messing with a flute embouchure/reed/etc....

(Yes, I know how silly all this sounds. But I think it's fun to Frankenstein new things together....)

I don't think it is silly. It is a matter of curiosity, thought, experimentation and learing. These are the things many people will try as they investigate what their instruments will do.

The recorder head graft will work provided when you connect it to the Nuvo flute that you preserve the sounding length of the flute and assuming that the recorder head has a similar internal diameter as the flute.

You measure the distance from where the flute head joins the body to the center of the embouchure hole. if you can position the recorder head so that the edge of the labium is set at same distance it should work reasonably well. If you can bridge the body and the head with a connecting tube of some sort that allows for adjustment of the length between the two you should be able get a good scale.

As long as you aren't destroying either instrument, there's no downside in trying it out. Have fun.

The bocal idea is cool. Remember that when you do this that the window of the whistle head has to be placed right at the top of the bore to work. So you can't just stick it on the blowing end of the bocal. It has to work just like a bass or contrabass recorder design. I have made bocals for whistles. If you were to successfully put a whistle head on something like a bassoon bore you'll get something sounding more like an overtone flute - not unlike a fujara I would think.

Feadoggie

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I've proven who I am so many times, the magnetic strips worn thin.

I was just looking at some nice looking chromatic flutes made by Daniel Bingamon.. he just left a comment on my Elaphone thread, and there is a link to his site.

On the topic of putting pieces of different instruments together we should mention the tromboon, a trombone with a bassoon mouthpiece which combines all the worst characteristics of both instruments.

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The crwth will set you free!

Tim Smith
Kindred Spirit
www.kspirit.info

Hello, I've just joined this forum. I was looking for info on this subject and found I'm not the only one with this idea. I played flute many years ago but ultimately gave up on it because of the metallic tone and pursued the recorder (treble and tenor) for a while - I love the woody tone that it gives, but the lack of keying is a limitation. I married the head piece of my Yamaha ABS YRA302BIII recorder to the body of a second hand Phoenix concert flute that I found on ebay, and I'm in love with the tone of the recorder I get together with all the fingering advantages of the flute.
I had to sacrifice the head of the flute by cutting it to fit into the recorder head piece (using "Selleys Metal Cement) but I can't see myself ever going back to the classic flute, so sacrilegious or not I've no regrets.
Comments from listeners have been "ethereal", "like a clarinet that's gone to heaven" and "the most mellow sound I've heard" - this last from a symphony flautist.
The only problem I've got is whether to call it a RecorderFlute or a FluteRecorder.