In most cases with these instruments the question is one of exercise.
You need to develope the muscles in the mouth to hold on to the
instrument without loosening up under the pressure. At least in my
experience, the issue isn't catching my breath unless the instrument
is having problems and allowing too much air to escape as much as it
is to keep my lip tension up to hold the wind cap in my mouth.
In general, if you spend practice time you will build the needed
strength relatively quickly (it may take a month or two of daily
practice to play really extended pieces). Even with the low pressure
instruments like cornamusen and krumhorns the same problem arises
(although it takes longer): I used to play bass krumhorn and after an
hour-and-a-half performance I have to say I wasn't a pretty sight as
I tried to keep from drooling all over myself because my lips were
almost totally slack and the muscles in the wall of my mouth hurt
like the dickens. But when I started it took half an hour to get to
that point, so there was definite improvement. With a rauschpfeif you
may start out at less than five minutes, but you will be able to work
up to what you need with practice. Work on playing it each day until
you get to the point where you start hurting and then rest until the
next day. (I don't know if this is the optimal way to build the
strength, but it has worked for me with shawms.)
By the way, the alternative pop group They Might Be Giants uses a
rauschpfeif in their song Older (a humorous look at getting older). I
heard them on the radio talking about how they wanted an instrument
that "sounded like it had spider webs in it" for the song, and
someone recommended the rauschpfeif to them. It's actually perfect
for the song they did.
-Arle
On Apr 3, 2007, at 3:54 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
In a message dated 4/2/2007 11:07:53 P.M. Central Daylight Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
Though we had never seen their Rauschpfeifs we did
not hesitate to purchase from them. I'm glad we did. Though they are
extremely loud, as all rauschpfeifs are, they both have amazingly
beautiful
tones. The tenor has the tone quality of an english horn on
steroids. The
alto is smooth and just loud, not obnoxious. We have already
decided that
we are buying their single bladderpipes because we wants some that
are not
droned.
If all this is true, then of course I want one, but does it address
the issue of back pressure? Since you have experience with all
these others, how long (say renaissance dances) can you play one? I
used the rauschpfeiff for fanfares before giving up and selling it.
No problem as fanfare instruments; gave me time to recover my breath.
Cheers,
Alice
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