The US Army Issued Ocarinas to Soldiers in World War II(flutetunes.com) |
The US Army Issued Ocarinas to Soldiers in World War II(flutetunes.com) |
Carter?
"Yes sir?"
What is it, Carter?
"An ocarina, sir"
Bring it up here!
It came with some sheet music that shows each note as a box with four dots in it that can be shown as either open or closed:
https://ocarinasongbook.com/fingering-charts/four-hole/
It sounds unusually sophisticated — perhaps even better after forty-plus years -- and it's actually a relatively new design. The ocarina is ancient but the four hole chromatic design dates from the 1960s, so it's newer than those Gretsch ocarinas in the article.
You can get them in all sorts of shapes and sizes -- Thomann sell hand-painted clay 4H ocarinas in the shapes of strawberries and clownfish.
I wish we'd been taught to play these in school instead of with those Aulos descant recorders that everyone in British schools, particularly teachers I imagine, grew to hate.
Sadly with English Vessel Flutes (4/6/8 holes) the holes need to all be roughly equidistant from the center of the chamber, which makes a two finger setup ergonomically complicated while keeping a tangential fipple. It is also very desirable to use the pads of the fingers to cover the holes, making a good air seal is tricky with the middle of the finger. On ergonomics, it is also worth mentioning some Ocs get quite big as well! My largest 6 hole is almost 300mm wide, my fingers are not quite long enough to span this...
Also because — not sure how to explain it — but in my experience the holes on a four hole ocarina are also sort of finger grips, in a way. That is to say, you support the ocarina against your lips with at least one finger below it and two thumbs behind it, but part of your grip on the instrument is gently transferring from fingertip to fingertip as you play, a bit like a recorder or the pipe of bagpipes. The "open" low note has the loosest grip, and you might even subconsciously tilt your head back slightly to allow the weight of the ocarina to shift more to your thumbs.
It might be possible to design, effectively, a one-handed playable instrument that works the way you are talking about, but I think it would be quite uncomfortable.
Indeed. I mentioned Hind above. Charlie Hind makes soprano, alto, tenor, bass, and double ocarinas, made from rosewood, cocobola, and other woods. [I'm not affiliated at all; just a fan of his products]: https://hindocarina.com/sweet_potato.shtml
I gather a lot of schools are adopting ukuleles now. Ukes have a bad name, unfairly I think. (Listen to Eddie Vedder's "Ukulele Songs" album, very underrated). The ukulele is more forgiving than the recorder in my opinion.
It's a fabulous instrument, nuanced and subtle, and you can buy beautiful instruments these days for really not much money at all.
But AFAIK its popularity in school as a teaching instrument has as much to do with Spongebob as it does its capability :-)
It feels like the internet is missing stuff like that now, or it's at least harder to find. Nowadays Nintendo would shut that seller down, or the seller would just be drop shipping them from Alibaba for a 500% markup.
It looks like they stopped producing them in 2024, but that is still a long run. Though they did stop making wood ocarinas at some point in that time frame.
Put beer into drop tanks on Spitfires
https://planehistoria.com/flying-pubs-spitfires-flew-beer-to...
https://duckduckgo.com/q=recorder+instrument+nazi
https://www.thestar.com.my/news/true-or-not/2025/02/19/quick...
I think I was put off by certain players for a while such as Tiny Tim and some of the hipster types. But it really has won me over in its way.
Eddie Vedder has done some excellent ukulele songs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4W0B-1iF6S4
Then of course there is Taimane Gardner who is ridiculously good.
The best way to learn is to move straight over tabs and onto to score, while playing scales and arpeggios to learn the fingerings. This will give you access to a lot more music options! (There is a TON of sheet for Trombone and Clarinet!)
The next thing to recommend is learning to transpose keys. This isn't as hard or daunting as it sounds at first! You kinda just pretend your instrument is tuned differently, this widens your options a lot.
Then the final recommendation following this would be getting yourself a chromatic tuner. One of the most challenging parts of playing the Ocarina is playing it in tune!
Some people kind of don't care, and just are out there living their best lives squeaking for the joy of it, power to them: But if you ever want to play with other people you want to learn to discipline your breath pressure to control your tone/intune.
"Alpine Lake Keg Drop".
Oh god. Yeah just follow the path of the 9 x 16" gun salvos from Rodney blowing big-ass holes in the ground, you can't miss it. LOL. Now those are some directions!