[Terry's Tale] To Mirror the Heavens

And I have felt . . . a sense sublime

Of something far more deeply interfused,

Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,

And the round ocean and the living air,

And the blue sky, and the mind of man;

A motion and a spirit, that impels

All thinking things, all objects of all thought,

And rolls through all things.

-       Wordsworth, “Tintern Abbey”

It has long been recognized that all living things are inhabited by a creative force.  This force is powerful and aggressive yet it can be considered to represent heaven and light for it is a portal into our true inner nature.  For me, the sound of music produced by a simple bamboo flute, has been a mild muse.

For some time now, though I have had little time and I have no teacher, I have been working to learn how to play the ‘danso’.  This instrument, an ancient form of reedless bamboo flute has a hauntingly airy voice and is not only found in Asia, but is an instrument long known by the native American Indians.

The Danso 

The notch 

 The sound comes out this end

 The bottom side

 Completely hollow in the middle

The view of the notch from the playing end

Due to its design, it is quite difficult to master, and can, at times, be difficult for a master to play.  The reasons for the level difficulty are:

1)  It is made of a material, bamboo, and a design that makes it extremely subject to the vagaries of ambient conditions – that is, humidity or dryness, cold and heat, etc.

2)  Since the sound is produced by the splitting of a flow of air across a notch and the notch is located at one end of the flute, the positioning of angle of the notch to the mouth and the power of the breath used are entirely controlled by the would be player.  Reed instruments such as the clarinet or even other flute types that utilize a reed apparatus at the rear of the instrument, and non-reed instruments such as the ocarina, by design control the air flow split making sound production much easier.

3)  You have but four holes on top and one on the bottom for note production, thus your range of notes is somewhat limited.

I currently am to the point where making sound is no longer a serious problem – until you learn mouth positioning and breath technique making any sound harmonic to the ear is very difficult, so now, as time permits, I can focus more on the making of music.