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Toot toot!
It arrived today: an alto recorder. Specifically, a Yamaha simulated Rosewood 300-series alto recorder. It was a mistake that, so far, I'm happy to have made.
You see, the thing that got me thinking of taking up the recorder was the mistaken notion that it was some sort of recorder that was being played in some Carbon Leaf songs. Turns out, it's a large tin whistle of some sort. I started looking into recorders, though, and thought it would be a cool instrument to learn, because it's relatively easy to learn, relatively inexpensive to buy, and very portable. The soprano recorder, the one kids learn in school, always seemed a bit shrill, so I picked up an alto recorder. It has a more pleasing tone.
Anyway, after just an hour of messing around with the alto recorder, I had learned 7 notes pretty well: G F# F E D C and B, plus the lower G rather inconsistently and the higher A also rather inconsistently. I can play a few simple songs like "Mary Had a Little Lamb," most of "Ode to Joy," sort of "Frere Jacques"... and I also improvised a few of my own, just to practice the notes and fingering. I know enough about breath support from singing that I'm getting a decent tone out of it, though I can't say it's really great, and there are notes that don't really sound right, but on the whole I can't complain about the progress I've made. Probably it will go a lot more slowly from here on out.
I found that my recorder is just a bit flat of perfect A=440 tuning (or maybe I'm doing something wrong that's flatting the sound, I don't know), but with my electronic piano I can adjust the tuning very precisely and can make it play in tune with the recorder. I could also record whatever I play on the piano or even make it sound like other instruments. When I have a bit more time, I'd like to write some simple dongs to play; I could write a recorder part simple enough to for me to play and a piano accompaniment part to go with it so I could accompany myself. On the other hand, I could also transpose other songs into a form where I could play them. So many possibilities, so little time to play around with them, but it's fun learning a new instrument!
The dog hates it, by the way. Now, back to work.
Ah, I can see it now, John and his dog, sitting on the porch of his hand
built tire house, blowing a "simple dong" on his recorder.
all mocking of you and your typos aside, recorder is pretty cool. the altos
have a nice calming sound that should be fun and appropriate over the
summer months.
Surely you know by now there is no such thing as a "simple dong" and your
ding will never catch up. Seriously, though, the recorder is a fun
instrument to tootle with.
Believe it or not, I actually have a Yamaha alto recorder. I also have a
Yamaha tenor recorder too -- the tenor has one key on it. I picked them up
at the flea market new a long time ago, but I've not done much with them.
They also make a bass as well.