Posted by Alan Albright and His Ocarinas: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4
I bought my second Alan Albright ocarina in February 2023. This time, it is a tenor size. After the ocarina has arrived, I took a photo of my two ocarinas and send it to Mr. Albright. As always, I received a long reply, which I am sharing below:
Naturally, your photo of my “little ones” brings back memories. Kinetic, first of all, because the overall shape reflects the palm of my hands, but also the little rounded stones one finds on the shores of the East Coast. Particulary on the island of White Head, in New Brunswick (Canada) where my parents bought a house in the early 1970s. (My first doubles came into being around 1975).
Another influence would be my admiration of the work of the Romanian sculptor, Brancusi.
When John Hartvigson took over the manufacture of this instrument (I had passed along what I could in January of 2001), his concerns as a woodworker were much more mechanical…. and it shows in the form. For the general cut, he used a bandsaw as I did. And certainly the flat bed of a table sander. But for the edges, he’s used a router (which I was always terrified of). He did not raise up the belt sander and use the back for smoother shaping, nor did he use “flap wheels” to complete a rounded shape. So the overall appearance is flat— and thereby more distant from the body. Less “organic”. At the same time, as is clear in the picture below, much cleaner woodwork. The imperfections of my work are clear around the windows and the finger holes.
In short, John is making an efficient tool. I was trying to make an extension of my, or the player’s, body…. or physical self.
Before making any more comments on the physicality of the instruments, I should emphasize that Cynthia does a much better job on the musical side— the function of the instrument— which translates as the final sizing of the fingerholes. The tuning. She’s a musician herself (clarinet) and I encouraged her to do this— passing on all the little tuning “tricks” I’d developed. So, in this area, I have only praise for her and her work.
And here, we consider the essence of the “thing”: two voices in harmony, animated by a single breath, a single mind, a single spirit and— if we are to cite the traditional saying: “music is the voice of the soul.” In short, the mystery of Being in Duality.
Hats off here to ancient Chinese philosophy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhuang_Zhou !
John and Cynthia and their families are Mormon —- followers of the Latter Day Saints—- so I’d be surprised if the worldview of Zhuang_Zhou has any influence in their daily lives!
That said, John and I obviously share a love of wood. I looks like he is using a form of rosewood for the body (above) with a fipple made of maple or birch.
Your two instruments, on the other hand, are made of a softer, more easily shapable “mahogany” type wood. Mahogany (you can read all about it on the web) became well-known in the USA through furniture coming from Cuba! By the time I came along, all sorts of similar woods were being called “mahogany” for marketing purposes, I assume. It’s a warm, friendly wood to work with…. and to hold in the hand.
So I should end with a story about my suppliers.
It begins with bamboo in 1970. At the time, I was working in a storefront school on Catherine Street (south Chinatown, NYC), supposedly teaching English to immigrant teenagers from South China and Hong Kong, mostly. This is a bad way to learn a language and I quickly realized that they simply needed to find work with English-speakers…. and they’d quickly be on their feet. One day, I loaded up the school van and took a half dozen of my students with me, through the Holland Tunnel, to Hoboken, N.J. where there was a warehouse of bamboo. (An old family friend had challenged me to find bamboo in New York). There was a friendly old man in charge of the warehouse, who told us stories of his travels to China to buy the bamboo—- which now was cut into lengths of 9 and 12 feet, since it was mainly used by the rug industry for transport…. This man sold me $15 worth of bamboo and I made my first flute from it. This proved to be the beginning of Remarkable Flutes— a co-effort of Steve Rowles (brother of the challenger) and myself, with the idea of putting all those English-learners to work!
We could barely support ourselves with this new adventure of introducing this ancient instrument to the American public through craft shows (1970-74).
When I handed over the flute “enterprise” to my friend Steve (who later went on to violin school and making beautiful instruments), I had to do something to survive— finding my way to the ocarinas and then buying my wood from Doll Lumber in Florida, NY… to Ray Tunquist, another “old man” in charge of an operation of transforming imported lumber (from Africa and Asia) shipped into Brooklyn docks and from there to his place where he kiln dried and sawed the logs into boards. It was a two-man operation and the wood went mostly to Constantine’s, with their catalog of exotic woods, and who sold the boards at as much as ten times what they had paid for them!
Such fun we had at Doll Lumber— 80-year-old Ray and I. He’d lead me to pile of “scraps’— which were usually boards with both the light sapwood and the dark heartwood. Lovely! And perfect for symbolizing in the same piece of wood the high and low voices! So I’d pick out a pile of “junk” (as he called it) and he’d give me a price. Much too low, given the value of the wood in my eyes. So I’d always pay him double the price he asked!
And then, at the prompting of my French wife, I moved to San Francisco where her best friend lived. There, I would cross the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito. I don’t remember the name of the enterprise, but Tim was the boss and his right hand man was an adept of the Green Gulch Zen Center in nearby Muir Beach. Beautiful wood— which TIm had mostly found on his trips to Mexico and brought back in containers. I particularly like bocote, which has the appearance of turtle shell. It’s a harder wood than mahogany, so I mostly used this for the sopranos and altos— reserving mahogany for the large baritones and basses, because it is much easier to work.
And there you have it!