Mk developments
Postal Strikes and Shipping Delays
In recent times, pressures have been mounting on delivery networks and shipping carriers. Covid, Brexit, labour shortages, rising prices and the Christmas surge have all played a part in making delivery more challenging. In December the situation was escalated when workers in our national postal service in the United Kingdom – the Royal Mail – went on strike. Unknown to us, during this time, the Royal Mail prioritised domestic mail, which has caused long delays on international mail leaving the UK and difficulties in the tracking systems i.e. limited or no tracking. This has meant a number of our customers have packages that have been severely delayed.
We have greatly appreciated all of our customers patience through this time. We understand it is annoying and extremely awkward when you have counted on an instrument arriving in time for Christmas or for a performance or rehearsal. Not to mention it is worrying when it doesn’t arrive and tracking isn’t working – leaving us with the thought it’s lost. Many of these packages have been arriving and will continue to do so …so if you are still waiting please hang in there we believe packages are making it through and at the time of writing we are not aware of any that have been lost or gone missing. For customers that have waited patiently for packages that have finally arrived – thank you for your patience and we hope you will get many years service from your instrument.
Please be aware postage is insured- we make sure you will receive your instrument. In fact we have never not delivered an order, but we do have to work with the postal networks and whatever economic, political and logistical challenges are being faced.
At this time everyone is doing everything they can to restore the delivery services. We are constantly testing shipping carriers for reliability. In order to relieve pressure from Royal Mail we have momentarily withdrawn our economy international shipping options. Please be aware there may be delays on express services also as all networks are under pressure. Whichever delivery service however, please bear in mind packages are making it through to customer even if they are delayed.
Late …but not Lost!
Postal services have been under a lot of strain recently. We would like to say, from our recent experiences, that although there have been delays across many networks , packages have been making it through. It is not that packages are being lost, they are only taking longer than usual. Please take this into account within the bigger picture – of course we all like to receive things within a few days, but a great musical instrument will be a great friend for many years.
Weights of High and Low Whistles and Woodwind Instruments for Comparison
Particularly among players at the early stages of learning to play low whistles, the weight of an instrument can be a talking point. It should be said whistles are generally the lightest woodwind instruments, with a typical low D weighing around 180-250 grams.
For interests sake here is a table comparing the weight of woodwind instruments. Some of the heavier woodwinds do make use of a neck strap. The lightest woodwind to sometimes make use of a neck strap is the clarinet which typically weighs around 0.8 kgs or 1.7 lbs. Many heavier woodwinds though, don’t have much opportunity for additional support. A Trombone, which is typically ten times heavier than a low D, has no opportunity for additional support.
mk Pro D – 240 grams / 0.5 lbs
mk Midgie High D – 63 grams / 0.13 lbs
Overton low D – 190 grams / 0.4 lbs
Typical wooden flute – 560 grams / 1.2 lbs
*Clarinet – 800 grams / 1.7 lbs
Typical silver flute – 440 grams
**Typical Alto Saxophone – 2.5 kgs
Trombone – 2.7 kgs / 6.1lbs
Tuba 15.8 kgs / 35 lbs
* Sometimes used with a neck strap
** Typically used with a neck strap
Small Hands & Stretch to Reach the Fingerholes on a Low D Whistle
One of the questions we’re asked most, is about making the stretch to reach the fingerholes on a Low D whistle. There’s a lot of good news here – we offer a full money back guarantee if you can’t make the stretch after a while and, in the last several decades, we could count on one hand the number of people who have made use of the guarantee because they couldn’t make the stretch to reach the fingerholes.
This question is more commonly raised by women, who understandably feel that because they have smaller hands – and, let’s face it, the majority of items in this ‘modern’ world are designed for men and man sized hands – that they are more likely to have issues trying to play a Low D whistle. However, in reality gender has very little influence; for whatever reason, women generally carry a lot more joint flexibility than men. Making the stretch to play a Low D is nowhere near as hard as adapting to doing the splits, but it is similar. Women are typically much better at stretching than men.
The fact is that anyone who picks up a Low D initially will not find it comfortable at first. This is true irrespective of age, gender or hand-size. Playing musical instruments of any kind does involve developing strength and suppleness. Part of the beauty of learning to play an instrument is, in fact, seeing yourself develop; revelling in finding something easy to do that was once difficult. Whether it’s ‘developing your chops’ with a trumpet, forming an embouchure on a flute, playing stretched out chords on a guitar or reaching fifth position on a violin, there’s some patience, discipline and play-in time required. Perhaps because it’s a whistle and whistles are, quite rightfully, known to be accessible instruments to play, this can come as a little bit of a shock to someone who expects it to be easy from the outset.
With a little practice over the first few weeks, it is very easy to adapt to playing a Low D whistle. In fact, it can be said that if your patience doesn’t stretch to this then you probably aren’t made for playing a musical instrument! Any stretch requires a little work, whether it’s touching your toes, doing the splits or putting your foot behind your head, although stretching to reach the fingerholes on a Low D is certainly not as difficult as some of these.
Exceptions
In a very, very small number of cases we have found, even with some practice and patience and communicating with a customer, we can’t quite get it to work. Of the many thousands of instruments we have made for musicians around the world these cases could be counted on one hand – literally less than 0.01%. This can occur where several factors combine. For example, old hands that also carry some form of injury. That is not to discount older people who carry a hand injury of some kind, because in nearly all cases it’s worth trying and it is remarkable what people can overcome. If this applies to you, we would happily refund you the full cost of your purchase, including any postage costs incurred and offer you a discount on a smaller or different key for your efforts.
Technical notes/further info:
Blayne Chastain’s video on the Piper’s Grip.
You may also find Cutie Pie’s video on the pipers grip and stretches useful.
Kelpie F to be discontinued
As we make way for new whistles and keys in 2021, we will be discontinuing the Kelpie F for the foreseeable future. If you want one of these, then the last few batches are becoming available as we put the finishing touches to them in the workshop. Please keep an eye on the online shop or email us [info@mkwhistles.com – stock info] for an update.
To our EU customers…
As in times gone by, we will not let temporary political situations affect long-practised cultural and social collaboration and exchange. As ever, we are committed to offering our customers in Europe an excellent service. With this in mind, we thought we’d take this chance to explain pricing changes for our EU customers.
When the UK was in the EU, we had to charge VAT to all our customers in the EU (including Britain). The VAT was passed on to the UK government, then distributed to the EU accordingly. Since leaving the EU, EU customers no longer pay VAT when purchasing from us. This means that someone in the EU ordering a whistle from us will pay 20% less than someone ordering from the UK at the point of ordering. Instead of VAT, any taxes/customs charges will be due when your package enters your country. Some packages may have no charges applied -usually applicable for packages under €150] -, but if they do, the customs charges are likely to be roughly equivalent to VAT charges paid previously. We certainly understand that having to make a second payment for a customs charge can be an inconvenience, but we hope you see it in perspective compared to getting a great instrument and the long life it will have with you.
Limited Edition Blue Pro Ds
We have a small batch of limited edition Blue Ds available here. This is the second batch of blue Ds we have ever made – so they are pretty rare!!!
New Pro A
While it had always been my intention that the Low G would be the next key to follow the Low D and the F, it is in fact the A that has come to fruition first. The G remains very close, but it still needs that little extra something to give take that final 1% to being absolutely ‘there’. The A definitely is that- those who have played the prototypes seemed to consider it to be best A they have played. I’m certainly happy with them and I hope you like them also! They are currently available to buy on this page.
Notes: The new As feature a slightly different tuning slide to the brass slides as used on the Ds and Fs. They are still low profile, but use a low friction plastic lining instead of brass. They are also available in a satin plain aluminium finish.
Update on New Keys
I’ve been answering a lot of emails recently about when keys of whistles other than the D and F are going to come to fruition. I thought I’d provide a general update here. Though I had envisaged the G would be the next key, and we have taken a substantial number of advance orders for these, it is in fact probably the A which will be ready next. Those on the waiting list for the Gs (some of which have been waiting for almost a decade!!!), will be given first offer on the As. In a best case scenario we would also see both the G and the Eb available before the end of the year.
Polished Finish MK Pros Discontinued
Polished finish MK Pros will be discontinued for the foreseeable future. This is so that we can concentrate on finishing work on different keys of whistles – G, A & Eb are all in the pipeline (quite literally!). We do currently have a very small number of polished finish Mk Pro D and Fs until such time as stocks run out.
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