This blog is dedicated to the sublime instruments called nose flutes and which produce the most divine sound ever. We have chosen to discard all the native models from S. Pacific and Asia, for they need fingering to be played. We'll concentrate on "buccal cavity driven" nose flutes : the well patented and trademarked metal or plastic ones, plus, by a condemnable indulgence, some wooden craft or home-made productions.

Nov 4, 2012

New designs by Akio Takamura

Mr. Akio Takamura is a very modest nose flute maker, whose work was previously shown in this post. This imaginative and talented craftsman of the Saitama province produces clay nose flutes and paints them.


4 comments:

  1. Amazing work, I particularly like the "rough", "natural" ones! They really look like pre-historic, "original" instruments to me... I would love to see a large yin-yang design!

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  2. I like both the natural and the painted ones.

    In the last picture I see variety in the size of the window, as if some are made for high notes and some for low.

    I wonder what happens to these and other Japanese flutes. They seem to make a good number of them. are they only sold locally in Japanese stores?.

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  3. You are right Luis: there seems to be quite a difference between individual flutes, also in the "natural" ones. I reckon this is probably a result of the firing and temperature differences within the kiln.

    I once noticed rather large differences between individual flutes from a bag of 50 "Schwans", which had all been made by injecting plastic into the same mould! I can imagine that these clay ones then must differ far more in sound even. It would be good to try them if we could! There must be a market when this many are made...

    I think the paint job on these tiny instruments is amazing!

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  4. Well, as far as I know, yes, the japanese makers sell only locally. For sure, you can order from some websites (Amazon.co.jp, Temiruya, Rakuten...) and do it from everywhere in the world, but I do not know any "external" distributor for japanese nose flutes.

    It's been 8 months that I've been trying to buy some flutes from Akio Takamura, but besides the language problem, Mr. Takamura doesn't look like regarding as a necessity to sell.

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