An Original Couchois

I recently had the great luck to acquire an original Garrett John Couchois' whistle (read: a nose flute). We previously posted an article about this beautiful baby, which (real) existence was not ascertained yet, besides the Couchois' patent. We had made researches about uts inventor (check here please). We had even built a replica (check here, here and here please).

But now, thanks to Mr. Brian B., we have one in our hand, and in a very nice condition! Take a look at that beauty!

It is stamped PAT. ALLOWED 1899, which perfectly corresponds to the Couchois patent No. US31,876, registered Nov. 21, 1899. Indeed, the Couchois' nose flute is the 2nd urban nose flute in history, following Carter's Nasalette [1892] (and from which it flattens the nose hood into a nose saddle and rounds the square mouth tube), and before the Magic Nose Flute [±1902], which will improve the Couchois with a mouth shield instead of the mouth tube.



Coincidentally, and by a curious chance, Mr. Brad G. very recently posted a comment on this blog to tell he had found a Couchois too. He kindly sent us a couple of phot, and yes, it is absolutely the same instrument, despite the repair Brad's nose flute got at the neck :



As you can see, it had been necessary to weld solidly the saddle and the neck. Indeed, mine shows frailty at the same point, and I suppose there was a real weakness at this point, as I had noticed with the difficult welding I had to make on the replica.



Brad wrote me: « On the front of the air tube is a patent date that says "PAT. 189" due to the repair the full date is unreadable as is another word that follows "PAT. that starts with "AL ».
This is interesting, because if you look on mine, a repair would have not make disappear the same part of the stampings, and so, we can state that, contrarywise to a Humanatone for instance, the stampings were made by hand (sometimes one way, sometimes the other...)

Now, was I right with my replica and the corrections I made on the inconsistent patent drawings? Well, I must say I was not totally wrong... but my replica is a bit taller, the mouth hole that I reduced was a wrong interpretation, and following the size of the air entrance deduced by the patent was a mistake (since it got wider in the poduction).

But Couchois' drawings wre not accurate neither, compared to the real nose flute. So, I don't really feel guilty :)



And big thanks to Brad G. for sharing your pictures, and if your have other public (or not!) performances, please try to have someone to shoot a video!

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