Review : the Nasiphone / Mellibrou

I discovered the Nasiphone in Larigot (#29 & #30), the bulletin published by ACIMV, searched for Mr. Mellier in the phonebook, and called him to discuss and order Mellibrous.

Mr. René Mellier is now in the beginning of his eighties, and began making his nose flutes when retired. He also built small size barrel organs, and was interested in wind instruments physics and acoustics. It was at the IRCAM where he was following a course, that he was shown the book Instruments à vent, by Henri Bouasse, 1929, and was particularly interested in the little tin plate "toy" sold by "carnies", depicted in the following pages :

Mr. Mellier decided to build a small instrument following the same principle, and after several attempts, created the Nasiphone.
Later, René Mellier was asked to present the instrument in a TV show. But the TV producer got afraid by the instrument name, because it sounded like "nazi-phone" (!!)... So, for the circumstances, a new name was found, the Mellibrou, by concatenation of the beginning of Mr. Mellier's name with Brou, which is the village where he lives.

There are two models of Nasiphones : one large for adults, and a smaller one for children. I ordered both, and received them packed in a rolled user manual.

The Nasiphone is made of zinc plate, plus a wooden nose rest. The zinc part is a sandwich made of 3 plates : a long central one, in which is cut the mouth hole, soldered to two shorter and angled ones, fixed on the wood part by brass nails. They form a very thin air duct, as thin as the central plate is thick (0.65 mm - 1/4"on my palmer). This is a very easy and simple, but clever way to set the duct thickness...

The wooden nose rest is cut with a more or less 100° scoop to fit occiental nose conformation, and drilled of 2 holes as air passageway. Obviously, on the chid size, the drillings are smaller in diameter and squeezed together (very cute!).

The Mellibrou profile is interesting too, notably the way it is angled :

Well, the Nasiphone is not chiseled like a silversmith piece, but its roughness, rusticity and simplicity are parts of its appeal. Each Mellibrou is stamped with Mellier's initials, plus the year of making.

I wouldn't say the Nasiphone is the most comfortable flute I ever tried, neither the most beautiful, nor the best sounding... But it works, with a large range of notes from basses to sharps, and exhales a real character of authenticity and friendliness.

The only real flaws are the formation of condensation (probably because of a Z shape of the beginning of the air duct), which imposes to dry the flute (with a hard blow in the nose holes) after 15 minutes of playing, and a tendency to "over whistle" (some stridents unwanted sounds, maybe due to a flat labium).

Here is a sound sample :



Mr. Mellier stopped making the Nasiphone...and told me he is out of stock now.
So, it has become a collector's object.
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Video : Berlin's Extraordinary People

Here is an excerpt of a documentary movie filmed in Berlin by Hajo Rubbert. Karl O. at the bandoneon, Bauchladen Berny at the nose flute and a third fellow at the barrel organ. Beautiful music, but unfortunately, the nose flute is difficult to hear, masked by the organ.

An interesting organization : the ACIMV

Founded in 1987, and thus ready to celebrate its 25 years of existence, the french Association des Collectionneurs d'instruments de musique à vent (ACIMV) is an non-profit organization which goal is to gather wind instruments collectors and enthusiasts, and to introduce « french instruments making and increasing knowledge on this subject ». But no chauvinism, since the organization is also interested in foreign instruments and collections...
His founder and president, Mr. Bruno Kampmann, told me that a third of the members are spread around the world, even as far as New Zealand.

The ACIMV has a blog with nice pictures of stunning instruments, and publishes a biannual paper bulletin called « Larigot » (from the name of an organ stop, coming itself from an old small flute name), plus an annual special catalog.

Checking the contents of Larigot past issues, I found four short articles dealing with nasal flutes :

- Larigot #27, Aug. 2001 : Le Vociphone : un gadget instrumental..., by Jacques Cools, which was the inaugural text dealing with nose flutes in Larigot and mainly exposed the belgian Vociphone (about which we'll post later).

- Larigot #29, Jul. 2002 : Les Flûtes nasales (suite), by Jeremy Montagu, trans. by B. Kampmann, which began to draw an inventory of modern nose flutes (with some tiny mistakes :) [Read a related article by J. Montagu published in English in FoRMHI bulletin (P. 7-9)]

- Larigot #30, Dec. 2002 : Les Flûtes nasales (suite), à propos du Mellibrou, by Jacques Cools, dealing mostly with a french contemporary nose flute called Mellibrou or Nasiphone, built by René Mellier (about which we'll post later).

- Larigot #34, Oct. 2004 : Les Flûtes nasales (suite), à propos du Cello-Phone, by Jacques Cools, and exposing a stunning swan-neck nose flute.

With a very kind generosity, Mr. Kampmann authorized us to publish those whole pages, and provided the original files, with the color pictures. Thanks a lot to him, to the ACIMV, Larigot and the authors.

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From Larigot #27 (All rights reserved, ©2001, J. Cools & ACIMV/Larigot) :

From Larigot #29 (All rights reserved, ©2002, J. Montagu & ACIMV/Larigot) :

From Larigot #30 & #34 (All rights reserved, ©2002 & 2004, J. Cools & ACIMV/Larigot) :

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ACIMV : c/o B. Kampmann - 136, Bd de Magenta - 75010 Paris - France
tel/fax : +33 148 787 009
e.mail : acimv[dot]larigot[at]free[dot]fr

ACIMV blog : http://acimv.blogspot.com

Subscription : Active member : 30€ / Benefactor : 40€ +
(includes Larigot bulletins)
contact : claribole59[at]yahoo.fr

Larigot past issues (#1 to #46) : 8€ per copy, 15€ per 3 copies.
Special issues : 10€ per copy, 20€ per 3 copies.

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Techno : vibratos, tremolos and trills

What makes a nose flute playing beautiful ? Probably the same criteria usually applied to whistling or maybe singing.

The most important one is probably the interpretation itself, i.e. the way a player appropriates the music he plays, incarnates it, in a coherent manner adapted to reveal its character and beauty. This is a matter of pure art, and we won't deal with it here and now.

The second important point is the beauty of the voice/sound itself, its purity and texture. In the case of the nose flute, this mostly depends on the instrument itself. But also on the voice ambitus (the range of accessible notes) and the breath length, which are really important in nosefluting. Master Mosurin seems to have infinitely deep lungs...

Another point we won't discuss here is the perfect pitch. This is as a matter of "ear" as a question of being accustomed to a specific nose flute, and being able to provide a real time perfect mouth/tongue move.

Finally, the ornaments. There are many kinds of ornaments in music playing, but the most adapted to nosefluting are the vibratos, tremolos and trills, which are often confused all together.

A Tremolo/tremolando (meaning tremble/trembling in italian) is an ornament in which the intensity (amplitude) of the note periodically varies around an average value.

A Vibrato (meaning vibrate in italian) is an ornament in which the sharpness (tonality) of the note periodically varies around an average value.

A Trill is an ornament in which the note rapidly alternates between to adjacent notes.

The classic and common plastic Humanatone provides a little airhole besides the mouth hole, that many people say themselves to be curious about. In the Humanatone patent (see here), Ernest Davis called it a "true tremolo" hole.

In fact, using this feature by alternatively closing and releasing the little hole, provides a kind of mix of a vibrato and a trill. Indeed, it is not a "true vibrato" since it provides an alternation between 2 notes (and not a variation "around" a note), and it is not neither a "true trill" since the gap between the 2 notes produced depends on the pitch of the original note : the gap is much bigger if the note is sharp (up to one tone), and almost not audible with a bass note. So, the gap is not controlled, and corresponds even less to a specific scale. Using this feature certainly provides a "trembling effect" though.

Now, what are the ways of producing tremolos, vibratos and trills with a nose flute ? There are 4 available means, more or less difficult to achieve :

- Breath control
- Moving the flute
- Moving the mouth
- Moving the tongue

Breath control is not easy. Being able to blow rapidly and alternatively strongly and weakly is difficult and needs a lot of practice. The Nosy Diva Miss Birdy Kuck is able to, as she masters the other following techniques... (so jealous I am!) Just check her crazy Valkyrie cover, or her Queen of the Night ... Well, breath control provides a "true tremolo".
Contrarywise, it's rather easy to alternatively blow-and-stop (air/no-air), thus provoking a hashed and discontinuous note.

Moving the flute is much easier. It needs some practice in order to get a rather smooth and regular action. It consists in pressing and releasing quickly and alternatively on the base of the flute. This technique provides a "true vibrato".
You can check a well performed sample of that finger technique in this video.

Moving the mouth : with this technique, the player alternatively pulls forward and backward his chin, pushing by that way the base of flute, and provoking the same effect than with "moving the flute", but by another physical mean.

Moving the tongue : the tongue can be moved according to several actions. Back and forth, or left-right-left... or up-down-up... applying different types of trembling effects. The 2 last moves (L/R and U/D) are really easy to perform widely, and provide a kind of "bird call" vibrato, with a huge gap between the bass and sharp notes. It's more difficult to avoid this large range, and to master a tiny and subtle vibrato.

Well, there is a subsidiary way, which is to alternately block and release the mouth hole with a finger, partly or entirely, but it provides no tremolo or vibrato, but a discontinuous note (pretty efficient for Morse code ?).

Trills ? They are produced with a typical tongue move (some kind of inflating it...) coupled with a soft breath control ... Impossible for me to describe precisely, since I do not master this technique. We need the Nosy Diva to reveal her secrets...

Weird : hanabue vending machine !

Japan is a paradisiac country, where you can find Humanatone vending machines ! In case of an urgent need to whistle, just drop ¥300 (a bit less that $4) and soothe your will to play, whenever your urge springs up.

Source : hanabue.emix-express.com/

Urbina & Maria : a contemporary Basque flute

Here is a spanish patent (ES1004918), filed on Mar. 7 under the title "Flauta Nasal", 1988 and registered on Oct. 10 of the same year, by Uriarte Urbina and Antonia Maria, inventors, for the account of Papelaria Informal S.A., Donostia-San Sebastián, Guipúzcoa, in the autonomous community of the Basque Country.

No specific technical innovation in this nose flute, but a neat and efficient design though, with two huge lateral walls, sized largely over what's necessary. Why ? To help a better grip maybe ? Or more probably in the design gesture, making the profile of the flute looking like an elephant head.

The Flauta Nasal is planned to be made in one piece, in cast plastics or composite material, but might be recovered by another material :

« De forma más concreta, la flauta nasal que se preconiza esta constituida mediante un cuerpo monopieza, preferentemente obtenido a base de material plástico, aunque obviamente puede estarlo en cualquier otro tipo de material apropiado, cuerpo dotado de una embocadura para insuflación de aire al interior del mismo y a través de las fosas nasales, estableciéndose en su seno una conducción arqueada que dirige el aire insuflado hacia una salida del cuerpo, debidamente distanciada de la embocadura anteriormente citada, en correspondencia con el normal distanciamiento entre nariz y boca del usuario, quedando esta salida situada sobre una aleta sensiblemente plana, destinada a adaptarse al labio inferior por su zona extrema y libre de manera que la salida de aire quede situada inmediatamente por encima de dicho labio. »

Videos : a star is born !

The incomparable Nosy Diva Miss Birdy K., urged by her fans, has finally created her own Youtube channel, and uploaded a bunch of stunning, funny and highly talented videos. Playing the nose flute and the viola, the nose flute and the ukulele, the nose flute and ..., she masters incredible tremolos and vibratos, particularly in very sharp tones. A real Nasenflöte nightingale!

Here are three videos that noseflute.org was lucky to produce, but check the other ones too, on her channel, notably the Queen of the night aria, her Radetzky March, but also her intervention on Bach's Concerto in A minor... (More to come, so my advice would be that you subscribe to it...)

An interview of the Nosy Diva is to come soon on these pages.

Review : Heinrich Handler's nose flutes

Mr Handler is an Austrian man in his eighties, who produces Nasenflöten very near the perfection. In the 1980's, he rediscovered the 1930's Styrian nose flute, studied archives and photos, began to test and improve them, and then created his own models.

I received 2 flutes bought at Steirisches-Volksliedwerk, the "large" and the "small" models.

Both flutes were protected in very nice little pouches, made by Mrs Handler, and accompanied with a notice beginning by a little poem. Everything looks like having been made with the heart, a lot of care, and a precise craftsmanship.

The large model is rather built on the same technical specifications than the small one : same air duct length (2.2 cm), same very thin mouth hole (1.8 cm x 0.3 cm), and an air entrance quite similar, but a bit narrower on the small flute.
Only the mouth cap is longer on the large model, where the air duct cover is made in 3 parts, two of them following the sides all the flute long.

The large model :

The small model :

All Handler's Nose flutes are hand-free models, with a long horizontal drilling through the air duct cover, with gently tapered ending holes, allowing to pass a leather or elastic cord.

Handler's flutes are made of fruit tree wood, but also in maple or yew. Some are two colored wood mixed.

They wear the Heinrich Handler's monogram : a capital H between two points.

The precision of the work (sharp and neat labium) allied to sharp technical specifications (very narrow mouth hole) and quality woods, lead to high quality nose flutes, with a great rich wood sound, precise in response and very handy and confortable to play.

Here is a sound sample (thanks to the Nosy Diva Miss Birdy K.) :



You can purchase nose flutes by Heinrich Handler either :
- online, at Steirisches-Volksliedwerk

- or directly at :
Mr Heinrich Handler
Werksweg 58
A-8160 Weiz
Austria
Tel : +43 3172 3743

Here you can also download a PDF magazine with a text about the Styrian nose flutes and Mr. Handler (Page 32+)

And here a video in which Mr and Mrs Handler play their nose flutes.

Video : Kentucky T. Dutchersmith, a funny performer

Here is a classic video in which Kentucky T. Dutchersmith plays Nose flute, cello and different percussions, while accompanied by an orchestra. It seems that he plays a Max Zycha's Nasenflöte. Thanks to Miss Birdy K. for having made me discover it.

Patrick Huet de Froberville : a French patent

The first and only French patent I found dates of 1987. Filed by Patrick Huet de Froberville on 15th of June, 1987, and registered on 16th of December, 1988, under the number FR2616574, it depicts a very common nose flute in its functionning and refers explicitly to US2245432, CH253732, US 2197993 and GB214832 patents.

«In this instrument, sound is produced by the vibration of the air contained in a hollow globular body, and produced by the breath of the performer, which breaks on a bevelled edge, characterised in that it comprises a body 2, 3, 4 which is shaped so as to fit the nostrils and mouth of a user and to channel the flow of air exhaled through the nostrils of the latter onto a bevelled edge 8 of an opening 7 positioned in front of the half-open mouth of the user, whose oral cavity 17 is used as a hollow body of adjustable volume. »

« D'une façon avantageuse l'instrument suivant l'invention est réalisé en une matière plastique moulée. »

« L'instrument suivant l'invention est avantageusement réalisé en matière plastique moulée mais peut également être réalisé en métal ou autre. »

So, the nose flute is primarily planned to be made in plastics, but possibly in metal.

The novelty stands in the design of the instrument, not really appealing (to my own taste), with many useless angles, providing a kind of "Darth Vader"/stormtrooper massive look.

Video : The first notes of a great beginner

LuthVal is a very fine lute, renaissance guitar and theorbo player. UkeVal is a 'ukulele player who's specialized in classical and ancient music. Both persons are the same guy. Will the third pseudo NosefluteVal appear on YouTube ? Val built a cardboard nose flute with our template, and played his first notes! Thanks to him for the video.

Check his Lute channel
Check his ukulele channel

And for the best or the worst, this little "cuckoo" video :

Video : Becapella, a stunning duet

Andi Steil and Franz Fendt are two musicians from North Germany who play mainly the hang, and play it beautifully. Hang is a modern Swiss percussion instrument re-invented by PanArt, from traditional indian istruments. They are played by hitting them on different zones producing the notes of a specific scale.

But the Becapella members also play the nose flute : « The nose flute became a standard instrument in our show. Normally, we start and end up with it ».
Andi also adds « We perform everywhere it's not too noisy around the place we perform, otherwise the PA system has to be strong ».

Here, they play the Ode to Joy by Beethoven, with their hangs and wooden nose flutes.

There is also another version here, more ...funky.

Review : Sommer Musik nose flutes

I ordered and received two Nasenflöten by Martina Sommer, at sommer-musik.de. Martin and Martina Sommer are wood instruments makers, located in Berlin, Germany. Their workshop is the one you can see in the video here.

I ordered the 2 models, adult and children sized, and was pleasantly surprised to receive the hand-free nose flutes, nicely packed and already mounted with a matching color leather cord.

I just asked Martina a dark flute and a light one, and to choose nice pieces of wood. I'm very pleased with Martina's choices : I got a dark brown adult flute, with quite angular and convex shape, made of nicely grained walnut and elm. And the smaller one, with rounded design, concave front side, light and colored (mapple and cherry).

The flutes are quite small (5.4 x 3.8 cm for the bigger one, and 5x4 cm for the children size), but are made with care and attention, nice assemblings and beveled edges. The rear is comfortable for the nose rest as for the upper lip contact zone.

The rear side is also drilled of two holes sized in order to fit the cord knot, and are coninued by a lateral hole, of the diameter of the leather lace. This is really well done and conceived, thus avoiding the ungracious rise of the knot above the surface.


The technical choices and dimensions are a bit surprising, but lead to a good result. The air duct has a quarter-rounded section as thick as 3 millimeters at its largest. The mouth hole is a perfect circular hole with a 10 mm diameter, broadening in an elliptic cone at the rear, up to 20 mm at its largest. The distance between the air duct exit and the lowest part of the (circular) labium is 12 mm, which is a very large dimension compared to other nose flutes (for instance, on a plastic Humanatone, this distance is 6.5 mm).

On the "down" side, the "mouth cone" of my child size flute is not perfectly centered, leading to a disgracious encroachment on the side. This is a detail, only known by the player (me:), since that is not visible from the outside.

However, those two flutes work pretty fine and produce a good woody sound, clear and loud. The basses are easy to get, thanks to the mouth cone, adding some "free" room to the mouth

Here is a short sound sample (Lully, the Night ballet !) :



Martin and Martina Sommer website is here.
And here is a video in which Martin Sommer plays the Nasenflöte.

Downloadable template

I've been asked to provide the "new" template. Here it is. Click on it to get it full size, save it, and print it on a A4 format cardboard (200g/m2 minimum). The assembling manual is here.

Nose flute workshop debriefing - part 3

I made a video during the workshop. It is a bit long (12 mn) but gives a real idea of what it was. Big thanks to Fräulein Birdy K. for having allowed us to use some of her WIP recordings as soundtrack.

Nose flute workshop debriefing - part 2

An excerpt of the local newspaper, with some lines dedicated to the workshop : reading the article, we could believe that I am the inventor of all nose flutes in the world. Hmm. Rather confusing...

Nose flute workshop debriefing - part 1

My nose flute workshop at the Architecture school of Nancy (France) was a great success! Yesterday, between 10AM and 17PM, 200 cardboard nose flutes (100 adult size + 100 children size) were built from the templates by the visitors (mostly) and my assitants. Parallely, we taught all the visitors how to play them (almost everybody succeded). Great fun!

Here are some pictures of the workshop :
(click here for a bigger size)