Category Archives: Art

Part One: The apparatus behind a traditional craft I have developed and adapted the apparatus I use to make silk strings over many years. Some of its parts are ordinary components; others are tools I made to solve particular problems. … Continue reading →

My big Sunflowers grow even bigger stalks.   They have a pithy center that is fairly easy to remove. The stalks are porous. The big leaves attach at alternating points and sometimes leave little holes at their points of attachment … Continue reading →

This Overtone flute is end-blown, with the breath diverted across an opening much as the Native American (NA) style of fipple (See previous post). I like to use a stabilized, printed heavy paper ring, in the place of a folded slip … Continue reading →

I often wait until the early hours of the morning to make recordings, but then there are the occasional outside sounds like this train in the night. Then sometimes there are birds and sometimes puppies, or then the slide of … Continue reading →

Musicians interested to play flutes with a directed airflow might find my remarks helpful today concerning end-blown flutes without those details. I insist they are much more interesting because they have more expressive possibilities. What is an end-blown flute? This … Continue reading →

What is a Xun? Xun is a very ancient musical instrument, originally of clay. Is an end-blown wood Xun, a Xun in the strictest sense? Is a clay Ocarina strictly speaking a kind of Xun? Xun is often presented as … Continue reading →

Tea bowls specifically for Matcha tea have many subtle characteristics that make them most suitable for the enjoyment of Tea. Over the last 60 years I have made and sold a variety of chawan and here are a few photos … Continue reading →

LPKaster · Birdsong windbells.wav This recording started with an improvisation on my Zheng, tuned to Japanese Minyo scale. Then I layered it with a live recording of the tubular windbells in the photo below. These are the windbells I have … Continue reading →

Here are some photos of the process of making the ancient clay musical instrument called Xun. Rolling coils Adding coils to the base Personally, I prefer to let the surface show the slow work of my hands and fingers Firing … Continue reading →

Last Summer I grew a little grove of sunflowers, then in the Fall I collected a few of the bigger stalks. Lately I am making flutes with an embrochure or “utaguchi” similar to the end-blown Shakuhachi flute. Recording of Sunflower … Continue reading →

Here are photos of Xun and some other recordings.         Xun with Tibetan Singing Bowl  

Last month I bought a 2000X endoscope camera to look more closely at my Silk strings.? I find it very interesting to compare some of the fibers from different sources. To the left is a Chinese Bombyx Mori silk that … Continue reading →

I acquired several medium sized gourds a few years back, and slowy discovered how to best use them as I intended, to make musical instruments.  Gourds have traditionally served as resonating bodies in musical instruments, either as the main body, … Continue reading →

You might remember my electronic  music, including Theremin from some years back. Some might notice I stopped recording about 5 years ago. I have been focusing on an acoustic interest that goes back decades before I built my Theremin. I … Continue reading →

I’ve been making flutes for over 30 years, but it is quite recent that I have a regular supply of Arundo donax -sometimes referred to as “oboe cane” -to work with. I have always planned to have my own stand … Continue reading →

I decided to work a little bigger with these drawings on plywood. They will be boxed later, and I’m still working on the thousands of layers of French Polish before I even build them. The first of the series owes … Continue reading →

When a new discovery was made in a Bronze Age archaeological site of a thin gold “Sun Disc” there was a general excitement among friends. At the Summer Solstice this year, the Wiltshire Museum added this penny-sized disc to their … Continue reading →

I’ve been thinking about it for quite a while, that I need an instrument om which to test my longer Real Silk strings, so I combined a long-necked and rectangular design and tuned it to the common scale of the … Continue reading →

How surprised I was last year to ship not one, but 3 sets of stalks to Maylasia, where I later learned a bio – epic concerning Marco Polo was being filmed.   When the series aired on Netflix I watched … Continue reading →

I dreamt I was in school. It was just to pass the time, an evening watercolor class, but it was really packed with students. The instructor carried a very important air, but suggested we all try to paint something of … Continue reading →

Check out this item in my Etsy shop https://www.etsy.com/listing/246227315/taoist-water-talisman-disc-in-felt