Ocarinas

For those who don't know what an ocarina is - I don't blame you. It's a very elusive instrument with very little mainstream attention or media exposure - so allow me to begin this blog by introducing this wonderful instrument.

To quote Wikipedia;  
"The ocarina ( /ɒkəˈriːnə/) is an ancient flute-like wind instrument.While variations exist, a typical ocarina is an oval-shaped enclosed space with four to twelve finger holes and a mouthpiece that projects from the body. It is often ceramic, but other materials, such as plastic, wood, glass,clay and metal may also be used."

 
The very first ocarina-like instruments appeared over 12000 years ago, and curiously enough - they just cropped up in various civilizations from different parts of the world, from China to ancient Mesoamerica!

When ocarinas were introduced to the courts of Europe, they were novelties - fun, animal-shaped toys which played only a few notes, and they remained this way all the way up to the 1850's, where a genius named Giuseppe Donati turned these playthings into musical instruments. He gave them the form that we now recognize the instrument by, a range of over an octave, and he named it "Ocarina".

Giuseppe Donati

Fabio Menaglio Sol4 - a traditional style Italian ocarina

These early modern ocarinas have ten holes, allowing 18 notes. Since Donati, the ocarina has gone through a few serious innovations - in the 1920's, a Japanese maker created what's now known as the "Japanese" fingering system by giving the ocarina an additional two subholes, increasing the range to 21 - and in the 1960's, a British mathematician-musician named John Taylor invented the English cross-fingering system, which allows for a full octave using only four holes closed in combinations!

A Japanese ocarina

English style ocarina.

The ocarina's an interesting example of how one of the most ancient of instruments is also relatively modern and still going through cycles of innovation.

The Smule iPhone ocarina (English system!)

So... yeah. Now that I have that out of the way...

Hi everyone. My name's Panch, and I'm an ocarina maker. I've been making ceramic ocarinas for a few years now.

My style is to place particular emphasis on the harmony between visual form and musical function.
Before I started making, I wasn't satisfied with a majority of the ocarinas I had available to me. It's an unfortunate reality that many makers prefer to concentrate predominantly on sound, without much effort put into the aesthetics of the instrument. While that in itself is an admirable quality, I believe that ocarinas can be as much a work of visual art as they are beautiful-sounding musical instruments, and I craft them as such - putting days of effort into each one to make it sing, and then refining the exterior, making its visual appearance match its tone in quality.

My preferred style of ocarina is the transverse Japanese 12-hole, due to the higher range and that extra touch of visual sophistication and complexity that additional fingering holes lend to it. On occasion, I would even unnecessarily split the right pinky hole of an ocarina, creating a "13th" hole with limited function other than to be aesthetically pleasing.

I made this blog to pretty much keep everyone up to date with my progress and such, and I hope you enjoy reading along!

A great place to learn about ocarinas is at The Ocarina Network, a forum with many, many ocarina enthusiasts and dedicated staff. Another good place I'd urge you to visit is David Ramos' OcTalk forums.
On both of these sites you can find out just about anything you could need to know about ocarinas and their makers, along with playing tips and more!


Take care, and feel free to comment or otherwise contact me if you have any questions.