Dizi Questions

[PassionForTheWinds]

1) Why does binding help to prevent cracking?

2) Is it healthy for the dizi if I rinse the inside with water before playing, since a moist dizi would resonate better?

3) How does cracking within the dizi occur?

[Charlie Huang]

I would advise you to avoid no. 2 at all costs! Water and musical instruments, especially wooden ones, don't mix!!! Moisture in the wood dulls the tone and sound qaulity, that's why some woods require 5-20 years to dry and cure naturally before being used to make musical instruments.

[blob]

1) Yes, but more importantly, it helps stop the crack from spreading if it does happen.
2) Well, not really for a few reasons I guess, of which the greatest is that you have the dimo, and if you rinse the dizi in water, you wet the dimo and thats the end of it.
And the water inside will actually interfere with the resonance of the flute, which is why for irish flute players, after playing a while, when there is a buildup of water in the flute through condensation of breath, they have to get rid of the water (blowing hard with all holes closed) otherwise the tone becomes a bit muffled.

3) Cracking in a dizi occurs most commonly because different parts (i.e. inside and outside) have too different temperatures too suddenly.. one part ones to perhaps contract or expand, another wants to stay the same... also, this can happen due to humidity, which is why on dryer climates, dizis crack much more often if not taken care of properly, here usually outside dries much faster, whilst inside stays moist-ish, so inside wants to maintain the same size, but the drier part wants to shrink, and you get a crack outside..

[jetz320]

Ok, first of all, the binding/wrapping of silk bound holds the flute together. So it won't crack. The only reason it will crack is because of a dramitc "Climate Change". Many dizi musicians have a winter and summer set. Mostly in Beijing, because it snows.

If ya wanna put H20 down your dizi, go ahead. Stupid move. Don't ever get the dizi wet or leave it in direct sunlight. It will ruin it. The only exception is for the dimo.

[YouLanFengChune]

winter and summer sets? Far as i know, my teachers and myself belief in 2 things JETz said abt dizis.

We have a new way of treating the bamboo before making to REDUCE cracking, but not 100% prevent it. It removes the resin from the bamboo naturally, keeping the minerals in it, thereby making the dizi "crispier sounding"

to ensure that the dizi does not crack, binding does very little to help. Instead, we keep it in PVC pipings, airtight when outdoors.

Soaking dizi is good ONLY IF, the dizi is 100% dry(neglected for months), and we only use 1 tablespoonful of water. A gentle wetness, and we use a long chopstick with cloth to dry it out.

JetZ, do you play dizi too? Lets have more fun in collaboration. I am looking for a partner to play a piece by Yu Xun Fa. Xi Xun Chuan LAi Le kai Huai, recorded over the internet, by 2 friends. Wanna try?

[jetz320]

HUH!!! Thanks for the offer. I play dizi regularly. I practice about .75 hour. I am currently still having trouble with reading of the music. I know the basics. But the dizi keys I don't get. You can email me the music and tell me which flute to use and the key required. That's what I don't get. Which flute should I use for this song?!!?

[PassionForTheWinds]

Oic tks.. then some dizi that don't have bindings, does that mean the bamboo is hard or stable enough to override being binded?

Oh yea, how to play the Bawu properly? Just put the mouth over the reed part? Is the metal reed fragile and how to prevent spoiling the part?

[YouLanFengChune]

Bawu is ez to play, hard to master.

The new dizi maker i employed has a new way of ensuring that bawu need not be controlled when we play. normal bawu needs to be controlled when we play the lowest note. a new bending of copper reed ensures this need not be so.

For Xi Xun, get a good E key dizi, and it should be easy.

[PassionForTheWinds]

Oic.. Hmm glad that Cadenza has moved up another notch =)

[YouLanFengChune]

weel, for dizis, there are even more designs. I'm waiting for official releases from my maker and company. There will be 5 year warranties, on all instruments made (dizi and erhu), treatment of bamboo and wood, scientific regularity of snakeskin (imagine a $200 erhu sounding like a $500 one) wood density and porosity studies, varnish studies and much much more.

Just to announce, you can get Cadenza Erhu in Osaka, Hiroshima, Tokyo, Tainan(taiwan) and Kowloon. Soon to come In Vancouver, Seattle and other places. Keep u posted real soon.