Yet another “Rainbow” poplar flute, a simple drone in design, but complex in the build. The flute is 21 inches in length, with two one inch diameter sound chambers.It's a large drone, and requires a substantial amount of lung capacity. The mouthpiece is shaped from laminates of beautiful twice dyed/stabilized Box Elder burl, between layers of Amboyna burl (the most expensive burl in the world) and capped with this rainbow poplar, which you know to be a brownish green.
The fetish blocks, although absolutely identical in shape, have subtle differences in terms of inlay and overlay. They are cut from bookmatched box elder burl, bonded to bases of Oklahoma red cedar. Wing overlay includes Tiger Sycamore, a different variety of paua abalone for each block, and are capped with White Ash.
Inlay for this flute, beginning at the mouthpiece, includes an 11x13mm Mexican boulder opal, flanked by 5.2mm dome cut Australian fire opal solids. The fetish ties run through the flute rather than around the compression chamber, giving me a surface for additional inlay. Specifically, on each side, 18mm disks of box elder burl, are accented with inlay of copper cuprite, pipestone, malachite, chrysocolla, and turquoise from Globe Arizona’s famous Sleeping Beauty mine. (The pipestone was generously donated by flutemaker Joe Nulph for this project).
Moving toward the foot, or far end of the flute, the sound chamber is accented with a 20x25 mm Mexican crazy lace agate, while the finger holes are set off by four 4.8 mm paua abalone cabs, and an 8x10 mm quartz capped oval of 70 million year old ammolite from the Alberta Bearpaw formation. Now classed as a gemstone, ammolite is mined at only two locations in the world, and based on carats extracted per ton, considered the rarest gemstone in the world. In addition, taking advantage of the spine thickness, a 9x10 mm Australian boulder opal was inlaid to the far end of the flute.
Lastly, one fetish block has a 4.8 mm orange pearl set to the crown, with 2.0 mm natural faceted African cognac diamonds, set as eyes. The other includes a 5.6 mm black pearl set to the crown, and 2.3 mm faceted African black diamonds, again, inlaid as eyes.
The flute was tuned at 71.4 degrees F, at 75% humidity, and the finger holes are very slightly dished.
Purchase includes a removable/slide off wrap of South Dakota prairie rattlesnake skin mostly because it’s the same rainbow color as the wood, which would be green. The instrument also comes with a two piece Manzanita burl display stand, and a saddle tan deerskin full waterfall fringe soft case from Ann Charles of Kanza leathers, valued at $170.00.