Hi, buenas tardes.
My name is Quentin Howard from the group Sukai and we travel so much with Sukai and so many
people have asked us about the different wind instruments we play, the band pipes and kena
flutes that we are happy to have this opportunity to have some time to show you how to play
those instruments and to tell you what we know about them.
So to do that we have Carlos Crespo who along with myself we play the wind instruments in
the Andes and I guess there's a whole family of pan pipes that have been handed down from
tradition, traditional festivals that still take place in the countryside among farmers
and miners in the Andes today and of those family of pan pipes the smallest is called
the Icas and maybe Carlos can play a small sound of it, Icas.
And then four octaves away from the Icas the largest pan pipes are called Toyos and just
to hear a contrast of the sound of Toyos.
But the most popular of the pan pipes are Sampoña and Sanca and maybe on the Sampoña
we'll just show how to hold the instrument and how to make a clear sound on it.
You hold the instrument vertically like Carlos will show, you hold it vertically, don't tilt
it in any one direction because you want to have the ear coming down at a 45 degree
angle and the ear is coming from your diaphragm, a push of your diaphragm but also it's being
pushed by your tongue and that's an important point in playing the pan pipe.
So when you have your first pan pipe you want to try to get a very clear note, you keep
working to get a clear sound and Carlos will play just one note.
It shouldn't have a muffled sound, it should have that very clear note but then the first
obstacle people have in playing the pan pipe is that they take one breath and they put
the entire breath into one pipe and of course they do that for three, four or five pipes
and they are hyperventilated.
So the first secret of playing the pan pipe is you take a big breath and you should be
able to go back and forth along the pan pipe or at least play a whole phrase of the song
with that one breath by putting a little bit of air into each tube.
So maybe Carlos with one breath will show us.
So these are the first exercises that you should try on your pan pipe.
So this is an important technique in playing the pan pipe and if you catch it right from
the beginning then your playing is going to be excellent and the point is that you have
to make the note with your tongue and if you can watch Carlos maybe just without the
pan pipe pushing the air from his mouth with his tongue.
And so you also have another style of playing in the Andes where you don't have that clear
sound but you'll get an entirely breathy or windy sound and it will just have the air
blown across the pan pipe.
So often these techniques are even combined, the playing a strong clear note mixed with
especially in the new traditional music coming from the Andes today.
And when you see the pan pipe you'll see it's divided into two parts, every pan pipe.
Two rows of tubes and this is because in the ancient times the pan pipe was actually separated
so that two persons would play the one instrument and a musical scale actually would be alternated
back and forth between the two persons.
And then in more modern times the instrument was put together and played where as today
Carlos will make a scale.
So that was just made by alternating between the two rows of pipes, alternating the blowing
to get the scale and in contrast to playing back and forth like we showed before.
But now we'll try our first melody and we can try it on a piece written by Carlos called
Huero in Rhythm of Carnival and he'll do the melody just using the two rows of pipes singly
like is used mostly in the contemporary folk music today in Bolivia and do the melody slowly
for Huero.
So that's the melody from Huero in Rhythm of Carnival and you notice that one technique
that Carlos was doing and of course he was doing in slow motion but when you hear the
song up to speed you realize he'll be sliding the breath along the pipes to give a sound
like and so a lot of times to begin a phrase or even to end a phrase sometime that technique
is used judiciously in certain songs.
So maybe you notice that in playing the panpipe that both Carlos and I are using different
are playing on different sides of the panpipe and Carlos would be playing with the bass
notes to the left like on a piano and I'll be playing with the bass notes on the right
and we really haven't figured out why we do that maybe Carlos says because he's a man
and I'm a woman so we have to play opposite ways but it's just a matter of preference
the way you want to play but the important technique though is to remember that the air
is coming up is being pushed in from the stomach from the diaphragm the force and you're taking
in the air in the mouth with the mouth you're going you're sucking in the air with your
mouth and that will be an important point when you start to play more rapidly on the
panpipe maybe we could hear Carlos play the same melody but just a little faster like
at medium speed the melody we just played before.
So when there's more than one person playing and more than one panpipe playing sometime
the panpipe will play accompanying chords or sometime it'll play the harmony actually
the harmony or sometime it'll just play creative grace notes or something creative behind the
other panpipe but in Weirdo Carlos wrote a second panpipe playing the harmony and it
So now if you put those together you'll hear the sound of weirdo as we as we play it maybe
in a show so this is weirdo with the harmony and the melody.
So that was an example of playing the Sampoña using the both halves and remember we played
a scale before in the ancient tradition of playing the panpipe separating the instrument
into two parts there and that means it took two musicians to play the melody and so in
that form we'll try the next piece a song written by Carlos called White Assin.
So if you have a panpipe now that's already bound the two parts together you don't have
to cut them open to play separate like we just did but you can if you have a friend
who has another panpipe you can play the top row for instance and the other person can
play the bottom row and you can have the same effect so we'll play a few times through
White Assin and maybe we'll combine the technique we showed before of the breathy blowing and
so panpipes come in any key any tone or key and these panpipes the typical ones we're
playing Sampoña size are in the key of E minor or G major and if you're playing with
other instruments like a piano or a guitar you might want to know what notes are on each
pipe so maybe I'll say the notes and Carlos will indicate on them so that's E is the first
row but the second pipe that starts the scale E F sharp G A B C D E F sharp G A B and they're
alternated like that now any melody that you know any melody that you can sing with your voice then
you can try to find on the panpipe you can play on the panpipe but maybe we'll try some more melodies
written by the group this next one is called Yijia and Carlos will play on it first on the
Sanca which is the octave of the Sampoña and he'll play very slowly and so if you have a
panpipe try to follow along with the with the Sanca Yijia
so you probably noticed that the vibrato adds a very special quality to the playing and the
way the vibrato is done is it's done with the diaphragm or with the stomach but also with the
air that collects in the cheeks and maybe Carlos will just show us some vibrato on the
and maybe some vibrato on the on the larger panpipes
and actually the longer you're playing the Sanca the more them and the kind of flute the more the
muscles will begin to build around your mouth so if you can't get that vibrato effect right at the
beginning you shouldn't be discouraged because it comes with time it comes with continual playing
and repeating all the melodies you know on the Sampoña and then playing them over and over again
and with practice comes this increased muscle in the in the cheeks and around the mouth and that
gives that beautiful vibrato sound so we might learn the next simple melody using one of the
techniques in the Andes that is kind of like the sound of an echo where one musician will play a
very simple melody and the other musician will simply play the same melody but in syncopated
time and sort of echo it back and forth so Carlos will just play the simple melody and everyone
could pick that up with your panpipe
so now remember with each note you're trying to get a clear sound in every tube and we'll try the
melody and we'll try another person playing the melody syncopated and see the effect that makes
so there's a variety of different panpipes in the Andes and one of them is a simple one road
flute called Antara and it's tuned diatonically and on this flute maybe Carlos will show us
another technique of getting half tones on single pipes and he does this by bending the
the Antara or the panpipe toward him and then rectangle and then perpendicular again to get
the regular note maybe you can show us how you do that and maybe Carlos will play to a
melody a sad melody called Mama Luna that he wrote just a piece of that
then
now we'll go back to the two row Sampogna and just to review some of the important things that you
shouldn't forget when you're practicing is you want to hold the Sampogna perpendicular don't
bend it to try to get your notes even if they come more easily try to keep it perpendicular and
remember that you're spitting with your tongue air into each of the tubes a little bit of air
and you're pushing with the force of your diaphragm and you're resonating with your cheeks
which will probably eventually come by itself so now I'll try an older melody a traditional
melody that's played in the festival times when there's a lot of men playing only panpipes and
drums no string instruments
now if you're playing Sampogna with the Sanca you remember those are tuned an octave apart
there are any kind of creative ways that they can augment each other and one of the ways is
in a song we play in Sukai and it's usually accompanied by singing verses but we'll just
do the instrumental part and it's called Te Estrañare and it's in rhythm of saia and starts
with the Sampogna
we'd like to show you how a simple melody that Carlos played one day became the song
that we play in concert called Tutaiai and here's how Carlos first played it
and so then as the song was being arranged Carlos chose to use the Toyos and the Icas
to play the same phrase so now maybe just to hear the sound and feel free you should play
along with your Sampogna because these are still tuned in the key of E minor or G
and now you'll hear the song as played by Sukai in concert
so the Kena is a notched flute and along with the Sampogna the pan pipes are some of the most
ancient instruments that were handed down in the Andes the Kena has holes it's hollow on one end
and the notch is part of a mouthpiece that's a little difficult at first for people who have
never played the Kena but if you want to understand it better you might take an ordinary
recorder this this one is primitive but an ordinary recorder will have a mouthpiece built
on top and that will direct the air to this notch and so anyone who puts their mouth on a recorder
automatically gets the sound but the Kena would be the principle as if you imagine that the top
part of the record is cut off and so you have to make that mouthpiece precisely with your lips by
finding the air shift and having it hit the edge actually so that half the air is actually
directed in the flute and the other half out you do that by taking the Kena and moving it back
and forth on your mouth and trying to hear a clear sound so you might get breath at first and then
a clear sound will appear and when it does you should try to remember where that Kena was on
your mouth like feel a sensation of the flute on your mouth and then it will be easier when
you try to play the Kena again you'll put it back in the same place and an important thing is how
to hold it you want to brace the Kena with some of your fingers the thumb and back fingers at
the ends so that it feels pretty solid and you're able to hold it like this also when you're making
your first sound don't put any holes don't cover any of the holes the reason being is because if
a little air is escaping if they're not properly covered no sound will come out and you won't know
if that's if you're improperly blowing or if it's because the holes aren't covered so first make
your sound with no holes and then you'll begin to do a scale and maybe Carlos will just make
a scale on the Kena so that's a scale of two octaves actually the Kena has a third octave
which is sometimes hard on the ears but we'll stay today with the two octaves of the Kena and
maybe Carlos can go back once more and play the lower octave and the higher octave of the Kena
on each note and so he's getting the higher octave by blowing on a note and then for the
the higher octave he's making his lips tighter and he's blowing harder and simply that it's
the same fingering but it's just blowing harder on the note that will give the second octave so
along with the Kena in the end is the Canacho or its bass counterpart is also played and they
both have the same principle they have a hole in the back and then six holes in the front and then
the key of the flute these this is in a minor it will begin here this is a lower note but the
the flute will begin to actually on this note and that will be played in a minor or the same
Kena can be played in E minor D minor or B minor the Kena is more flexible than the symphony in
that aspect and also you can make half tones on the Kena and it's important that that's learned
at the same time you learn to play a clear note you want to make half tones on the Kena
so first we'll start with a simple melody by Carlos and then we'll show the principle of making
half tones
now the whole beauty of playing the songs on the Kena is that the Kena lends itself to put a lot of
techniques and beautiful bends and trills and different different little ways of moving your
finger to bring in a lot of feeling and emotion into the can and one of them is is a bending
of the Kena maybe Carlos shows a little piece of
and then also you can put grace notes on to Kena and this is used in almost every song you'll hear
and that'll that'll come by just hammering down you're hammering down on the on the note
and sometime you're even coming up on a note in a melody like you may go
and that'll be included with trills and and bends and it'll give a beautiful feeling to the melodies
you play maybe we'll try a melody written by Carlos called Tutayai and he'll start off by
playing the low octave very slowly and then later the song of course is played on the second octave
but maybe we can follow along with your Kena on the low octave for Tutayai
do
that song you heard a lot of notes that are bent and they give that beautiful emotional
quality so maybe Carlos will show us how he bends those notes
and those bends are very important because eventually you're going to be making
half tones and you need to even make a half tone for the scale of for the key of A minor
because you're going to be making the F in that key with the half tone even when you do that
ordinary scale when you come to the F here's the E you have to make the F with the half finger so
maybe Carlos will show us some half half tones
and there are two ways basically of doing that some Kenes in the Andes will open the finger
and others will roll the finger up roll the finger up to get a half tone
or you can open it on the side and that's any way you choose any way you can make
clear sounding half note is important to practice so the song Tutayai that Carlos played before on
the low octave is actually played on the upper octave and he'll begin by playing Tutayai now on
the high octave
so
now the harmony of Tutayai which you'll hear on on the record is actually much easier than the
melody and it's played on the lower active so maybe we'll do the harmony and it has a
few half tones in it so
do
and now we'll put those together the harmony and the it's not exactly the harmony it's like
an arrangement of the song Tutayai two different parts actually and Carlos will play the melody
and I'll play the lower part
so
do
so now don't be discouraged if when you're playing and you're just beginning to learn the kena
if you find that after getting a sound or having a sound for a few minutes then you're unable to
have a sound and it's because the muscles around the lips need time need sometimes months to form
and you're you may be able to get a sound at first but you have to wait and just be patient
and play a little each day and then you'll have muscles that are strong enough to keep the lips
tightened and if you also have a problem having your initial sound try smiling and then closing
your mouth and putting the flute and be very careful not to touch the top part of your lip
onto the flute the top part cannot touch the wooden edge so you're playing here and like the
symphony you're also spitting air into it it's you're blowing with your tongue so you're
and so maybe we'll try one more melody and we'll try the melody and then the harmony part
and this is an ecuadorian piece of folklore called toro beroso
so
that was the melody of toro beroso and now let's hear the harmony played by carlos
do
so now the melody toro beroso with the kenya and harmony and melody together
do
so we hope you enjoyed this tape and have learned at least the basics of playing the south american
uh pan pipes and flutes and also if you would like to get instruments and records or tapes
you might write to sukai and care of homespun tapes we make all our own instruments the kenya's
i make the pan pipes carlos makes and everyone in the group participates on them so if you have
any questions feel free to write to us and that's all thanks so we're gonna maybe finish with a song
uh that we play during the the tape but it's called weirdo and we'll just start
off where the kenya combines with the pan pipes
so
you