Terry, please share pics of your ocarina when it arrives!  I used to want one very badly, so I will live vicariously through the many vids you will share....  

Hi Eileen,

That's very cool!  There's a fellow in New Zealand who makes wooden double ocarinas where opne side is a drone note, and they are made with an interval that sounds rather medieval...sounds so pretty!  -see the pure white wood one on the middle of this page, with a sound clip:  http://www.wood-n-bone.co.nz/musical_instruments.html

I didn't keep up with learning my ocarina.  However I did actually learn to play the bones in the end ok (yay), and I'm making progress on penny whistle now...which is sort of vaguely related to ocarina I suppose?...I mean, you blow into both of them at one end and cover the various holes to make music, right?  

I started out checking out the medieval and renaissance music forum on here, and somehow got segued into this double ocarina.  Oh dear!  They look beautifully made and this one is in F and C with similar fingering to the C and F recorders, with which I'm familiar.  Ah temptation yet again!  http://hindocarina.com/ocarinas/index.php?l=product_detail&p=84  and

That's worth a lot Strumelia.  I've been practicing Christmas songs on harmonica.  Thinking perhaps I can learn a couple on Ocarina within a couple of weeks.  We'll see.

P.S., for what it's worth.... when I was fooling with my ocarina way back then, I did notice that various Christmas carols sounded very pretty and festive on ocarina.  It's that time of year now, so don't be afraid to try your favorite holiday/winter tunes.  

Peace, good will, and sound logic.

Terry, I'm afraid I didn't keep up with learning my ocarina.  I'd have to start all over from scratch again, and now I'm spending my 'learn new instrument energy' on learning the bones.  Sure wish I had three more weeks every month to just have fun and play everything I wish I could!  I'll be reading this thread though, to have vicarious fun from you all!  

Gonna have to wait a spell on me.  I won't have my first ever Ocarina until sometime next week.

Strumelia, please give us a demonstration of you playing your Ocarina.   

This is all pretty cool.  Ok, so where are the vids of you all practicing and playing??  

Enjoy them Terry, I know our house is happier with them playing upstairs. (They're a little loud) I always know that my son is happy when I hear him play.

After much research, I am so excited and can hardly wait for my C & G Mountain Ocarinas to come to my home.   My wife is even excited.  The sounds of the Ocarinas are beautiful.   Like a Pan Flute 

Now I really have to go find mine! 

He is a good performer, for sure. Makes very good slides, which makes the ocarina sing!

Shared this video with my so who plays ocarina. He told me he has seen a lot of David Erick Ramos' videos, and that the wall of ocarina's seen in this video are about 1/10th of what he owns. 

Nice, a wall full of ocarina's

I picked up one at a sale shaped like an Armadillo for my son who plays ocarina. I don't think anyone even knew what it was, because they sold it to me for a quarter. It's definitely unique!

Somewhere I have a small one that kind of looks like a terracotta pig.  I'll have to see if I can find it.

Just ordered a Mountain Ocarina today.  Couldn't help myself.  G tuned,  cost $24.00 plus shipping.

My thinking is that at 69, I'll never be really good  at  any instrument,  because I dabble in too many, and started to late.  But it's just too much darn fun to change.

Hopeless and satisfied.

Well my alto C seedpod strawfire ocarina showed up on Friday. Fits nicely in the hand and feels lovely to hold.

The Aria ones do sound lovely, good choice! I like the brown glazed seedpods as well, earthy tones, and no 2 are quite the same.

Ruth It's an Aria tenor, not nearly as high as the soprano. Cats don't seem to care for my ocarina OR my rebec....just too piercing for them- they run for the door like crazy! lol

I like those brown raku-style seedpods, they sound nice too I think. The twleve hole isn't much diff from the ten hole ones- those two tiny 'extra' holes on the 12 hole give you a couple of very handy sharp or flat notes, but you don't have to use them. That enables you to play in a couple more keys, or songs that have an accidental note here and there. I notice lots of xmas carols have those notes. But good thinking to start on a 6 hole or 8 hole pod Oc.

What brand of ocarina? And given the cats reaction, was it soprano? I'm toying with getting either a seedpod or scarab style one from Songbird, but an alto. Both these are 6 holes, the 12 hole ones look too daunting.

Love the NA also, Only have three.

I love the NA flute too! Infact I like them so much I have 6 and just sent some wood this morning to a flute maker to have one made. lol I even attend 3 different flute circles in my area. Tons of fun

Yeah right, I'll be playing Stairway to Heaven soon....or Zelda's Lullaby....

I love the part about the cats! When my neighbors had a dog, I could play harmonica in my dining room and make him bark and howl along with the music next door. My cats never seemed to mind. My wife, on the other hand... well, I never had an actual curfew, but she says she can relate! And playing while on the road generally requires going further away from civilization than the people who smoke.

I had to refresh my memory on ocarinas. Rock on!

I bought an ocarina last week, and have been having some fun on it.

I've always loved the sound of recorders and whistles playing early music- medieval and renaissance, even just early folk tunes. Well made ceramic ocarinas can sound pretty nice once you get the hang of controlling proper intonation with your breath, especially if you learn a little vibrato. I've never played a wind instrument before, but always wanted to try one. I do have a passion for learning new things and exploring new musical challenges.

The challenge in this case is- I'm using it as a little tool to improve my limited skill at reading music (standard notation sheet music). I can pick out tunes in standard notation, but it's a laborious process for me- I want to be able to sight read sheet music better than I do. Surprising how this ocarina is actually helping a lot with that. My ocarina plays in key of C, but can play sharps and flats as well, so I'm just starting by playing very simple early tunes in C with limited range and reading them from the sheet music rather than using 'ocarina tab' like many folks do. Ocarina tab is pretty annoying, and if I'm going to spend any effort learning to read anything I figure it might as well be something I can use for any instrument.

I'm learning a lot and it sounds pretty...sometimes. To me at least. lolol...

The high notes can be a bit intense, and after only like four days, the cats Suki and Sheba just know. As soon as they see me take the ocarina out of the box they both rush to the door and run downstairs to get away from me. Brian set an ocarina curfew of 10 PM. Whaa....?? Suddenly I'm a leper.