Ocarinas United

Hi everyone,

I didn't learn about the ocarina through the zelda game. However, i study Chinese at an university and found out about an instrument called the Xun which has some kind af resemblance to the ocarina. And now, i really want to learn to play the ocarina.

I would like to find an ocarina of which the tones closely, or even fully (if possible) resemble the ones from the the ocarina played in the song "the sun rises" from the game "okami", link to the song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ya3yxTbkh5s .
It would be good if it was tuned in the key of C but it isn't obligatory and the brand doesn't matter.

Thank you for helping me.

Here's a link to someone playing The rising Sun (same song?) on ocarina!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBb8wzCMI80

he is playing a 12 hole Soprano C from http://www.stlocarina.com !

Hey thanks, OcarinaMan!
It's the same song and the tones the boy plays are the same as the ones in that song.
I also listenened to the sample on the site of STL and this is the one i'm going to buy.

(To be honest, i already watched it before since it's very easy to find but i wanted to hear it from some kind of expert since i didn't go to music school myself. The reason was the audio sample on the STL site, it's very hard to recognise the sound played in the video.)

One last question: every ocarina STL has, is chromatic, isn't it? Because some site warned me not to buy diatonic ones. However, i find it hard to believe 12 hole diatonic ocarinas exist.

12 hole ocarinas are fully chromatic!

You should also look into Focalink Ocarinas!

They are of professional quality at a great price!

They are sold at http://www.focalink.com/tw and http://www.songbirdocarina.com

Songbird is a distributor, so you can get them with a lower shipping price, but Focalink has a wider variety! Focalink is highly recommended by many ocarina players(I have a Focalink Double AC, and I absolutely love it!)

Well done, now don't know wich one to choose anymore
It's going to be either the 12 hole soprano from STL or the 12 hole soprano from Focalink.
I am not going to try double or triple ones yet, since it's my first musical experience.

Do you know more about that "wider variety" of ocarinas from Focalink?
Because they don't seem to have more 12 hole sweet potatoes than any other company.
Or were you talking about the customisation option? I know there is one but their site doesn't mention a lot about it.
Does it only involve the painting of the ocarina or are there also other things which can be changed?
I have just sent them a mail with the same question but perhaps your response is a bit quicker than theirs.

Focalink's options are actually wider than any other company because companies such as StL list different color ocarinas as different products, but Focalink lists all models of the same type together regardless of color, if you want a certain color you can email them to arrange an order! Also, the painted ocarinas have been done "custom" for people in the past, but I believe it does cost a little more.

you can see some examples here!

Focalinks are some of the easiest ocarinas to learn to play! And I guarantee you that you will NOT out grow the ocarina, professionals such as Hao Lun Hsu use them!

here's his channel: http://www.youtube.com/haolunhsu

and here's a video using an Alto C(which is usually recommended to start on because some people complain about ringing ears from playing soprano ocarinas(you could always get two(Alto C and soprano C!)): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhK22pDidI0

If you have any other questions, please ask! I really want you to have a good ocarina experience!

I finally got my first ocarina but it's not one of those high quality ocarinas.
After a long dispute with my parents it was decided that i wasn't allowed to order one on the internet.
My parents are afraid of that since you need to share private information for the shipping and payment.

So i was restricted to buying one here in Belgium and the only one i found was the schwarz tenor C.
After i got it, i went to look up information about it and found it's definitely not recommended for beginners since the amount of breath has to be very precise or something like that.

Nevertheless i'm going to try to master it.
Thanks for all the info!

Kissing88 on youtube has one of those! It was also his very first ocarina! He said that it require a very large volume of air, and a good tone is also hard to produce...

But, he said that in ways it is good to start on because other ocarinas will seem incredibly easy to play after wards!