Dizi, Chinese Bamboo Flutes by Xie Bing

I had a new batch of Dizis (Chinese Bamboo Flute) that came in today by a maker called Xie Bing (解兵).

Xie Bing's flutes were actually brought to my attention by Zhan Yong Ming, who is a 1st grade Dizi performer in China. He was in China a while ago and we asked him if he could pick and bring back one lot of Xie Bing Dizis to Singapore.

He came to our shop this afternoon with the Dizis. I'm not a flute player so I'm usually very excited when excellent flute players share their opinions on the different Dizi makers.

Zhan Yong Ming was full of praise for Xie Bing's Dizis. He told me the quality of his Dizis has improved tremendously over the years. XB's flutes are easy to play, has excellent tone and has excellent intonation. He has been introducing the Dizis to all his students recently.

He took a few Dizis and tested the different octaves in front of me. I not so discreetly took out my digital camera and took a few clips.

By the way, he just used scotch-tape to tape over the dimo hole for convenience sake. So you can imagine how good it sounds with the dimo on:









See how the high notes are reached with ease.

And they look gorgeous as well:



I have his F, E and D key flutes listed on my website currently:

- Xie Bing F key Dizi
- Xie Bing E key Dizi
- Xie Bing D key Dizi

The keys not listed but in stock are high A, high G, C, low A and low G. You can contact me at tansungwah@eason.com.sg if you want to order them.

I know some of you might be thinking, these bamboo flutes might be prone to cracking. What if I bought one and it cracks not due to my negligence?

Well, we have good news for you. We've spoken to Xie Bing and he has agreed to do a 1 to 1 exchange if his Dizi cracks due to climatic changes (not if you drop it on the floor or bash your friend with it.)

But please take good care of it by keeping it in the cloth case provided when you are not playing it. Do not hang it out to dry after playing.

So there you have it. Xie Bing's Dizis. Quality guaranteed. You get a new piece if it cracks naturally. (We'll need to bill you US$12 for the return postage though)

If you are interested in seeing performances of Zhan Yong Ming, here are some youtube videos of him when he was younger:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxKiaB3GNPA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrYqfkCuzLo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOGm6RlF9zI

A search would yield more results.