going to start playing piccolo (once i get one)but soon this month i think but any tips you have for me would be great thanks
oh is it possible that the piccolo can cause ear damage to it`s player?

erm, get a piccolo with a black body (lol dunno the word... i play a diff instrument... lower joint?) b/c in my opinion silver ones ring in ur ears too much haha... dunno... the good oens just have a black bottom half, made out of... plastic? haha i have no idea what i`m talking about, forget my avdice lol.. bye... haha, good luck w/ piccolo tho.

I consider the lasty post a load of nonsense. Metal-bodied piccolos can be as sweet-sounding as any timber or plastic one.

How pleasant the sound is depends almost entirely on the player, and how much embouchure and breath control he/she has.

A lot of piccolo playing can DEFINITELY damage your ears, especially if you play loud. Just as the volume at a night club, or sitting in front of brass players
can.

A rough guide is that if at any time your ears are ringing, then damage has just been done.

The damage is cumulative, so you may not notice the effects for a few decades. The damage cannot be undone.

If you are doing a lot of piccolo practice, then either play quietly - difficult! but possible - or get some form of ear protection.

i play piccolo.. i love it! i have a completely silver one.. a yamaha YPC-30 I LOVE IT!! and i would recomend it..

i have a wooden yamaha .... it`s lovely to play on!
beth x

I would recommend a Yamaha, whether it be a silver plated piccolo or a wooden one. I have a wooden one. I will say this, if you`re playing it for band, you have got to get used to sticking out. Your sticking out is caused by, as you probably already know, the piccolo playing one octave higher than the flute. You just have to get used to it. Plus, when you`re practicing ALWAYS use your tuner. My piccolo always goes extremely sharp. You mostly have to roll in or out, not like adjusting your headjoint on flute. But, if you`re EXTREMELY sharp, like me , you might have to pull out just a tad to get a little better in tune.

"....My piccolo always goes extremely sharp. ..."

I`m sure you did not mean to say that. It is the player`s way of playing that is sharp. You cannot really blame the piccolo, especially a good one like Yamaha.

BTW, the higher you play, the less reliable a tuner is, because it is checking against a `tempered` mathematical scale.

In reality:
1. True scales, that our ears prefer to hear, are slightly different in tuning.

2. Our ears EXPECT the tuning to go sharper as the notes get higher. (the tuner does not)

3. We are used to hearing and playing with pianos. The octaves of a piano are almost always `stretched` slightly more than an octave, for the sake of compromises too complex to write about here. So if you play with a piano, or your concept of piano tuning, then as you go higher you will have to play sharper to keep in tune.

Say a trumpet is playing sharp, and a piccolo is playing an octave higher. Unless the piccolo tunes perfectly to the trumpet`s out-of-tune note, the `beat frequencies` will sound ghastly, so good tuning in this situation is to follow the trumpet, unless the trumpet player can be corrected.

Always, there is seldom perfect tuning. It is a compromise that sounds best, note by note, in the situation you find yourself in. The player must listen to the contest around him/her, ALL THE TIME, and make adjustments by embouchure changes, in an ongoing manner. There is probably no instrument that this is more true for than a piccolo. The result of doing this will usually be rather different from playing to what a tuner thinks are the right notes.

Its true, people say piccolo is sharp more than it actually is, because they arent used to hearing those higher pitches.
Metal Pic`s are good for marching, so are plastic ones...
if your simply playing for yourself or in a orchestra/ concert setting, try to grab a wood one. wood has a sweet tone, they are very nice.. yamaha`s are good, decent articulation, and like their flutes they have a good tonal color.. HOWEVER older wood flutes tend to be good.. i got mine on e-bay, its a Christenson (he worked with William S. Haynes and Verne Q. Powell) and the only two pics I`ve ever played that compare are Lillian Burkarts and original (made BY powell himself) powell piccolo`s. gemeinhardt has a good piccolo to.
BUT! remember, even though the instrument does matter, a good player can make a broken one even sound like gold... and have LOTS OF FUN!... invest in ear plugs, it CAN dammage hearing, its at a high enough decible to do dammage...