This has been in the works for a while now, and I have been hinting at it in numerous social media posts and ocarina group chats, but I am excited to now finally present a look at the first ever official batch of high end wooden pendant ocarinas from Bretti Musical Instruments!
This development ultimately came about from discussions with members of the ocarina community. Before, I had never even given pendants any thought, nor did I have any interest in them myself whatsoever. However, now that I have jumped straight into the world of pendants, I must say I have come to absolutely enjoy both making and playing them. There is truly a special charm about having a fully capable instrument that is so compact to take everywhere with you, and even small enough to wear!
My pendant ocarinas follow the same design inspired from my inline development, with the same methods of crafting, finishing, and details. Like my inlines, very pendant consists of a body, a top, a decorative lamination if required, and a solid aromatic cedar or redwood mouthpiece. The insides of the body and outside of the mouthpiece is brush coated with numerous layers of high-grade, 100% food grade and edible shellac, with the outside of the bodies hand polished with a oil-based hardening varnish. Each pendant also includes a 3.5mm drilled hole for a neck cord to be worn, and every pendant will come with a beautiful 3mm black waxed cotton cord.
These pendants are made a 7-hole pendants (standard 6-hole pendant fingering plus 1 sub-hole for dropping down a semi-tone below the fundamental) for a total range of 18 chromatic notes! Each pendant is carefully voiced with sweetness and clarity across the range, with a low breath curve that makes them effortless to play even at the high end. Despite these ocarinas being very small instruments, I still consider them fully capable, high quality musical instruments, and with a respectable range for a portable pendant with only one note less than my standard extended range inlines, these pendants have tremendous flexibility in the music they can play. And despite being smaller and higher pitched soprano ocarinas, the wooden body construction helps mellow the tone, and with the low breath pressure means you can play these without harsh shrillness or painful volumes at the high end like other clay and plastic sopranos.
This batch consists of 6 soprano pendant ocarinas (SN 051-056). This ocarina batch is also especially unique as it includes ocarinas with multiple keys (a mix of soprano E5 and F5 ocarinas), and every ocarina in the set is made up a unique selection of woods. A summary of the woods for each ocarina is as follows:
SN 051 (E5): curly birch, bloodwood, Italian olivewood, aromatic cedar
SN 052 (F5): ribbon stripe afrormosia, bloodwood, Italian olivewood, aromatic cedar
SN 053 (E5): curly mango, zebrawood, aromatic cedar
SN 054 (F5): curly eucalyptus, bloodwood, reclaimed figured maple, aromatic cedar
SN 055 (F5): madrone, wenge, ambrosia maple, aromatic cedar
SN 056 (F5): figured bubinga, aromatic cedar
Full in-depth details of every ocarina, as well as the story behind the pendant development, features of the pendants, sound samples, and a full song demo from this batch is now available on the Bretti Musical Instruments YouTube page:
First Official Pendant Batch Unveiling! – Batch #20 – Feb 2026
Ye Banks and Braes O’ Bonnie Doon – Soprano F5 Pendant Ocarina
Additional details for the new pendant ocarinas can also be found on the dedicated Pendant Ocarinas page, where I include all of the general details, range, available keys, dimensions, and other resources. This is only the first of many pendant batches to come, already with new keys and sizes in production now, so this page will be updated with further information as new pendants are released. I also plan on making my pendant ocarinas a permanent standard offering, and will be releasing new batches on a regular basis. Keep an eye out for a lot more exciting selections to come!
