Because Dick Feynman became obsessed with Tuva or Bust, then died just before a planned trip with his friend--Muricans discovered throat singing.

This is best explanation of the phenom I've heard. No euphemisms re the "other students" "who aren't very good" !! 'We' would never say that!

I don't grok the whistle method; I can whistle with mouth sl. open, using tongue for pitch--but this is something Completely Different.
(I just Know that, had M. Python discovered this technique back then--well, you can almost Hear that skit.)

that a Murican could/would win over a Tuvan, in one of the styles?! And Learn Tuvan, to boot..
Makes rest of us all seem rilly-lazy.
Will audition some of the (crap-quality) mp3s and ponder springing for the flic.

Thanks for the tip. Lots of links there, tying-in RPF and friends-- those poor bastards have been fighting-off Russky imperialism forever.

(Maybe this is comparable to 'rotary breathing', by wind instrument players: Galway on flute, Sergei N., Wynton and others now, on brass..)
Makes it possible to play Perpetuum Mobile for Ex. with no pauses for breathing. Eerie on first hearing.
Rotary seems a step towards throat-singing prestidigitations; at least I'd guess that, if you could train self for the former--you'd have a chance at grokking the latter.

(Hearsay from a trumpet player at a Sergei concert: he damned near asphyxiated-self, in recording Perpetuum! he (alone among those who've recorded it) tongued
ie 'attacked' each note, rather than slurring; need extra air, etc. One-of-a-Kind is S.)

Wonder what bizarre stresses accompany throat-singing..

Wish I'd gotten the Word ... a while back.

(I think.. Rafael Mendez, the über-trumpeter of my yout, had accomplished this feat, though I heard nada about that until much later)
--it certainly wasn't even a topic, amidst instrumentalists du jour.
Lucky you-seeing it live!
I'd hoped that Sergei might do Bumblebee as an encore, at his local appearance. Nah.. Carnival of Venice.