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Thread: Any Penny Whistle Players here

  1. #26
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    Default Re: Any Penny Whistle Players here

    Stupid question I'm sure but what is the sliding mouthpiece for on a tin whistle ?

  2. #27
    Mediocre but OK with that Paul Busman's Avatar
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    Default Re: Any Penny Whistle Players here

    Quote Originally Posted by yankees1 View Post
    Stupid question I'm sure but what is the sliding mouthpiece for on a tin whistle ?
    That allows the player to slightly tune the whistle to the pitch of other instruments.
    For wooden musical fun that doesn't involve strumming, check out:
    www.busmanwhistles.com
    Handcrafted pennywhistles in exotic hardwoods.

  3. #28
    Harley Marty
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    Default Re: Any Penny Whistle Players here

    Quote Originally Posted by bruce.b View Post
    I started out on whistle and flute. I could never play flute well due to injury, but got ok on whistle. Fiddle has also pretty much taken over my life. I’m trying to still fit in some tenor guitar to keep my chops up. Just recently I bought a Milligan high D whistle and am having a ton of fun with it. It’s an incredible whistle and is beautiful to just hold and look at. The tone is gorgeous and intonation is great. A high end whistle is pretty inexpensive compared to other instruments. If you are serious about checking out whistles I’d get a good whistle. I think it’s a bad idea to get a cheap one that is likely to play poorly, not be in tune, and just generally be uninspiring. The quality of good whistles for one or two hundred dollars is amazing. It’s exactly like playing a great mandolin, it makes you want to play it more often.
    I agree that you need a decent instrument to start on. I just got a cheap piccolo (€165) from China 3 days ago. It sounds like a D whistle but 10 times louder, which is perfect for the big sessions we have in Mullingar. Everyone thought it sounded great until I played a solo peice! Now I'm saving for a €1650 piccolo

  4. #29

    Default Re: Any Penny Whistle Players here

    Penny whistles are wonderful. I started down my musical path 60 years ago as a Db Piccolo player in our town band. Ten years later I had a tux, a union card, and was second chair flute and piccolo in a regional symphony. Tooting a flute paid my way through school, then asthma took my breath away. Time to find another profession. I moved to Scotland for grad school and fell in with a bunch of traditional players. Whistle takes less air than transverse flute, so I got some ‘Generation’ whistles still in regular use these decades later. I never found a meaningful improvement from more expensive whistles. I did find early training in breath control, ear training and reading music transferred easily to whistle. If a note does not sound right, bend and shape it until it fits. I love the ornamentation whistles make possible, though the calluses I got from playing things with steel strings means changing finger position some. Concert flutes can make amazing music: made of precious metals; are delicate mechanical monstrosities and can cost as much as a car. A simple tin whistle playing an old tune could bring tears to my granny’s eyes.

  5. #30
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    Default Re: Any Penny Whistle Players here

    Just ordered a Killarney brass D whistle and it should be here in about ten days or less. Good companion o my Milligan Cocobolo D whistle !

  6. #31
    Registered User Rob Ross's Avatar
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    Default Re: Any Penny Whistle Players here

    The memory is getting all foggy now, but I believe I taught myself fife before I got my hands on a whistle, so I knew most of the fingerings already, but I really learned a lot from Robin Williamson's "The Penny Whistle Book". It seems to be readily available used on the internet. It has American and British Isles tunes, and works it way slowly but steadily up to more complex tunes. The Clark Tin Whistle book mentioned by several folks is also an exceptionally good little book with a lot of good instruction and great tunes. I recommend you peruse Nigel Gatherer's site, it has been such a great source of so much and many types of music through the years. I have been highly appreciative of everything Nigel Gatherer has ever put forth even though I still double-clutch in jams because I always want to play the 3 part version of New Five Cents I learned as played by Don Grieser on CoMando Sessions Volume 1 and notated out on Nigel Gatherer's website. Everyone else plays a 2 part version. It's really their loss.

    I think at one point I was keeping Oak Publications solvent with my purchases: I taught myself mandolin from Jack Tottle's "Bluegrass Mandolin", taught myself fiddle tunes from Marion Thede's "The Fiddle Book", failed to learn how to play all those neat breaks in Gene Lowinger's "Bluegrass Fiddle", enjoyed finding all the great tunes in "O'Neill's Music of Ireland" and "The Gow Collection of Scottish Dance Music", and I still remember the great happiness I had as I left the San Francisco Lark in the Morning store with my very own copy of "The Fiddler's Fakebook" in my grubby mitts. Just this past week I had a delightful time at the Bozeman Scottish session playing tunes I learned 40 years ago from one of my all time favorite tune books, Robin Williamson's "English, Welsh, Scottish and Irish Fiddle Tunes."
    Rob Ross
    Apple Valley, Minne-SOH-tah

    1996 Flatiron A5-Performer, 1915 Gibson F-2 (loaned to me by a friend), 2008 Kentucky Master KM-505 A-Model
    1925 Bacon Peerless tenor banjo (Irish tuning), 1985 Lloyd Laplant F-5, 2021 Ibanez PFT2 Tenor Guitar (GDAE)
    and of course, the 1970 Suzuki-Violin-Sha Bowl Back Taterbug

  7. #32
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    Default Re: Any Penny Whistle Players here

    Still waiting for my Killarney whistle to arrive ! First song I want to learn is " The Last Rose of Summer".

  8. #33
    Mediocre but OK with that Paul Busman's Avatar
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    Default Re: Any Penny Whistle Players here

    Yankees1- In case it hasn't been mentioned above,I'd strongly advise you to learn to read sheet music if you don't know already. It may look daunting but it's really not hard at all, and it will give you access to literally thousands of tunes.
    A lot of people look down on sheet music,saying that the only "real" way to learn is by ear. Both ways have their advantages and disadvantages. Understand that the sheet music of a tune is only the bare bones,and it takes time and experience to flesh it out to the way you'll really want it to sound.Irish music is both simple and complicated. The basic tune may be relatively simple, but how it gets played,with ornamentation,variations,and rhythm are a whole other thing.
    For wooden musical fun that doesn't involve strumming, check out:
    www.busmanwhistles.com
    Handcrafted pennywhistles in exotic hardwoods.

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