+50 year Trumpet player, new to Irish whistle

Whistle
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I’ve been playing trumpet semi-professionally for the past 50 years and have recently fell in love with the Irish whistle. Without starting a flame war, I’d like to solicit opinions from the Chiff & Fipple hivemind.

After surfing the interwebby, I feel that I’ve found my tribe! Yes, I am an unrepentant gear head as I currently own seven trumpets: Bb, C & Eb trumpets, Bb cornet, Bb flugelhorn, A/Bb piccolo, and an Eb baroque (no valve) trumpet. I currently play in a British-style brass band, symphony orchestra and professional big band.

At a recent Sea Shanty Festival, I participated in a tin whistle workshop. I am now the proud owner of a McBrides high D whistle (that cost me a whole CAD$15). I’m still getting used to coordinating 6 fingers as opposed to 3 (well, 4 on the piccolo).

My goal is to get to the point where I can jump on stage and jam with other musicians without embarrassing anyone (particularly myself).

I realize that I’m still a rank beginner on the whistle but I’d like to upgrade to a better quality instrument to learn on. My budget is around CAD$200/US$150/€125.

Given all that, what whistle would you recommend I try? My local music shop only stocks whistles similar to what I already have.

Thanks in advance.

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I’ve found over the years that people coming to whistle from other instruments, especially Brass, Sax, and Highland bagpipes, prefer whistles that require a stronger force of wind. They’re used to putting a lot more air through their instruments than whistles require.

There’s a dichotomy there, because many people who play whistle as their only instrument, or primary instrument, especially people coming from a pure Trad background, prefer very light-blowing whistles.

I’ve pretty consistently found that musicians coming from Brass, Sax, etc love Michael Burke whistles.

They have a wider bore ratio and wider windway for a given size/key so they need more air putting through them.

They have a bigger, fatter low end than most, and require more “support”, a stronger blow, in the high notes than most. People coming from other instruments, like you, nearly always find that more natural and satisfying.

And no doubt Burkes are really good professional whistles (literally, I’ve seen a number of Studio Musician “doublers” use them).

They have very smooth consistent voicing, and play extremely consistently across the gamut of keys/sizes.

Be aware that Burke offers High D whistles with two bore ratios, the “narrow bore” and the “session bore” (which is wider). You’d probably get on best with the Session Bore. All of the other Burke keys/sizes have the wider bore ratio as a matter of course.

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Richard’s advice is very insightful.

My first thought is always that you could become the world’s best player on the whistle you already have. If it can play two octaves without you having to deploy workarounds to fix the tuning, it’s fine. But it’s true some cheap whistles aren’t up to snuff, and it’s true it can be harder for a beginner to make them sound good.

If you’re having to hold back on the breath with your current whistle, or to allow air to leak out of the sides of your mouth, a wide bore will likely be more comfortable. But if you’re happy with an air-efficient one, it might be easier to get a sweet tone out of mid-priced brass whistles such as Lir and Killarney. It will take a while to work out your preferences, and at least with those brands you shouldn’t lose half your outlay on the resale if you decided to move on.

Enjoy!

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I personally like Colin Goldie soft blower whistles better than any other whistle. Their tuning is immaculate, their volume is more consistent than any whistle, and they have the strongest lower end of any decent whistle (including a Burke, in my opinion).

I also love Roy MacManus’s whistles. Not quite as balanced volume-wise between the octaves, but they have a lovely sound and are very easy to play.

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I would like to second pancelticpiper’s recommendation of Burke whistles. I have 4 of them (High D, Bb, G and F) and enjoy playing them very much. Used ones (high D) are just slightly higher than your stated budget of $150USD. They will run around $180 to $200 USD. Keep your eyes open and you can find really good deals from time to time on second hand ones.

Colin Goldie whistles, while they are very good, will run you double to more than double your budget (even for used ones).

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Here you go! https://forums.chiffandfipple.com/t/fs-burke-session-whistle-in-d/107366/1

I had one of these, they’re excellent whistles.

As I mentioned they take a stronger blow than I myself would prefer, though in truth I had no trouble adapting to it.

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Eh, not necessarily. I’ve seen them sold used for $200 USD multiple times. Admittedly, that’s still a bit outside NordicNorm’s budget. But a brand new Burke costs $290 USD, and I’ve seen used ones for sale at $200 USD, same as Goldie whistles.

So they’re more expensive than Burkes, but not THAT Much more expensive (at least if you get one used).

For something similar to a Goldie but more within NordicNorm’s budget, I’d also highly recommend a fully aluminum Mazur. Not as good as a Goldie, but pretty close, and it only costs $100.

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Well, I have not seen that (at least on this forum). For the past 5 years I’ve been in the buying mode for whistles. I’ve spent lots of time on this forum monitoring the for sale section and I can tell you that $200 is not the “normal” or “usual” price for a Goldie used whistle. If it were I’d would have already bought one. I did see a Goldie low D on here for $220 shipped and I jumped on that one faster than a duck on a June bug. The current price for a Goldie High D new whistle is $375 USD (not including VAT for EU purchases only) then you have add shipping and import fees for US purchases. So the price for a new Goldie is well over $400 US. So, 200 is an outlier price not the norm from my experience here on C&F.

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Thanks for all the excellent advice everyone!

In the end, I settled on a Thornton High D whistle (in wood). It was slightly above my budget, but coming brass instruments that run +$5,000, it seemed a pretty cheap investment (which is always relative).

I’m now learning to blow without ‘over blowing’.

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I also play trumpet and agree that it is nice to have a whistle with some back pressure. I have a high D Wild whistle from McNeela that I quite like and takes a lot of air. Ironically I recently played a Burke wide bore aluminum whistle and found that it required considerably less air than the Wild whistle. But just one man’s experience. Your mileage may vary.

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I think there may be a bit of ambiguity in the discussion so far regarding the term “stronger blow”. There are at least two independent issues: (1) Air requirements - how much air is required to play the instrument, and (2) back pressure - how much resistance must be overcome. Whistles can have any combination of the two, depending on design. ie., high back pressure and low air requirements; low back pressure and high air requirements; high back pressure and high air requirements; low back pressure and low air requirements.

I’m not a trumpet player, but I would expect a trumpet player to prefer a higher resistance whistle (ie., high back pressure), perhaps with low air requirements. In contrast, flute players sometimes prefer whistles with higher air requirements, because flutes tend to have higher air requirements than whistles (particularly high D whistles compared to low D flutes).

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As a former trombonist, welcome! Imo, I’d stay pretty cheap. The glory of the tinwhistle is that there is a whole world of not super spendy ones that get the job done; my current favorite is the Tony Dixon DX004. It’s only about $30US (probably will be cheaper in Canada than in the US soon, with the way things are going) and it’s tough and tune-able and has a very sweet sound. I have RSI issues so like to use a thumb rest, for which I went to Rob Gandara at Carbony.com (he’s just lovely), but you can honestly just go to town with this or other inexpensive whistles. I myself do like to buy one that’s already tune-able, but there are ways to make even the cheapies so. If you actively don’t like what you’re playing, though, then I do think finding a whistle that feels/sounds good to you makes a big difference in how you progress. Good luck, and have a grand time!

eta: oh, I see you’ve made your choice! Fabulous. I know, right?!? compared to a really fancy trombone or trumpet, it feels like the money goes farther in whistle-world. Rock on!

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Welcome @Daylily ! I still remember back when - when I upgrade from a Clarke original to a Dixon - what a pleasant upgrade! Long story short, it’s all been downhill (maybe uphill?) from there!

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Haha, yeah, honestly I think the leap from a super cheap whistle to a middling whistle is HUGE, possibly bigger than the leap from middling to premium, but I’m also still early in my own whistle journey, so perhaps the absolute top-line ones would open doors I don’t yet know about. For learning, though, it’s a fine line to walk, because imo you need a good enough instrument to actually improve on, yet not so specialized that it takes you in a direction that might not be best for you, if that’s not too convoluted a thought. (; It’s so easy for a newbie like me to think an expensive option is the best option, and that might not be true (and I know this from experience - I’ve had to sell on a few whistles that didn’t turn me into a different - and better - player just because they were excellent - and $$ - instruments, but hey, that’s part of the learning process, too).

I do wonder, sometimes, what a wooden whistle would be like to play, that’s something I haven’t tried yet, but I live in an area with radically variable humidity rates, so it’s probably best to stick to plastic, carbon fiber, and metal.

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