A little bit of heresy

Whistle
1

I have followed a few threads on this site on the right speed for learners to play. The wisdom of the wise is always play slowly, get your technique right and then speed up. This is good advice, but it has a couple of problems with it. Most ITM just doesn’t sound right when it is played too slowly: you seem to have to wind it up to a certain speed before you get that “Ah! I see!” feeling and it makes sense. Also most people learn the whistle because they want to play with other people and it is frustrating to have to put in ten years apprenticeship before you can play in a real session.

So I want to suggest whack on the old Altan CD and play along but don’t try to play all the notes. A lot of ITM tunes have a sort of skeleton tune inside them with the rest being ornamentation and it is often possible to simplify them to the point where even beginners can play at speed. It might not sound great on your own, but add a few other instruments and it’s OK. before long your fingers start twitching to do a few diddly bits and you’ve got the whole tune anyway.

The other advantage of this method is that if you crank up the speed beyond your abilities you have to “use the force”, ie, you have to switch off the part of the brain that is trying to work out what combination of fingers you need for F# and just go for it.

You need to practice slowly as well, of course you do, but I don’t reckon it does any harm to have a good blast at top speed in the privacy of your own home. You were doing it anyway, but I just want to say in my opinion there is nothing wrong with it.

2

It might not sound great on your own, but add a few other instruments and it’s OK.

No actually it isn’t. You give yourself the illusion it’s OK but it really really isn’t.

3

great thread title :smiley:

it isn’t practicing

the finding the skeleton part was good

4

Very true.

5

This is false. ITM doesn’t sound right when the rhythm is wrong. Wrong rhythm faster is not going to make it better. I played a few times with a fiddler who insisted on playing it really fast because “it’s dance music” and it was some of the worst music I’ve ever heard.

Leaving out the notes is bad advice. If you are leaving notes out you are not playing it right. As Chris Langan said, (and I’m paraphrasing) if you strip it down to the bones, take out all the meat, all the juicy bits, it’s not worth eating or listening to.

It might not sound great on your own, but add a few other instruments and it’s OK.

As Peter says, no it still sounds bad.

before long your fingers start twitching to do a few diddly bits and you’ve got the whole tune anyway.

I know several whistle players who’s fingers “start twitching”. They don’t sound good at all. They aren’t fun to play with. They must be “put up with” to make good music.

Also most people learn the whistle because they want to play with other people and it is frustrating to have to put in ten years apprenticeship before you can play in a real session.

More to be said for learning to play because you want to make good music. I guess this is yet another reason sessions are bad for beginners!

The wisdom of the wise is always play slowly, get your technique right and then speed up.

You said it. This is the only way.

6

No actually it isn’t. You give yourself the illusion it’s OK but it really really isn’t.

I tend to agree with Peter. A tune only sounds good when the player has control over every blip and note. When people play faster than their abilities it will only sound messy.
I can give a good example on the art of faking ITM:
I’ve been playing the whistle since 1992, but I never cared to sit down and struggle with rolls. Instead I played two consecutive cuts when I should have played a roll etc. The result was that practising became rather meaningless, since I was honest enough to admit that I sounded like crap. Over the years I’ve been practising less and less because of this.
Recently I’ve been forcing myself to practise proper rolls,-no faking, and now I find myself to have to re-learn all those tunes. My fingers still want to fake it, while my mind wants to play them the proper way.
I could have been playing very well today hadn’t it been for my “bright” ideas of faking it in the past.
So folks . . . don’t fake it wether it’s about speed or proper playing technique.

7

the finding the skeleton part was good

Yes, there was certainly some sense in it (I have slightly more time to respond now). It is vitally important to learn pick out the bones, the important notes, then the phrases but they are phases you (rapidly) go through learning the whole tune. I can’t agree with the suggestion it’s OK to play half the tune in hopes other instruments will cover you.

I have encountered a few acting on that premiss and it was never a pleasant musical experience.

8

I would have to hear somebody play the skeleton they perceive in order to judge whether it “sounds right” to me.
If it entails playing a dotted quarter note wherever the tune has a roll etc it possibly could sound idiomatic, as I’ve heard good flute and whistle players who do a quite a bit of this “long note” stuff.

Now, if you’re talking about taking out every other note, which in the case of reels would sort of turn them into polkas, I don’t think that that would “sound right” to any traditional player.

I encountered a similar thing in a book purporting to teach beginners how to play Appalachian fiddle. (Appalachian tunes are quite like Irish reels in that they usually progress with eighth-notes.) This book claimed that half of the notes in Appalachian tunes were not actually part of the tune but added ad lib by the player. Take away every other note, the book said, to reveal the “real” tune.
This book then had the beginner learn a bunch of these cretinous versions, which of course bore little resemblance to the tunes as actually played (all of the tunes being quite familiar to me).
If somebody were to apply this theory to learning Irish reels the results would be equally unidiomatic.

9

I knew you guys wouldn’t like this. I’m not suggesting you should go and toot away at your local serious session; you’d look a prat and spoil the fun.

I just think it’s like riding a bike: if you do it too slowly it gets harder. Or like skiing: you need a bit of speed to do the parallel turns, otherwise you’re just snowploughing your way down the slopes.

There are lots of versions of tunes anyway, and some are easier to play on the whistle than others. I am suggesting simplify them a bit more until you can play them, then add in the extra bits. It’s not so different from starting slowly and building up speed.

If you have been playing for a long time and got good at it there is a strong temptation to want it to be difficult. When I was at school I longed to be old enough to do woodwork. When the big day came and we stood by our benches I thought we would start by making something. The teacher took the whole hour telling us how to hold a saw just to make a point. I’ve never really forgiven him. Don’t do the same. :devil:

10

Yes, but those who can ride extremely slowly without falling over, or indeed even do a trackstand, are that much better riders, even at speed. Good mountain bike instructors routinely teach the benefits of learning to ride extremely slowly.

Or like skiing: you need a bit of speed to do the parallel turns, otherwise you’re just snowploughing your way down the slopes.

Simply not true, you can and should learn to parallel turn slowly and precisely at first, this allows you to truly feel and understand where your weight should be, and when it should shift. This lays the foundation for skiing fast.

If you have been playing for a long time and got good at it there is a strong temptation to want it to be difficult.

Ridiculous.

When I was at school I longed to be old enough to do woodwork. When the big day came and we stood by our benches I thought we would start by making something. The teacher took the whole hour telling us how to hold a saw just to make a point. I’ve never really forgiven him. Don’t do the same. > :devil:

Dale, I’m begging you, puhleeese bring back the eye roll emoticon!!!


When I started as an apprentice woodwind maker, the first thing the head of the shop said to me on my first day of work was: “Loren, we are not in a hurry here, there is only one way to do things, and that is the right way.”

Before I could learn hand carving of windows on recorders, I first had to learn how to make a carving knife by hand. Then I had to learn how to sharpen and hone the blade, then I had to learn how to hold the carving knife. All before cutting into my first headjoint! Many weeks and months went by with me butchering one boxwood headjoint after another while learning the basic cutting and scraping techniques. Eventually I did learn, but not without first concentrating on how to properly hold the carving knife, how to position the headjoint for each cut, how to control the the angle of the blade and pressure on the blade during each cut, and so on.


Music is the same way, one must focus on and develop each element (rhythm, breathing, phrasing, dynamics, ornamentation, intonation, listening, etc.) in order to be able to integrate these things into unified whole. Shortcuts simply don’t work. Rushing makes things worse. Speed without foundational skills and musicality leads to ugly sounding playing.

Being good at anything takes time spent, although that time needn’t be a chore.

As my father, who played Flamenco guitar, once said to me regarding learning to play: “Loren, learning to play an instrument is really just a matter of you and the clock.”



Loren

11

short lunch :confused:
good post :smiley:

12

Wax on, wax off. :wink:

I couldn’t agree more. Take for example Joanie Madden on whistle or Eric Johnson on guitar. Both have what it takes to play at breakneck speeds, but what really gets my attention is their tone, phrasing, and rock-solid rhythm.

That having been said, I play bass guitar for a group at church. One of the tricks I’ve learned that has helped me greatly is to take all of the lowest notes normally played by the keyboardist and practice them slowly, making sure I play every note. Once this is done, I build up my speed until I can play it faster than usual without mistakes. That way, when I join the group, I’m actually slowing down my playing a bit, and it’s much easier to keep a solid rhythm. The same would likely hold true for any instrument.

13

Rare day off.

Thanks :wink:

Loren

14

Ahh yes, EJ, a master of the instrument indeed.

Once this is done, I build up my speed until I can play it > faster > than usual without mistakes. That way, when I join the group, I’m actually > slowing down > my playing a bit, and it’s much easier to keep a solid rhythm. The same would likely hold true for any instrument.

Agreed, once you can play well slowly, certainly there is benefit to working up your speed while maintaining all the important elements (in practice) to beyond what will be necessary when playing/performing out, so that you are not on the ragged edge of your ability level when playing with others at sessions, gigs, what have you.

Now, as I still need much work on my own playing, I must return to my Shugyo.


Loren

15

All good advice here.

Consider this:

As we get older, it gets harder and takes longer to learn new things.

Now consider a baby - It takes around a year for a baby to learn how to walk. If the baby does not learn how to walk, it will never run.

There are some intermediate steps - first rolling, then dragging, then crawling, then using furniture and walls as a prop.

It’s just the way things are.

The learning curve will sort-out how much you want the result, for some, there are better things to do.

At a certain point - the whole technique thing starts to become as natural as walking. When I get throught that bit, I’ll be looking forward to understanding the underlying harmony structure in the tunes so I can do meaningful variations. Another year or so for that!

I will say this though - there are some very worthwhile side-effects from maintaining a daily practice discipline - it can be life-changing. Give it a go!

16

Now this of course is true! You can’t play fluently if you’re still at the stage where you’re “trying to work out” the fingerings. The fingerings have to be automatic due to the speed Irish reels and jigs are played at.

17

I too believe in this practice strategy and use it, especially on the Highland bagpipe tunes I play in the Pipe Band.
I “work up” the tunes by playing them slowly with a metronome, steadily increasing the speed until I’m at a speed faster than we will actually ever play them. I try to do this at each personal practice session. That way, no matter what tempo the band ends up taking the tunes at, I’m prepared.
Some pipers only practice the tunes at the “ideal” speed. In the heat of competition, when the band may bump up the tempos a bit, these players, suddenly being forced to play the tunes faster than they’ve ever practiced them, tend to fall apart.
But, in the main, I practice tunes rather slower than the performance speed in order to clean up everything.

18

So is your goal to insult those here who have the ability and knowledge to actually help your playing?

Here’s a more likely scenario: If you haven’t been playing very long and aren’t very good there is a temptation to want it to be easier than it is.

Truth is you have to work for it and it won’t happen overnight. Once you realize that there aren’t any shortcuts and devote your practice time to the essentials rather than your schemes and shortcuts the time you spend practicing will be more worthwhile and you’ll be closer to decent playing.

I remember my stubborn days as a newbie, I had the same frame of mind. I figured I wouldn’t try to learn “the hard tunes” so that I could get by with the sub-mediocre playing I had already accomplished. That trip didn’t last very long before I hit a wall. If you think the only purpose in going to a session is for you to play tunes with a group then you’re missing a huge piece of the puzzle and you’re likely missing out on some great resources.

19

Once you realize that there aren’t any shortcuts . . .

. . . exactly,-which reminds me of an old blues song: “Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody want’s to die.”

20

I think you need to read again what I actually wrote, which was a very mild suggestion that there might be more than one way to approach it, and then consider the vehemence of the reaction: you kind of make my point for me.

Several of you sound very much like my old woodwork teacher, or my violin teacher when I was eight, who told us we wouldn’t even be getting the bows out of the case before week six (I don’t think I made it past week four). Lighten up guys, music is supposed to be fun.

I’m not a newbie; I’ve been playing for a long time, most of it slowly, building up the skills and the technique but every so often I like to let rip at full speed, even if I play a few bum notes.

I’m sure there are others reading this who feel the same: what about some support here?