I’ve started really taking in interest in Irish traditional music, and have begun playing it a lot. I’m having a hard time getting my roles to sound right because my taps are too slow. Any ideas on how to spead them up? Thanks,
Josh.
Raise your finger so that there’s a tension, and then release your musculature holding back the finger so that the tension makes it fall down on the hole and bounce from it. Basically you use more muscle force when lifting the finger, and practically none when tapping.
That’s how I do it, credits to Grey Larsen’s book.
Taps were much harder for me to manage than cuts. But some people find cuts harder.
Remember that they’re just what they sound like: taps. Don’t think of it as a distinct downward stroke and a distinct up stroke. Literally, just tap your finger on the hole. You don’t need this to sound like a distinct separate not. It’s more a fluctuation or pulse of the base note of the ornament.
Rolls. 
Practice, practice. Really, that’s most of it. You need to train the muscles and reflexes, and that takes time.
Think about the upstroke more than the downstroke. Pretend that you’re “flinching” you finger off a hot whistle, bouncing it up off the hole. The word “tap” can create the wrong mindset. It’s not so much tapping the finger down, but rapidly pulling the finger back up, that creates the timing. Leaving the finger down too long is what ruins it.
Try using the knuckle joint of your finger to tap. The harder surface of the joint can make a crisper tap than the flabbier finger pad. This works best if you play flat-fingered, as you should.
Make sure you’re supporting the whistle with the lower hand when you play taps with the upper hand. The more stable the whistle, the better.
Practice playing perfectly spaced taps, like a metronome. In fact, set a metronome to a moderate speed like 100, and tap on each beat. Keep it going as long as you can. When it’s perfectly even, increase the speed a notch.
Incorporating them in rolls is a different issue. But crisp, quick, even taps are the starting point. And good timing is more important than raw speed.
I agree with Guru when he says that leaving the finger on the hole is what ruins the effect of a tap.
Right now, tap one of your fingers on your desk top. Note how the finger just bounces back up instantly? This is what you’re looking for–not a lingering thing at all.
This oft repeated link is something I think everyone starting to play ITM on the whistle should read: http://www.rogermillington.com/siamsa/brosteve/index.html
Yes: http://www.rogermillington.com/siamsa/brosteve/taps.html
But it’s funny … I never think of the quick single note from below as a tap, though I don’t know why not; it’s the logical inverse of a single cut from above. Maybe I think of it as a “whistle pull-off” - interference from guitar, or emphasizing the upward motion, for which “tap” feels like the wrong word. But if that’s the case, “cut” is probably the wrong word for a single cut, too. Now I’m totally weirded out. Curses on you, Steve Jones! 
I do play them, but sparingly. As lead-ins to rolls, or certain stressed notes. Now I’m going to have to think about it. Funny how we develop such automatic habits.
In any case, I’m pretty sure the OP is talking about mid-taps, Brother Steve’s separating taps, as played in rolls, and that’s what I was describing above.
On all Irish wind instruments you’ll see players raise the finger which is to do the tap rather high off the instrument a moment before the tap.
This additional distance gives the finger room to achieve the required velocity.
I try to impress on beginners that a tap/pat only has the right sound if
- the finger fully closes the hole, creating a clear lower gracenote, and
- it is quick enough
If either of these conditions aren’t met the tap/pat won’t have the right effect/sound.
This notion of raising a finger high above the instrument flies in the face of the way people who play orchestral woodwinds are trained. On these instruments (clarinet, Boehm flute, oboe, sax, etc) the fingers have a “guide position” which they are to remain in whenever not actually pressing on their key or hole. This “guide position” is rather close to the instrument.
People coming from a background in these instruments always try to play their pats/taps by moving the patting finger from its “guide position” onto the surface of the instrument and back. This results in a pat that’s far too slow.
It’s most noticable on people coming from Boehm flute. On that instrument players are taught they must not slap the fingers onto the keys because the result is the dreaded “key slap” noise.
A side note is that it’s very common (if not universal) for certain pats on the uilleann pipes to involve two or even three fingers patting together. I do these sorts of pats on the whistle also. It’s tricky to get two or three fingers to pat exactly together as one.
BTW you’ll also see Irish fiddlers pull their finger back right before it strikes the string, for the same reason, velocity. (In their case they’re producing a gracenote above the melody note.)
Thanks a lot everyone! I just tried using my knuckle, and it seemed to work. I tend to play using the pads of my fingers. Is this the wrong way to do it? I’ve never had too much trouble with cuts, but I do tend to have trouble making my taps so long that you hear the lower note briefly.
Yep, finger pads work best.