Since I’ve begun my ear learning oddessey I’ve learned about 10 tunes in a month. I started to learn and almost finished three of them on a D whistle when the person I was learning them from was on a different pitched instrument… like an Eb or C whistle, or a different pitched set of pipes. Finally I realised a few notes were off and there was no way I could fix them. Then I realise I needed a different pitched whistle. So then I had to unlearn what I’ve learned and relearn the tune using the correct whistle. I’ve found it very frustrating so far and I was hoping that somebody alot smarter than me figured out a nice way to finger out what pitch someone is playing in. For me the only way I can figure it out is if I have just about the whole tune down but a few notes won’t fix themselves or the player is nice enough to sound the pitch note at teh beginning or end of the tune like Josie McDermott and Willie Clancy sometimes do. I need some help though cause feeling around in the dark is not very time effecient and I’d hate to have to resort to posting every time I want to learn a tune just to figure out what key they are using.
I listen for the lowest note in the tune, it’s often going to be the lowest note on the whistle - and it certainly won’t be below it, so if it is you need to move lower.
Why not take up the fiddle and rid yourself of wrong-key blues?
Lilt the tune until you feel that you are “into” that key, whatever it is, then sing the scale of the tune, up and down. If you find yourself singing a major scale (or if it sounds “just normal”), fine, if not (or if it sounds “a bit strange, but very Irish”) extend the scale downwards until you find yourself singing a major scale. Now rest on the lowest note, and run to a piano or guitar or any chromatic instrument and find that note. This is the “base key” the tune is in. If your tune was in E dorian (Drowsy Maggie), you would find yourself sitting on “D”, and you need all the notes from the D major scale to play E dorian (same notes, different starting / end point), so you grab your D whistle.
I’m not sure if I’m helping or adding to the confusion.
Actually, Drowsy Maggie is horrible to lilt, take the Swallowtail Jig as an example. And I forgot to mention that using this method you may find that while the key fits on the whistle, the range doesn’t, and you run out of notes at either end (mostly the bottom end) of the whistle. If that happens, try with a whistle in a key next to the one you need in the circle of fifths:
F# - B - E - A - D - G - C - F - Bb - Eb - Ab - Db - Gb
i.e. a G tune (or Adorian) is likely to fit on a D whistle as well etc.
It would be far easier to explain this with sound files, but I don’t have the equipment to record them.
Get an Eb whistle. When you’re starting, see if it’s easier to match notes on it or the D whistle.
Telling C from D is a lot harder, except for the obvious D minor tunes, which need a C whistle. Not much you can do besides experiment.
One clue is that people usually don’t change during a set of tunes, so if you know one tune in the set, figure out what whistle it would take to play it and keep on using that.
It helps to know your source. Sligo whistle and flute players love Eb, and it’s commonly used by Matt Molloy, Mary Bergin, and Joe Cooley, as well. C is popular with old time whistle players. The only other thing I can think of in my collection which happens to have much in C is the Callan Bridge album.
On her first album Mary Bergin uses D, F, C and possibly Bb and Eb whistles. I don’t exactly remember. If you’re planning to learn tunes from her or someone else who uses a bunch of whistles, you should probably have all of those. As Colomon says, an Eb is very useful. In trying to figure out the tune, I try to get some of it in my head-enough so that I will be able to play a few phrases. Then listen to the tune and just try to see if the tune souds high or low. For instance Joe McKenna has a really nice set of reels including Fermoy Lasses and a couple of others. When I was trying to learn these, it sounded to me as if the whistle was lower than a D but I wouldn’t know if it was a C whistle or a Bb until I tried to duplicate a phrase on one of those whistles. A C just didn’t work. Any phrase I tried to play wouldn’t match his playing. So the next thing is to try a Bb and that worked. It’s kind of an intuitive process of homing in on the correct key.
If I didn’t know that you know Jack and I didn’t know that you know that I know Jack I might think you might be using Pepsi as a substitute for something stronger but as we both know and both know that each other know that Jack is teetotal such a misunderstanding would never arise. Clearly.
I pretty much use Sonja’s method except that I bypass the lilting and go straight to a chromatic instrument—guitar or piano. I only concern myself with the basic contours of the melody. That way I get the scale, and with that the whistle. The broad contour of a melody, together with the feel of it, will tell me whether it’s major, minor or, say mixolydian. For example, recently I was describing a tune as ‘yearning’ and reported the key, straight from the sheet music, as G major—that’s what it said. Then I thought: that can’t be right. Sure enough, a quick glance at the contours of the melody showed that it was in D mixolydian.
I don’t know why I don’t go through the lilting stage; I sing well enough. It’s just quicker to go straight to a guitar usually or a piano.
I’ve read that sentence four times and it still doesn’t make any sense to me, I think I need a pepsi!!
Thanks to all that have replied but I’ve found this not very helpful as it still feels like guess and checking, and I hate math class! What about this? Are there any notes that come out of a C whistle that don’t come out on a D? Eb is easier to hear as is F and G but C and D very close and unless the tune goes down do the low C I have no way of knowing. So are there any flats or sharps or naturals that come out of C whistle that don’t come out on D. I would consult my C generation but the thing is so out of tune I don’t trust it. I was thinking this might be helpful if I slowed the tune down and listened for certian signature notes. Would that work?
Oh and martin, ect is I didn’t have enough room to type pipes, flute, and fiddle in the title. Notice I left out the box.
A C whistle has no flats or sharps (until you start cross fingering and half-holing); a D whistle has two sharps: F# and C#. A key signature with no sharps or flats will play most easily on a C whistle or perhaps F if the melody starts below the C bell note. But the key could be C major, D dorian or G mixolydian and only attention to the mood and tune contour can possibly tell you which. Further, a tune might modulate in the B section from say C major to D Dorian or, worse, from say, C major to C minor. If the latter, get ready for some serious half-holing, or get really good at changing whistles quickly. Or just lay out and have a sip of … whatever it was you were drinking.
Yes, there are notes on a C whistle that don’t come out of a D whistle. Look at a piano. A C whistle basically has the white keys. That’s called a diatonic scale. Apart from that, you can flatten the 7th note counted from the bottom, that’s the famous Cnat on a D, and maybe sharpen the 4th from the bottom, that would be G#. Everything else is half-holing and prayer. So you have 9 notes out of 12 per octave at your disposal, and it’s different 9 for a whistle in a different key.
You don’t need math. It’s just another step in learning by ear. When I closely listen to a tune I can’t play, I can find out the fingering without knowing what key the tune is in, and without having an instrument at hand. I’m not 100% right, and it is horribly difficult in fast tunes and it really needs lots of listening and time, but it can be done. It is certainly no magic. I also think it is easier for me as I don’t have any pitch memory (“perfect pitch”) to speak of, so I can switch whistles and don’t get too confused.
Well, yes. That’s because, unless you have perfect pitch, the process invariably involves guessing and checking. Unless you’re one of those rare people who can just listen and know, the only sensible way tell the difference between D and Eb is to pick up a whistle and try to play along.
On the D whistle, you normally can play tunes written in one (cross-finger to get C natural) or two sharps, ie a D and G major sounding modes, and the “moody” sounding modes of E (crossfinger c nat again) and B. I can’t remember what they are called off hand, but you might think of them as minor sounding.
There is an A mixedupedolodian mode you can play as well (A scale with a flatted 7th)
If you drop down to a C whistle, you can drop all the modes mentioned above down a whole step.
If you go to a low G whistle, the major modes will be G and C and moody modes would be A and E.
I like having on hand an E flat, D, C, Bflat, low A, low G and low E whistles. I can join in on the session killer keys then.
The first hint I have to the key, is the last note. Most tunes resolve to the key note. Then I listen for the feel of the mode. For example if it ends in E and almost has a minor feel but not quite, I try E Dorian, which is the scale that starts on E played on a D whistle. E F# G A B C# D E is E-Dorian. Of course if its feels more minor I might try E minor (E F# G A B C D E). Sometime this doesn’t work at all, but often it lets me pick out the key quickly. As another example, if a song ends on a G, there’s a better than average chance that the C’s in the tune are C natural and not C sharp. From there apply all of the above.
Of course as a complete novice I also read the CD liner first, occasionally there will be a big clue, like the comment that so and so “plays this love tune on his Eb Olwell…”
Goodness me, I thought it was simple enough. Let me explain.
Jack is teetotal. Susan knows Jack. Martin knows Jack. While Susan and Martin have not met in person, they know each other both through reputation and through the medium of The Chiff, and a certain rapport has developed in which either party may use occasional euphemisms to avoid shocking the younger, tenderer, and generally more easily shockable members of the aforementioned online poststructural community. Susan knows Jack is teetotal. Martin knows Jack is teetotal. Susan knows Martin knows Jack. Martin knows Susan knows Jack. Susan knows Martin knows Jack is teetotal. Martin knows Susan knows Jack is teetotal. Under the aforestated consideration of shared knowledge, the use of the word Pepsi, which under other conditions might be employed as a euphemism for an alcoholic beverage, cannot be mistaken by either of the parties to mean anything other that what it says on the tin, Pepsi. Or Maybe Coca Cola. But probably Pepsi.
Ah, by ect you meant etc. Now I see.
The fiddler’s joy is that he doesn’t need to know the key before selecting which instrument to play on. I’ll play this on my (drum roll) fiddle! All the known notes available, plus an infinite number of possible variants (and don’t my longsuffering neighbours know that!).
That’s because, unless you have perfect pitch, the process invariably involves guessing and checking.
You’re not going to like this, but one does not “have” perfect pitch. It is a learned skill, like picking up tunes. You can pick up any musicians’ magazine and see ads for “Teach yourself Perfect Pitch” courses, but basically it is sitting down and learning the sound of each note, much like you’re doing with tunes, until you start to recognize the notes on any instrument. The courses then go on to two-note, three-note, etc. chords, but these are a bit harder to play on whistle.
I used to tease someone I went to college with who had perfect pitch that he was lucky he was alive now, since he would have been really out of tune 100 years ago.
I think the more useful idea is that of relative pitch. Meaning, kinda, that once someone gives you one pitch you can easily find the rest, and hold on to them. Maybe not after you sleep, but for a whole day, easily.
Jack was wondering about how to tell. I guess part of it comes from experience. The timbre (or something, je ne sais quoi) of the different keys is a little, well, different. The easiest thing is probably to take a whistle that you’re familiar with and see what notes go with whatever you’re trying to learn.
Actually, to obviate the problem, Jack, even easier is not to play with the recordings. You can learn it in a different pitch and then figure it out once you know it. Whistles aren’t so flexible that I could believe you’d learn a tune in completely the wrong key . . .
And learning without playing with the recording (or person) is good for you. Builds character.
Well Martin, I will have you know that I’ve taken some serious thought into taking up the fiddle now that I’ve tamed the whistle and flute, but I don’t see how that fixes the problem? I mean a fiddler cannot switch keys/pitch on a tune while he’s playing it, can he? I would think that it would all be muscle memory and you couldn’t really adapt that quickly, right?
Stuart, I said I could almost learn a tune in the wrong key but a few of the notes wouldn’t line up so I figured out I was playing the wrong keyed whistle. And how should I go about learning a tune without listening/playing with the recording?
I sing/lilt with the recording, then learn to lilt by heart, and finally transfer to whistle or harp, going back at each step to the recording if necessary. I don’t play along until the very end.
