Hallo from Scotland! Newbie here, just started learning a few days ago and really enjoying it so far!
Having read a few topics on here before, I noticed that the tonguing technique isn’t really necessary for all of the notes…is that correct? All the tuition books seem to teach that first of all so I just wanted to see what you guys thought!
Also, when I’m trying to go down to the low D, I find it really difficult to control my breathe from blowing quite hard to more softly to reach it and so the D sounds like a screaming cat! Any advice?
I also put my first tune up on Youtube…Egan’s Polka, learnt from Nigel Gatherer’s website. Any tips?!
Tonguing, slurring notes and breath control will come with practice. Certain note combinations are more conducive to not needing to be tongued and others must be tongued or they sound crappy because of the way the fingerings are.
Tonguing not only isn’t necessary, it’s frowned on by many players. As you learn ornamentation and how to use it, you’ll find that tonguing becomes less and less necessary.
Breath control comes with time and work. I find that the mistake many people make is blowing into the whistle, where I just more breathe into it, most of the time.
Polkas make good tunes to play early on because of how easy they usually are, but they also don’t normally present much opportunity for incorporating ornamentation. One tune that I found is really useful for practicing ornamentation early on is Star of the County Down. Your rhythm needs some work - that’s not quite a polka rhythm. Also, G is a really weird key to hear that polka in - I always hear it in D. You may want to relearn it in the key of D; you can find the sheet music for that right here: http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/39
You might also be interested in knowing that you can find that one on BBC’s Virtual Session, which you can find here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/r2music/folk/sessions/
They have it as a “slow reel” called Peg Ryan’s. It’ll help you to play along with that.
Yes, in time all the notes will not tounged. You will find in your tutor books that they introduce slurring which is the technique that you will play more than one note with the tounging. Follow your tutors book as it is important to being able to tounge correctly before slurring.
The low D on a D whislte will require the less amount of tounging. Play this note very gently. In time you will know just how much air you can use until it breaks into the next register. Also, some whisltes are more sensitive for this note than others and in your whiste collection you will find some whistles that you like for tunes in the lower register and others for the upper registers.
Welcome ymurray,
If you are learning to play by ear, try playing Egan’s (I know it as the Kerry Polka) in the key of D, starting on F# rather than B. This tune works very well with a tune called The Galopede in the key of G.
I used to play it in a band as a polka medley for dancers, The Galopede followed by the Kerry polka, the switch from the key of G to D gives a really nice uplift and when played right it sounds like you have gone onto a faster tune when switching to the Egan’s/Kerry polka. It obviously is just our ears tricking us.
As for the tonguing debate, I say don’t do it. You will get many people saying rubbish about how it is alright to tongue and you should play the way you want and what sounds good to you. That is fine in it’s own right but if you are considering playing Irish traditional music you must learn to seperate your notes with cuts, taps, rolls etc, rather than tonguing.
Although there are well known players out there who tongue excessively, that does not mean it is within the tradition of Irish music, tonguing should be used sparingly and only where other forms of ornamentation won’t work.
I personally tongue as an absolute last resort, I was taught the traditional way of playing with cuts, taps and rolls etc.
Try sliding onto your first note on Egan’s, that is, slide from E to F#.
Good luck.
One thing to try that may help you get to that bottom D without the cat becoming involved is this; play bottom D on your whistle, put your whistle down and whistle it your self. Now jump an octave and whistle your next D.
Keep doing this octave jump, can you feel what happens to the shape of the inside of your mouth as you drop from high to low? Can you feel the tightening and loosening going on there? You should be getting the same sort of feeling when playing, that is how you control the airflow into your whistle, that is, imagine you are whistling into your whistle.
Let me know how you get on with that.
There are a couple of points here. First of all, although the majority of people on this forum seem to play Irish traditional music, not everyone does, and I for one don’t. Playing styles elsewhere in the British Isles will need quite a lot more tonguing than is commonly done in Ireland. I tongue quite a lot but then, I live in North East England and my playing style is very much influenced by Northumbrian music.
To ymurray. Firstly welcome. As you are from Scotland, you might like to look at Nigel Gatherer’s website. He has an online whistle tutorial and also has something about playing Scottish music on the whistle
Although there are well known players out there who tongue excessively, that does not mean it is within the tradition of Irish music, tonguing should be used sparingly and only where other forms of ornamentation won’t work.
This is not entirely true. I was at a workshop run by Cathal McConnell about 2 years ago and someone asked him about tonguing. His response was to take his whistle and play a tune in a very tongued style. The point he made was that it was about personal taste and that some players (and he named one, whose name, unfortunately, I forget) played in quite a tongued style. To say it is not part of the tradition is not entirely true, though it is clearly the predominant style in Irish music today.
On the other hand, Irish flute and whistle style has had quite an effect on flute and whistle in the rest of the British Isles and most flute and whistle players will include taps, cuts and rolls in their repertoire of techniques.
Tootler,
I would like to point out that I did not say tonguing was not part of the tradition, what I said was that excessive tonguing is not really within the tradition. I think you would find that a bigger proportion of ITM whistle palyers would tend to the less is more theory.
When I teach whistle, tonguing is the last thing I introduce. If a student eventually drifts towards tonguing because they like it, then so be it, but I would first try to show them a method of emphasisng a note instead of tonguing it.
I have taught people who have had no exposure to anyone playing whistle, let alone someone who has played whistle in the Irish style. Many have been ex recorder players so they had a tendency to tongue as a matter of course. The first thing I do is get them out of the habit by getting them to gently bite their tongue between their teeth to the side of their mouth and start playing like that. It is great to see the surprise on their faces when they realise that there are cuts, taps etc that they can use instead.
So, use tonguing sparingly, there are better ways to seperate and attack and ephasise notes than having that awful tut-t-tut sound. I know some very good players who tongue, but they do it so that it is barely noticable. I know one person who tongues while doing rolls, I asked them why they did this and they said it was something they had picked up and now did it automatically.
It sounds alright to me, the slight t-t sound is disguised well in the roll.
I understood this part of your post to mean that you think tonguing is not part of the Irish tradition. If I misunderstood you, I apologise.
I am a recorder player and tonguing is part of the technique of recorder playing, as I am sure you are aware. As you will appreciate, there is a lot more to tonguing than “te te te”. In fact “te” is a very explosive tonguing and it is what most people do which is why it tends to stand out. If you use “de” or “du” it puts the tongue further back in your mouth and is a lot less prominent. Even more discrete is “la”. I suspect many whistle players who tongue a lot have learnt these alternative tonguings and are able to make it much more discrete. Knowing about tonguings does, I think give you alternative articulations which can help to make your playing more interesting.
I don’t actually play whistle a great deal, I either play wooden flute or descant recorder, an instrument that is accepted in English traditional music, (which is what I play), even if some think it isn’t in Irish. I do think that the English style does need more tonguing than does Irish, but even so, I tongue much less when playing traditional music than when playing recorder in a classical style.
Sorry about the multiple replies. I hit stop a couple of times and then resubmitted. It seemed the post had already got through, but the reponse to me hadn’t
Newbie here, just started learning a few days ago and really enjoying it so far!