Dia dhuit from Croatia!

Whistle
1

Hello everyone! I’m Matija from Zagreb, Croatia (Maitín being my favorite Irish equivalent) and I started to play the tin whistle 6 days ago, unplanned. Since I research and listen to Irish music for almost 5 years and have become quite acquainted with it, my dear girlfriend decided to surprise me and buy me a tin whistle (in one of Zagreb’s music shops, which has surprised me). I couldn’t express my happiness and gratitude but with immediate start of playing. :smiley: It is Clarke’s MEG in D major. Now, I play a bass guitar and a double-bass, but I’m not experienced in playing reed instruments (I only had a low-quality recorder when I was a kid). But I am eager to learn to play it the Irish way. I have spent some time surfing, reading, watching tutorial videos and learning the basics. Now I can play some tunes with some ornaments, but still very sloppy. In all this research I have found out about this site and its forum. I was happy about it and decided to join. Now, as a green whistler I want to ask you a couple of questions and I would be thankful if you could help me:

  1. I hear the low octave on my whistle has apparently a bit lower pitch than the high one. Since I hear this pitch change, I automatically adjust it by harder blowing, but then I often get the squeaky tone. I checked if my fingers were fully covering the holes, and they were. Even if I press them the hardest I can (which I do not for playing purposes :smiley:) the tones (especially the lowest ones) from the low octave are a bit lower in pitch then the same tones in the higher one. Is there some catch? What could I be doing wrongly? I’ve read the Wandering Whistler’s review of my MEG and I’ve seen that it’s quite good, and possibly the best choice for beginners, so it obviously isn’t the quality of the whistle that matters. Is it?

  2. Is it normal that the cone is turned a little bit to to left so the holes are too (they aren’t aligned with the horizontal line of the fipple). I thought this unusual, and since the fipple on the MEG is not glued I shifted the cone so that the holes are exactly at the the top. But then I found out that there is a little mark on the fipple that obviously marks the point where it should be alligned with the merging line of the rolled metal. And I’ve seen that after my intervention this little mark has shifted to the right. I have moved it a little backwards and continued playing like that. (see the pictures) But I want to be sure what should be the position of the holes in respect to the horizontal line of the fipple. Is it right for them to be exactly on the top (my logic tells me that) or is it not?

  1. I uploaded two tunes I’m playing. It is so very sloppy and not exactly full of ornaments. Both I’ve learned playing by ear, as I knew those before while listening the Irish music (“Dunmore Lassies” by The Chieftains, and “You Raise Me Up” by Selah where the solo is played by uillean pipes). The first one is set in E minor, and the second in G major. So, what do you think, is there a hope for me? :smiley: What terrible mistakes do I make? It was recorded by my cell phone, so the quality isn’t exactly the quality. :slight_smile: But you can get the picture. (BTW you can hear the different pitch of the low octave, as I was talking about it in the first question).

Dunmore Lassies clip: http://drop.io/gabhann/asset/dunmorelassies-mp3
You Raise Me Up clip: http://drop.io/gabhann/asset/uraisemeup-mp3

Thank you in advance! :slight_smile:

P.S. Sorry if I am hard to understand at times. My English is not so good. :slight_smile:

2

Hi Matija,

You are right to line the finger holes up with the window. Don’t worry about the mark on the back.

For the problem with the upper octave, one thing that sometimes works is filling the cavity under the windway with some kind of putty. Make it even with the end of the windway. Most people use the kind of putty that stationery stores sell to stick posters to the wall.

Good luck! (And your English is great, by the way.)

3

Thank you for the advice! :slight_smile: But I just want to make clear one thing, it is not my upper octave that is not in tune, it is the lower one. I checked it with my clavinova, and various recordings of music, and found out that it is ok when I play in the upper octave, but the pitch is evidently lower when I play in the lower one, and that doesn’t sound greatly when I play along with the recordings. :confused: (and I’m already asked to play a solo part at the concert that will be held for less than a month :open_mouth: so I better solve this problem before :boggle: ).

4

Here, you can listen to the scale from third octave D to the first: http://drop.io/gabhann/asset/scale-mp3

You can hear the difference in pitch. It is especially evident on G tone which squeaks as I try to keep it tuned with the ones played before, and it goes even lower when played to the bottom. What’s the catch?

BTW I moved the fipple as close as possible to the metal part to get the higher tuning, but there was no change, for apparently it was already as close as possible. :puppyeyes:

5

Welcome to C&F, Matija.

I don’t personally have experience with the Meg line of whistles, but it is a cheap, mass-produced whistle, so there are bound to be a few bad ones. Look at Generation whistles, for example. People swear by them, but generally say that you have to poke at quite a few to get one of the greats. Maybe the Meg’s the same way.

Another thing with whistles is that they’re not perfectly in tune. A lot of times either the upper register or the lower register is in tune, but not both. Could be you’ve just got one that likes the upper register more. I don’t know.

You could try to tweak it yourself to fix the issues you’re seeing. There’s a tweaking guide on C&F that you could try to follow: http://www.chiffandfipple.com/tweak.html. Or you could get another whistle and see if that helps. I pretty much just buy off the internet, but if you’ve got a local shop that stocks some, no reason not to hop on over and check out the rest of their stock. Even another Meg wouldn’t be a bad investment, just to see if it’s a problem with your original Meg.

6

Ceud Mile Failte,
Good to hear Gaelic coming from Croatia and greetings from California. Enjoy the site and most of all, your musical journey.
Slan leat,
Deasan

7

@Protean: Thank you very much for the info. I also thought of that, but I just wanted to make sure that I’m not playing it wrong or something else. As for the tweaking, maybe I’ll try it some time, or give it to some craftier hands. :slight_smile: I don’t want to mess it up despite it’s cheap, because it’ll always have a sentimental value to me - my very first tin whistle, bought by my girlfriend. :heart:

@Deasan: Go raibh maith agat! :slight_smile:

8

I hear you on that one. I’ve got a Sweetone that was my first whistle (alas, bought by me, not my GF, so somewhat less sentimental than yours). I’ve done the poster-putty tweak, but otherwise I’m not touching it, and there’s no way I’d get rid of it. It’s slightly dented on the end, rusty on the inside, but I love the darn thing! :slight_smile: