I am considering a Sindt Bb but have this question…what is the difference between an E and an Eb?? On my E whistle I can play anything in the key of D or G…it just is higher pitched…nicely so. Now…would this also be true of an Eb??? Confusion reigns!! HELP!!!
Thanks ahead of time..you guys always bail me out!
AndreaZ
Hmmmm. Very interesting. How do you play in D on the E whistle?
The scales of E, D and G below would seem to preclude playing in those keys on an E whistle. Especially since the E whistle won’t even have a G and D.
E F# G# A B C# D# E
D E F# G A B C# D
G A B C D E F# G
Signed Confused. 
Eb is pitched between E and D. If you play a tune on it as if in D, it will actually be in Eb, and if you play a tune on it as if in G, it will actually be in Ab. The same pattern holds for all th other keys of whistle. The fingerings remain the same, but are pitched to sound in different keys.
The Eb will (as someone said) be pitched between D and E. Higher than D, lower than E. Generation makes a very good Eb. Very responsive and playable…more so than their D.
All of us have learned on a D whistle. If you pick up any other whistle and play it like you learned on a D, it will play the same tune, but in a different key. (Hey, I’m just repeating what someone else said). That make is a much easier instrument to change keys on…much easier than piano or violin.
Tom.
Ah… The good old Poststructural confusion!
In disorder to help it–the confusion–let’s clear the mud once and for all.
Forget your scales. It’s not fishy–though maritime–it’s ethnic.
Them tunes
Scots say in A
While Bretons argue Bb
Them Bbloody Bbreizh
A German would call just in B
Be slapped with a fish to tell him it may be
But not just
And the Scholar would play on an Eb whistle
While Irishmen pitched 'em up in D quite a whistle ago.
(Say, what’s the use of an E whistle?)
The use of an E-whistle, Zoob, is a virtual difficulty. Hard to hear the Music of the Pixels.
Oh the bliss of not being able to read music, and not careing. The Eb is just a great whistle. A lot of old duffers prefer it to the D for solo work. The Gen Eb is just about the livelyest whistle they make. Of course you have to play things a little faster in Eb then in D. 
Just think how fast you have to play with an F. And Zoob an E is for sea chanties. 
Tom
We are that which we seek
I think Andreaz54 still needs some help. Just a bit on scale construction if I’m not mistaken.
Take the notes on a piano. Starting on C and going up one note at a time including the black ones you get successively C, C#, D, Eb, E, F, F#, G, Ab, A, Bb, B, C. Twelve piano keys take you back to C an octave higher and after that the pattern repeats as before. This scale is called a chromatic scale because it includes every possible note.
Now, whichever note you start on, to get a major scale in that key take the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 6th, 8th, 10th and 11th notes in the chromatic scale using your root note as the first. You also have the notes you get on a whistle in that key which don’t require half-holing or cross fingering. For each whistle key, just apply the formula I’ve given to work out which notes are easily available on that whistle and where they lie. Starting on C you get all the white notes on the piano—those that are neither # or b. Starting on D you get D, E, F#, G, A, B, C#, D. That’s probably all you need to know about scale construction to make sense of the advice given earlier on this thread.
(hey, I’m starting to envy your Ryan, fly-boy. Now wait till I take off my Polikarpov I-16 Ishak. Or maybe a Rata. 
)
Blackbeer–Now, see? This is why I devised the Fa-Do Clock, originally to clear this mud for myself. Btw, there’s a bug in the one I sent you: the E# is misprinted. Sending you the update to-day.
Maybe, if this helps, I could add to Wombat’s explanation the fact that any given scale has all the seven ABCDEFG tones, some being sharpened, or flattened.
Note that many pipers’ sheet music or tutorials just do away with key signature: the scale being A, the three sharpened tones C, F, G are assumed # but not written such. Same with Bretons who note the same exact tunes (!) for the same instrument (!!) in Bb: the B and E are assumed flat.
Maybe this is why the key signature was such a great invention, especially for us endowed with a diatonic instrument…
I think that’s an excellent explanation Wommers old chap! Top hole!
To confuse the issue - an octave has twelve notes, but you only use 8 of them to play a scale, or 4 to play an arpeggio. The steps or jumps are always the same, but the starting step can differ, and this is the name of the key.
As Wombles shows, the D scale has 2 #s, so you see 2#s on the key signature in sheetmusic. Try starting on G, and you only get one #, F. Try again starting on A and you get 3 sharps, F, C and G.
Between Wombat and Martin, I’m beginning to feel a bit musically literate! Thanks guys for the simple straightforward explanation.
Philo
Ohhh, my head…