Hello i have been playing tin whistle for half a year now and I really like but I want to play something “quicker” than loch lomond, valley of knockamure, wild rover these are lovely songs but i want to get better with tin whistle so what easy “quicker” song would you suggest to start with, thank you 
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Being just over a year playing tin whistle I can off you some tunes to look at.
Silver Spear is a good reel to jump into and you can find lessons online for it.
A couple of hornpipes that I caught onto pretty quick were Boys of Blue hill and Harvest Home.
They roll nicely from one to the other.
I would suggest you have a good look around for tunes you like and stay away from the hackneyed chestnuts that will only get people to roll their eyes at you when you play them.
Hornpipes like Higgins’, the Kildare Fancy, the Fairy Hornpipe are not by any means more difficult than the Harvest Home or Boy of Bluehill but they will probably get you a more favourable reaction.
For reels I’d suggest you pick a few really simple ones and try to get the rhythm right, maybe something like The Blacksmith’s Reel
It may be worth considering a few polkas at this point and a look at Bro Steve’s Transcription page may yield a few ideas too.
Good luck.
What MrG said - Harvest Home seems to be a very challenging hornpipe to make sound good. I say that because so few people are able to make it sound good. Better to stick to ones that are a little easier to make musical.
I still love the Fairies’ Hornpipe and Cronin’s Hornpipe. Playing a reel like the Blacksmith, Rolling in the Rye Grass, Wind that Shakes the Barley, even the Mountain Road might actually be easier than a hornpipe, as long as you play it slowly (as slow as you are able to keep up with!) and work on making it musical.
Personally I’d avoid learning any polkas until you’ve had time to absorb the polka rhythm. I think it’s trickier to play polkas well than reels (although they’re far easier to learn as long as you don’t really care about the rhythm or pulse since there as so fewer notes). You might stick with a few marches instead of polkas. It’s pretty likely that one will end up playing polkas as marches when first learning irish music anyway.
Personally I’d avoid learning any polkas until you’ve had time to absorb the polka rhythm. I think it’s trickier to play polkas well than reels (although they’re far easier to learn as long as you don’t really care about the rhythm or pulse since there as so fewer notes). You might stick with a few marches instead of polkas. It’s pretty likely that one will end up playing polkas as marches when first learning irish music anyway.
I wasn’t necessarily thinking of going all Sliabh Luachra, more like McKenna’s polkas maybe (can’t think of the names right now, The Dark Girl in Blue and the one before it and some of the others he recorded). They’ll work nicely for starters.
Arguably it’s hard to get anything completely right as a beginner, I don’t think that should stop anyone from trying at least. You’ll have to start somewhere.
A simple set dance like An Suisín Ban will work nicely as well by the way.
True, some of the ways of playing polkas are easier than others. Those two McKenna polkas often get the Sliabh Luacra treatment though, as they were recorded by Denis and Julia.
I suppose it’s just something every beginner needs to go back and correct at some point… it’s just that so few do.
Some easy hornpipes would be Wicklow, Off to California, and Little Beggarman. Couple of easy slides would be Weaver’s and Dan Okeeffe’s. Esay jigs: Saddle the Pony and Tobin’s. Hard to think of an easy reel since they’re usually played pretty fast but a couple that might make good starters are Drowsy Maggie and the Congress reel. I realise that some of these suggestions would be considered “chestnuts” but if you like these tunes I wouldn’t care what others thought of them.
Ofcourse everybody should play the tunes they like. But it makes very little sense to select them from a small pool of tunes that are considered ‘beginners tunes’ that were popular during the 1970s and 80s and for that reason appeared in tutors of the time. The very ones that have been murdered and maltreated by thousands of beginners and mediocre players. It’s far less confining to open up your mind to the whole body of tunes that is available to you.
Yes.
Recently we had a thread about Brochan Lom, a Scottish peurt-a-beul. When sung properly the voice takes on many characteristics of piping ornaments. this catchy little ditty led me to a simple Irish reel, Kitty Jones. Simple. Follows the basic tune closely, and can be played fast and simply, or with added ornamentations to good effect.
enjoy!
Bob
Kitty Jones is one of these tunes that flies under the radar. I got it from Gussie Russell at some point. Most of the older musicians knew it but it doesn’t come up a lot. Nice old tune though.
Limestone Rock, the Mountain Top, Five Mile chase , the Honeymoon Reel. Primrose Lass and all of those are more G-reels will fit the bill too. But really, we can list a thousand tunes or more but you’re better off just lifting the ones you know and like best off your favourite recordings for now. The ones you know to hear are the easiest to learn.
Well that makes sense … go out of your way to find tunes that few people know or play so the curmudgeons if ITM don’t roll their eyes at you. From your extensive library and knowledge of music no less.
Us newbies … we will never learn.
Did anybody suggest tunes ‘hardly anybody knows’ here then?
Right now there is more music readily available to learn from than at any point in history. There’s no need to confine yourself. Open your mind and your ears, play the tunes you like and don’t worry if anybody else knows them. Play to please yourself.
Would you rather learn something that people might not play with you and that will have people thinking you haven’t listened to much, if any, irish music, or learn something that people might not know, but that will let them know you’ve been listening and doing your homework?
Alternatively, you could go to where the local expert musicians are, listen to what they’re playing, and maybe hear something you really like. Learn that, or have one of them teach it to you, and you’ll have something fun to play, and you’ll have musicians trying to encourage you.
But if you’re not planning on playing with anyone, then you might as well just learn whatever you hear that you like, and go ahead avoid ones that are generally avoided due to overplay.
As Mr G said, no one is suggesting that you only learn tunes that no one knows - that’s just completely absurd to suggest that anyone is! Learn tunes you like. Don’t learn a tune just because it’s one that keeps getting repeated online as a “beginner” tune, especially when it’s not. Learn easy tunes that catch your ear. Learn hard tunes that catch your ear too! But listen, listen, listen, and listen some more. And you’ll hear a bunch that you’ll want to learn.
Okay … I’m being a bit cheeky… but living in a small town in Ontario Canada options are limited. Around here it’s all chestnuts.
Love those hardwood forests. . . 
Bob
Just gather the C&F crumbs… its the crumbs I tell ya and be satisfied.
Feeding the Birds is a nice tune too.
I grew up in a small town in Ontario, and I went to a session in a small town in Ontario for a long time. I learned a few of the “chestnuts”, but still learned what I liked. But I didn’t learn the chestnuts because of the internet, I did it because that’s what the people were playing… And I still listened to a ton of music and learned what I liked. I also had a pipe teacher who taught me some very nice tunes, and it became apparent very quickly to me the difference between an overplayed tune, and one that’s not…
When I was starting out, the first reels I learned were Joe Cooley’s reel and Fermoy Lasses. Both of them work well played fast or slow and they offer just enough tricky transitions to offer a good learning exercise. I won’t get into the debate over whether something is called a beginners tune or has been overplayed since that’s so judgmental and audience dependent.
I sit in Golden Gate park sometimes and play things like; Down by the Salley Gardens, Roisin Dubh, or Fermoy Lasses and inevitably a crowd will gather to dance or inquire about the beautiful versatility of this “odd little toy instrument”.
I even had an old Scot (hey, I’m 60 and he was a lot older than I) and his wife stop by last Sunday to request Amhrán Na Leabhar - Lament for the Books, and Mná na hÉireann - Women of Ireland (forgive the spelling and translations, I’m an Irish/Indian Jew so it’s all phonetic to me), saying they heard me playing from a distance a couple of weeks ago and it reminded them of home.
Play what brings you joy, but play often. Life is too short to wait around.
ecohawk
Come West Along the Road has the advantage of being a “short reel” with quite simple fingerings and the usefulness of being almost impossible to play without proper breath support (unless you tongue everything). It doesn’t get too much play that I’ve heard around here, but I don’t get to many sessions so YMMV
Among the common tunes (most already mentioned) I’d suggest Jigs: Kesh, Out on the Ocean, Saddle the Pony, and My Darling Asleep. Hornpipes: Off to California (and avoid Harvest Home since it gets played as a reel in some places), or Boys of Blue Hill. Reels: In addition to Come West Along the Road John McIlgen’s (sp?). Again a short reel and not as well known as some, but easy.