Since working on anchoring R4, I’ve found that my playing has improved with regard to the faster pieces (all three of them) that I’m practicing. Part of it seems to be that anchoring keeps my fingers closer to the whistle, and travel distance is not as great.
In this same regard, I’ve been trying to think about fingerings that allow for less movement. For instance, a rapid D-B-D series is easier (to me at least) if the D has L1 closed.
However, I do see some good players on YouTube with wildly flailing fingers that seem intent upon moving as far away from the whistle as possible. In such cases of extreme dancing digits (Digits Gone Wild!!!), I figure that the end justifies the means, but I wonder if other folks here give thought to economy of motion in their playing.
Or do style points count and I’m just not getting it?
Close fingers can give you some speed, but won’t give you the velocity required to get much percussive pop out of the ornaments.
If you look at my whistle tune videos at http://www.tradlessons.com you can see how I do my cuts and taps. For taps, the finger comes up from resting position above the whistle first to put tension on the tendon (sort like cocking the gun), then is “fired” at the body to create a very rapid percussive closing of the hole.
Pancelticpiper has a very good discussion of the matter in one of his threads, you might want to search for it.
Yes as Michael is pointing out there are a couple distinct issues that fall under the “economy of motion” idea
the use of alternate fingerings so that fewer digits are moved in a given passage
how high the digits are lifted from the instrument
Starting with the second first, it’s odd that many old-time Irish whistleplayers I’ve seen over the years will hold their fingers further away from the whistle than is needed. Some even draw back their lower-hand fingers, curling them, so that they have to be uncurled when they’re needed. I don’t know where this habit comes from, but many instruments have stuff like that: for example the way “classical” fluteplayers tend to move the end of their flute around in a big circle as they play.
Anyhow, the fingers don’t need to be held more than, what, a half inch or so from the whistle, just high enough to not veil the tone. Look at the keys on a flute or sax to see how close they are.
But as Michael points out, to get the needed velocity to make “pats” pop out with the “right” sound, the patting finger(s) have to be lifted fairly high, maybe 2 or 3 inches, immediately before the pat. That’s why the pats of people coming from Boehm flute are so sluggish at first: they’ve been trained to keep their fingers in their “guide positions” and when they pat they move the finger from its guide position to the whistle and back. The finger needs more distance to achieve the needed velocity.
Now about the first issue, alternate fingerings. For one, I don’t like the term “false fingerings” because it implies that some fingerings are more correct than others.
When I started playing in the 70s and watched “real” Irish whistleplayers I noticed right away that they didn’t finger the whistle like my little Mel Bay book said to.
I picked up their tunes and their fingerings all together. What it boils down to is moving the fewest possible digits to create any given passage. These guys, and I, don’t think about it, it’s just a habit. The caveat is that back then everyone played Generation D whistles, the only D whistle available, and that whistle is very forgiving of alternate fingerings. And to boot “A” tends to be sharpish on many old whistles and flutes so that some of these “false” fingerings are actually more in tune than the “correct” ones.
An example is the second part of The Kesh Jig | B3~ dBd | which if you use xoo|oox for B and xxx|xxx for D means you’re only moving four digits, and those as a unit (no “scissors action”). If you use the Mel Bay fingerings xoo|ooo for B and oxx|xxx for D you’re moving all your fingers, and them in opposing/scissors motion.
And I’ve seen done, and done myself, the fingering xoo|xxx for B in such passages meaning that only two digits are moved. Obviously one can play faster and cleaner when moving two fingers rather than six.
Another example is a passage like | B2eB f#BeB | in the second part of Morning Dew. I will always, without thinking, finger B xoo|xxo in such passages, meaning that I’m only moving two digits, and them as a unit, when alternating between B and e. Likewise xoo|xoo is used to alternate between B and f#.
That’s neat. I was recently watching one of the top Irish whistle players, and I noticed her lower hand third finger was frequently down. The tunes were so fast I coudn’t figure out what all was going on though, but I guess it was in the context of the B as you describe.
If you want to see true economy of motion with precision and wonderful ornamentation flare and pop, listen to and watch Liam O’Flynn of Planxty fame. Amazing player and plays Burke brass whistles.
Another example is what might be called the “D shape” xxo|xoo.
So the beginning of The Mountain Road | F#2AF# BF#AF# | only one finger is moved when going from F# to A, and only two fingers when going from F# to B.
In many reels fairly long passages can be played with the two index fingers left down. On many old flutes and whistles A is a bit sharp and is more in tune fingered xxo|xoo anyhow.
thanks for the advice given here - it’s great! I am at the very beginning of learning how to play tin whistle, and unfortunately, I don’t have the possibility to have someone teaching me. So I am learning from recordings, books, video tutorials, forums… everything I can get.
Anyway, reading about those alternative fingerings today just opened my eyes somehow. I am practicing a tune at the moment which has A-F#-A-F#-D-A or something like that. (I am at work and don’t have a whistle with me and as I practiced the tune only by ear I must admit, I’d need to play it to myself to remember it correctly. ) I tried to do it the way I had learned it before, i.e., using the ‘standard’ fingerings, but I noticed that this was hard to do. It worked well as long as I concentrated on what my fingers where doing. But as soon as I start focusing on other things like rhythm and stuff I unconsciously start to leave the pointing finger of my right hand down all the time (so exactly that xxo|xoo).
So I thought that I just needed to concentrate more on the fingerings and tried to avoid this ‘mistake’. Well, now I know that next time I notice something like that I should listen to my intuition because what I think is wrong may not really be wrong at all.
Great clips, both. Thanks. It was actually Julie Fowlis’s playing that got me interested in the whistle. I sent her a message through her website and told her so, and she sent me back a very nice, encouraging email. Class act, that one.
A pretty good Boehm flutist I’ve worked with told me that the C# on the Boehm is invariably excruciatingly sharp, so you have to do some embouchure contortion to fix it, which involves raising the eyebrows. So I tried my wife’s (Boehm) flute, and yes, the C# was sharp, but raising my eyebrows didn’t do a dang bit of good.
Well, now I know that next time I notice something like that I should listen to my intuition because what I think is wrong may not really be wrong at all.