I play as xx then half hole the g hole. It’s very hit and miss. Anybody got any other suggestions. What it is, is I am playing an Eflat Generation with D fingering as my brain can only do it this way. I’m playing with a mostly brass band and the tunes are all E# and B#. Transposing was fine but the G# is a pig to get a nice tone. On the recorder it’s easier as you do xxoxx. I wondered if I could swap the G# for another note but it doesn’t really fit in.
E# and B#??? wouldn’t that be F and C?
F C G D A E B . . .
Let’s see. You can’t notate E# or B# as key signatures with our system. 6 sharps is F# major . . . 7 sharps is C# major.
You mean that Bb instruments are reading Eb and playing C#, for example?
Stuart
I’m sure she means E flat and B flat. She said she’s playing an E flat generation. The note she’s having difficulty playing is A (she said G sharp, using D scale fingerings).
The best solution to the problem, in my opinion, is to keep practicing the half-holing. Eventually you’ll be able to do it smoothly and consistantly. If you’re slurring the passages with the accidentals, try tonguing them instead.
I’m sure that’s what she meant too, but the only thing that threw me was that I thought the sharp signatures were perhaps possible. But what you’re saying makes sense.
Half-holing is the way to go. I’ve heard excellent flute playing where the half-holing is so good you’d swear there was keywork on the flute.
Stuart
This sounds right to me too given the fingering explanation. The best advice I’ve had for hitting this note in tune is to try to place the halfholing finger (left hand, ring finger) diagonally across the hole. It works for me better than any other trick I’ve heard of. Perhaps someone could offer Selkie a suggestion for cross fingering this note. I’ve seen proposals but not explored them in a sytematic way on different whistles.
Cross-fingering the G# by xxo xxx makes it too sharp, on all my standard whistles but one.
However, with a Silkstone “Plus” whistle with its extra 7th hole, playing the G# xxo xxx x
is perfectly in tune.
so here may be a tweak idea for those Gen whistles:
lengthening the tube to the same length as of a C whistle, and providing for an extra hole to sound the D.
On a wide-bore whistle (Oak, Susato, Sweet, Cronnolly, Dixon, etc) you can finger a good first octave G-sharp as
x x o | x x x
But this will not work on narrow-bore whistles (Oak, Acorn, Generation, Walton, Feadog, Clare), where this note must be half-holed.
In the second octave things are different. On narrow-bore whistles, usually
x x o | x x o
gives a G-sharp which is easy to hit and usually very well in tune (although the tone may vary a bit from the neighboring notes).
On wide bore whistles, for the second octave G-sharp sometimes
x x o | x o x
will work pretty well but be sharp; on some wide-bore whistles this note must be half-holed.
–James
Right. Thanks for all the help. Seeing as I am playing with trumpets behind me and flutes next to me I think the xxo|xxo will be the one I can get away with at a push. I can half hole but it’s not a clean half hole at speed and I can hear the note is wrong.