Hi,
I have rather bad situation here in Finland; my 10 years old daughter found my old pennywhistle (Sweetone; c) and started to play it by hersef. She is a quick learner and now she can play few tunes easily. Trouble is that She want´s to learn more -and the right way and my skills are limitted - My instrument is saxofone and I have tryed tin whistle only a few times just to see can I make any noise out of it.
In Finland this kind of pipe is not so common, so we are lacking teachers and mostly everything else essential information from fingering to how to blow… where I can find all what I need so I can start to quide my daugter?
Thankyou for all answers in advane!
Hi, and welcome!
You realize, of course, that introducing a child to music, especially a child who shows talent, entails the danger of enticing the poor child into becoming a musician. But if you are willing to take the risk, Brother Steve’s is an excellent place to start:
http://www.rogermillington.com/siamsa/brosteve/index.html
And this is a page of links:
http://www.cbel.com/tin_whistle_instruments/
Of course, you could also encourage her to hang out at the C&F forums - there are a lot of good people here who have no qualms about encouraging a child to dabble in the dark musical arts. Just be mindful of WhOA (Whistle Obsessive Acquisition disease) - most C&F’ers are infected and it is highly contagious.
Roger
Whistle and sax aren’t so different on basic fingering..it’s that F natural and F sharp you need to watch for. It took me ages to get it right on sax! My horn plays a two fingered C natural nearly on pitch if I’m having a bad day too 
.
Trisha
Thankyou for Your tips!
-I do know all the risks… it´s like watching my own childhood again and what have I become? Saxofone palyer. Sad story it was…
Unfortunately there is nothing I can do to prevent my sweet daugter not to go on that path -the saliva is dripping allready and she wonders around with this THING in her mouth. -Well at least I know where to find her -just follow the sound.
With a deep Motherly sigh
Mia
Hi Mia,
I’ve seen Finnish players on this board. Chiff & Fipple has a companion site (tinwhistletunes.com ) where a Finnish player of Irish music recently made an appearance. I’ve highlighted some of the names he mentions. Maybe you can locate one or more of them if you live anywhere near Helsinki.
3/01/05 Welcome to new poster, > Ville Karas> , from Finland, who writes, "My name’s Ville and my friends and I are practicing to accompany a group of dancers in a big irish dance show in may…The players are: Ville Karas - David Freshwater octave mandolin > Antti Havia > - fiddle > Keith O’Hiobháird > - > David Daye > pipes.
There was a follow up:
Ville Karas writes, "Well, these 3 were the first ones I’ve ever done where I play all the tracks… Normally I do a lot of stuff with some great Finnish players like > Markus Asunta > (posted some flute stuff before, now has a new Hammy Hamilton flute)
Good luck! Maybe your daughter will have a teacher sometime soon.
Cara
Thankyou Cara ! This information You send is just what I need -only I never thought I would find it from here! Finding a good teacher is very difficult, especially for a child!
Helsinki is about 200 km from where I live, but it´s not a problem!
/ Mia
My you’re up late.
I’ve been to Finland once. My sister studied piano and oboe at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki. It was a wonderful experience, being there for 10 days. I loved that the currency features great artists, composers, and architects rather than politicians. The only word I remember is “kiitos.” And that my sister lived on “junailijankuja” something or other. Wish I knew more!
There’s a very good chance that you’ll discover the Irish community through one of the names above. It’s a widespread but close network, if that makes sense.
cheers,
Cara
Hi Mia----I’ll just add a couple more instructional websites that I think are pretty helpful:
http://nigelgatherer.com/whistle/tut.html This website focuses on Scottish tunes and it has some good simple ones (not too simple for me, I am a beginner like your daughter).
http://www.whistleworkshop.co.uk/home.htm This website has some good simple tunes and also plays them at half and full speed which is nice.
Almost all whistle tunes are written for a D whistle. Then if you need to play in keys you can’t play on that whistle, people mostly get whistles in other keys and use the same fingering they would use on a D whistle. So if your daughter has a C whistle, I guess she should play with the D fingering—I mean she can’t play in the key of D (easily) on a C whistle. So she would play a C and pretend it was a D. I don’t know if that would be very good or not. Can someone help me here?
Hi Cynth!
I know this c whistle is not the right one to start if You want to learn proper way… I first bought it because I was (and still am) interested in Irish and Celtic folk music. -It sounds wierd to paly it by sax as You can easily imagine (unless You play Jiddish sax) So I went to the local Music- store and bought the only tin whistle they had at the moment and it was this black-painted alluminium Sweetone. When I went home I noticed that it was C, not D. I learned to play it a bit, but my playing allways ended with a feeling that it doesn´t sound right… I was missing D!
I think I could adjust my ears to hear D played C, but it can require some attitude issues with me! My daughter seems to have this problem too, she can hear easily if some tune is not correctly played -she knows something is wrong and allways corrects me when my peak is not in place… hard case!
Cara, junailijankuja is a familiar place to me, my friend once lived there! -Small world?
Mia 
[/b]
Hi again Mia—I’m not really saying it isn’t proper to start learning with a C whistle. I’m not sure what you mean about missing D—there are D’s on the whistle in the key of C. I must be confused. 
I just know that the sheet music (considered by many a poor way to learn the music compared to learning it by ear) is written for a D whistle by tradition, and they recommend starting with a D whistle because I guess you can play in the most commonly played keys. But if you are playing alone it doesn’t matter what key you are playing in.
I just was having trouble with how you would go about using sheet music written in the key of D or G (which can also be played on D whistle). I think you just pretend it is a D whistle and remember that you are actually playing one whole step lower.
I think others could give you better tips than I can, so I hope they come along and clear up this mess I’ve made!
Cynth, I found my D when I looked close enough C 
..
I think the best way to “clear up this mess” as You call it is me going out and buy a new D whistle! (What a revolution 
!) Can You recommend any? Is Sweetone ok or are there better whistles for beginners?
Mia
I am too much of a beginner to recommend whistles.
-
You can click on the word Search in the upper right hand corner of the screen and you can search the whistle forum. This is a very common topic of conversation with, naturally, many opinions. You could type in something like “beginner whistle” and you will find the different threads where that topic has been discussed. Or you could type in “Sweetone” and see what people say.
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You could start a new thread asking “What is a good whistle for 10-year old to start with?” People just love to give their advice!
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I think Sweetone is considered a good whistle for starting, but I just don’t know for sure. If your daughter is getting along well with the Sweetone you have, I suppose that would be some good evidence in favor of it.
The “mess” is the one I made in trying to figure out if you had a problem. You might not even have one. I am glad you found your D! We cannot have notes just wandering off and getting lost.
In my beginner’s opinion, Sweetone is an excellent beginners whistle. It’s not my favorite sounding but it’s one of the easiest players.
Cynth, and hello again!
I have to thank You for your effort to help me, it has been very kind to see all this trouble! How beginner are You? At least You seem to know a lot!
I agree with You Entropy, I personally think that Sweetone sound is not so nice than some other whistles I´ve heard, that´s why I asked if there is any other whistlemakers to recomend. (Might sound as a selfish thought; but I´m the one who has to listen the sound every day! And MANY hours per day…) 
Mia
Mia. You might want to give Erle Bartlett (Syn whistles) a shot. He’s a nice fellow to deal with, and he’ll ship to scandinavia without a problem (I’ve got experience). Great whistles as well. Look up his e-mail in the guides. I believe he’s under high-end, altough the the whistles are pretty cheap.
Ps. Nice to know there are some Finnish whistlers. I’m half Finnish, and our band has been to Finland twize to play. Our accordionist could speak Finnish with you, he’s from Finland. There is an Irish music scene over there, but it’s not too big. If you’d ever come to Sweden, look me up.
Hi Mia—I’m glad to see people are giving some advice on whistles.
I know about the website but not much about whistle playing. I can find tunes, but I can’t play them.
I started playing last September. I have run into a bit of a problem recently with it and I am hoping to get back my enthusiasm. I am a bit overwhelmed with all the details of things—breathing, this, and that—and I should just not get so intense because then I quit. But it may work out okay.
I am finding a wind instrument quite difficult. I have played piano and guitar in the past, not terribly well though. And there were plenty of difficulties with those too, just different ones.
You might want to think about your daughter’s whistle being tuneable—then you could play with her on the sax and she could play along with the sound clips on some of the tutorials. Ha! One more problem I have made for you. Oh dear. 
The very cheap whistles (which may be best to see if her interest continues) are usually not tuneable (sp), I believe. Pretty much all the others are.
Cynth, just a little bit of advice for you, and everyone else starting out. Take peoples hints as hints. You’ve got to find your own music. You create the music and it’s your own as long as you play it. You don’t have to breathe there and there, you don’t have to emphasize that particular note. You might be well off studying some of the skilled players though, but if you’ve got a good idea about the music you want to create. even that is not nessecary.
I have studyed many of the great players, and I’ve recieved advice from some of them, I build my playing according to the tradition I want to participate in and according to myself. I suggest you do the same.
Cheers
Thanks Henke—I think you are right. Especially at the beginning you can just get worried about too many things. I think your term “build my playing” is very good. It is an ongoing process, not something you figure everything out to in a few months, or ever really. You are building something. I will work on my thinking and perhaps try to do a little building tomorrow.
Why the assumption that Mia’s child would want to learn Irish music?
There are plenty of teaching resources which are much easier starting places than Brother Steve’s site which would get a child started playing familiar tunes drawn from all over the place. Whistle fits in many folk musics, whether or not it has been traditionally used in them.
Just add add my $500,000’s worth, the more strident the ‘hint’, the bigger the grain of salt to take it with. 
Some people around here have become musical ‘experts’ in an astonishingly short time. I have it on the best authority that they are experts; they keep telling me so themselves.