I’m interested to buy a Low whistle below the Low D.
Could be a Low C, a Low B, Low Bb or a Low A whistle.
But I do not know which to go[/b] because I don’t
have a permanent music style. Today I can play an
Irish tune, but tomorrow I could be playing something like Jazz.
Please make some kind of discretization like:
Pianos – Bb
Guitars – E
Irish – D, G
Jazz - …
and so on…
D and G (both can be easily played on a D whistle) are probably the most common keys in Irish music. In my limited experience, most other music involves the keys Eb, Bb, F, C, G, D and A. Unless you are really good at half-holing, there probably isn’t one whistle that will cover all those keys, so two thoughts:
Look at the music you play now and see what keys you presently use. Then get the whistle that will cover the most tunes.
Consider getting a recorder instead. You get a fipple flute sound (Whistle Police: I said “fipple flute sound” NOT “whistle sound”!) and you can play in any key.
Other will have their opinions and they are probably right.
The D whistle (which is pitched in C as with flute or violin) is the best whistle for most folk music, Irish traditional, fiddle tunes, etc. The C whistle (which is pitched in Bb as with soprano or tenor sax) is good for jazz. The F whistle (Eb as with alto sax) is also good for jazz.
walrii, methinks that you will find that the Bb on any F whistle and any other instrument is only one step from the C
unlike the claim made in this article which is indeed musically mysterious:-
Well there are different Bb out there…
I think the Germans got it right
Bb is B. If we all adapt that, then we got the answer to the ultimate question: To BE.
Anyway, F and Bb and G minor etc are gorgeous.
Don’t know why they’re called flat keys, they are not flat in character, but rather in equilibrium (together with C).
OK, then … My opinion is that the premise of your original question is flawed. So insisting on better answers will not necessarily give you better answers. Sorry.
As folk music, Irish trad is constrained and conditioned by the main instruments used to play it (fiddle, pipes/winds), and by the tradition itself. The other musics and instruments you mentioned aren’t limited in the same way, or in different ways from ITM. So there are no predictable main keys for all of them. Whistle isn’t a common instrument for these musics, so there are no common whistle keys, and there’s no good answer.
To force whistle outside its native diatonic idiom, you need to handle chromaticity, modulation, and in-between keys. Sure, it’s possible, but may require extreme fingering skill and/or a set of whistles in every key. It’s a procrustean* effort.
[* ask Nanohedron! ]
The non-D whistles you hear in trad(ish) recordings by McGoldrick, Finnegan, et al. are chosen mostly for the variety of timbre and pitch they bring to the music. They pick music that suits the whistle, not vice-versa. They play them as transposing instruments in the usual D fingering patterns and trad keys. And that’s an approach that you can use, too. Good luck!
*
