OK, maybe I’m a little late getting to the 21st century (some friends contend I’m still late for the 20th) but I’ll tell you about my new discovery anyway. I got a little MP3 player. It’s not an iPod but a Zen. I loaded it with whistle tunes from tutorial CDs, mostly tunes I’ve been meaning to learn but haven’t had the time. I pipe the Zen through my car radio and play the tunes on the way to and from work. I’ve been listening to that playlist for about a week or ten days. This evening, I pulled out a tutorial and practiced “Foggy Dew” and “Off to California,” two tunes I started on a while back and dropped as too difficult. I made it through both of them! Having the tunes stuck in my head made all the difference in learning them. I love my MP3 player!
Great idea, I have a cheap little mp3 player that I could really use for that. I wanted to put Wanderer’s MIDI files (who’s site I absolutely couldnt live without for learning tunes) on a CD for similar purposes but couldnt get them burned. I’m going to start hitting up Clips and Snips for everything
I do the same thing with my pocket pc. It really helps to learn the tunes. 
Ah… immersion… wunnerful, inn’t it?
I put them on at bed time and am amazed at how much I really do seem to absorb in that space between enjoying tunes 1 thru however many til I’m snoring. 
Where do you guys get your tunes? I’m too cheap to go buy any tutorial CD’s so hopefully there’s other good places. I know clips and snips of course but that doesnt have everything.
I had to actually part with cash and get some… mostly used on eBay… good if you know what to look for… risky if you don’t… I looked for the ones most recommended here… and I really like John Skelton’s “A Few Tunes” and “A Few More Tunes” books and CDs… 1st one gotten from the St. Louis Tionol last year and the second this year… I think there is one more… and there’s always next year.
A happy Zen Micro owner here. I use it all the time to listen to tunes I’m working on, I have whistle tutorials on it, have slowed-down tunes on it, and in a pinch I’ve used the built-in mic to record myself and hear how I’m doing with a tune. I also use it while jogging, use it to dance crazily with, and even use it to transfer files from my work computer to my laptop. I’m sold. And their sound quality is a little better than the iPod, according to the audiophiles.
That’s the reason I went with the Zen (better audio quality). I’ve got a nice pair of “open air” headphones (Sennheiser PX 100), and some of my session recordings sound like “you’re there.” …kinda spooky.
King: There are some pretty good recordings here that you’re free to download if you’d like:
http://faculty.ivytech.edu/~bpfingst/ss/ss.html
The ones towards the bottom (for 2006) are of better quality.
-brett
I’ve listened to a few of these clips and the music is great, I love the phrasing in the clips I heard. There’s some flute and some banjo, do you know who the players are?
I’d like to add that I’d like marry the banjo player, if she’s available, she’s awesome
I’m also a proud Creative Zen owner. Sounds great, automatically sets up as a removable drive on your computer, and takes one triple-A battery that you only have to change every now and then. 
The guy at Best Buy where I bought it actually recommended it over the other players they had, even though it wasn’t the most expensive. To me that says something.
The Cowon iAudio G3 is my favorite personal audio device. It gets about 40 hours of battery life from a single AA battery (use NiMH rechargeables), and plays the most efficient format, Ogg Vorbis, in addition to mp3s and other common types. I’ve had such great experiences with mine, since I got it in May of last year, that I recently decided to buy another one in a higher flash capacity.
I have an iRiver H-340 with about 2500 songs on it. The cool thing about this one is that it records as well allowing me to grab stuff at sessions or tionols and listen to it over and over. I have about 25 hours of house sessions alone. As a gift to the host I usually convert the night’s music back on to CD as thanks for hosting the party.
Great little gizmos!