I am interested in trying to play a low d whistle, but the one I had about 5 years ago was difficult to play. It seemed to take a lot of air and the fingering was wide. I do not know the brand but it was all aluminum. I was wondering if I should try a low f or g instead and just try to work up to the low d or does it make any difference? I figured a low F or G would be a little smaller and easier maybe to play. Also, what about playing Irish music? Is most Irish music in the key of D? Thanks for any advice.
Hi Scottie
I purchased my first low D (colin Goldie Low D - Med Blower) about 5 months ago and until 2 weeks ago, I could only play it for a very short time and had great difficulties holding and getting top few notes in the upper octave.
In frustration, I eventually put it in the cupboard and bought a Burke Low G, which had a very easy breath requirement and finger stretch.
After owning and playing the Burke low G for only 2 months, I got my Goldie Low D out of the cupboard to have a go and was astonished that I was able to play it much easier than before, including upper octave. I’m now steaming along with the Goldie whistle and loving it, and recently sold the Burke whistle because I stopped playing it.
What’s the moral of the story you may ask?? What I learned out of this experience is that it takes time to build up the fingering and breath skills when you jump from high whistles to a low D. The time on the Burke helped me build up my confidence and took the pressure off the fact that I had spent quite a bit of money on the Goldie whistle and initially couldn’t play it at all.
Regarding your other questions - Yes, D is the standard key that most Irish music (esp sessions) is played in and yes, an F or G would be easier to play from a breath and finger stretch perspective compared to a low D “of the same type.”
Remember that different brands of whistle have easier / harder playability depending on their construction. As a starting point for you, the Burkes are generally quite easy on the breath. I’m sure other forum members who have played a variety of whistles will be able to point you in the right direction brand-wise.
Good luck!
SSScotieee mah man!!!
You don’ play the ghb? Or the Greivous Bodily Harms??
Talk to a Glsswiegian about hardship .. and after about half a sentence you will understand tht the LOW whustules take aboot 2 weeks of pain till you get the ghost. LIke .. all them fingers floppin over the edge of the whustule give you black white-nigger guys a sense of rhythm .. th noo.
No pain .. no gain .. capische?
And as anyone would know - the only way I can get a performance on a low-whustule is to drop a series of goons out of an aircraft (of some sort), each with a well-known brand of aluminum whustule (for the press) and have them pull the thing outa their trench-coats at teh scriped time .. I have got them to play 2001-a-space-odesy (well the first few bars anyway) before I have to retrieve the the precious whustules from their rigoured hands where they’ve stuck into the ground after the plummet .. (my finances don’t go to issueing parachutes) .. rest-assured (make no mistake) The performance was good (once I pried the footage from the ricktuss-ed goon’s hand) and it all worked out well in “post”. And a box of 12 goons only costs me $12.99 .. A good investment .. I thought .. (I’ll gret it on youtube when I feel the market will be ready for “viral” . or “Viagral”..
And! you having digits (which I dont) will have the benefit of a few weeks learning how they work without medically-treatable outcomes .. how’s your insurance? .. And are your lawyers good enough to argue that the manufacturer caused the total melt-down of your fore-arms?? And most cogent - has any whustule-maker on this planet got enough insurance to make a damages case worth the barrister’s “fee”?? .. it’s not like a lawn-mower - you might hate your lawn .. but if you love you whustule .. well K-Mart can’t be to blame for that -I can’t imagine any business case where Wall Mart would EVER stock the cheapest musical instrument known in the universe .. Their buying-power simply don’t run to that (imagine selling the board to investing in $250 profit a year!! HARRR!!.) No one ever pays any one to give!!??
“jes play yer harmonica son” (Frank Zappa said that .. I agree)
(Edited to mention the word “goat” / My agient made me do it .. cheap at th pirce . Buy the whustule .. learn how it works .. and learn how you work in the process .. a handy knowledge)
(edited again to say - Come to Australia - This is like ground-zero for whustulers. Our governement gets selected by who is best to suport whustules - I should know - I participate in the most powerful poll in the local political universe - and I’m just a godamn stick!!! And we sticks have done much!!)
(edited again to say . well you WIL need some kind of certified skill .. otherwise you will have to come by boat and be incarcerated in a concentration camp for 2 or 3 years on some obscure pacific island .. DON’T say you are some kind of world-leading woodwind-maker - that don’t cut .. (as one of C&F’s finest has discovered) - say you can “weld” or “make toools” or Program computers (data-smith) .., or any other of the guilds that comprised the 17th century and they wil let you in regardless of what explosives you got strapped to your chest!! .. we need whistlers and realy really committed anarchists!!! .. to stop the 200-years-worth of coal that Australia is poisoning you-all with .. if you don’t beleive me - go surfing in florida 
) We got you all by the gonads. Come join us!!! (edited for the obviousb truth - if you aint here - you don’t breed .. sticks liek me have a future .. do you?)
I have several low D’s, but even less experience on high whistles. All my low whistles take more air than my high whistles. One thing that I have learnt is that embouchure can help immensely. What is it? the simple answer is using your lips to restrict the flow of air into the whistle ‘beak’. The long answer is…
Tapered bore whistles seem to have kinder hole spacings.
HTH
Not to “Philibuster” but … hmmmm - I’d be looking more closely at th resonant space I made in my mouth cavity and throat space (if I had such things .. which I don’t) ..but resonance is something a stick takes notice of .. I hate air conditioners that have fans that resonate with my wooden wavelength .. they make my fibres complain and go tooo loose for my sticky-man-like image .. and the chicky-whustules go away at the instant I display “sef-interest” .. ) (Is this advice .. or just noise .. don’t want too much noise in a whustule!! .. then agian . some like that .. gives access to obscur harmonics that might .. one day .. make you President of the United States of America!!!)
I recently made this move (after a few weeks practice on a Susato low G); tried out all the low Ds in my local shop, and found the Tony Dixon polymer was the only one that I could play comfortably. It requires more breath than the highs, or the Low G, but it’s manageable, so probably a good beginner’s whistle. Plus, it was cheap, which is always a bonus. I like its sound, and couldn’t get on with any of the metal ones at all. I may move “up” to a metal whistle in the future, if I find one that enchants me, but right now the Dixon keeps me very happy.
Most Irish music is in G or D, both of which are playable with the D. The tunes in G are often not suitable for playing with a G whistle, because a lot of tunes include the low D - Fsharp.
There are two different things which could fall under your statement “take a lot of air” 1) the pressure of air required 2) the volume of air which passes through the whistle as it’s played.
I much prefer Low D’s which are air-efficient, that is, a lower volume of air passes through the whistle, so that longer musical phrases can be played on a single breath.
About the finger-stretch on Low D’s, you’ll notice if you place several of the best Low D’s side-by-side that they all have more or less the same finger spacing. That’s because you get more evenly clear and stong notes with the hole placed as evenly as possible. If you put the fingerholes more closely together and compensate for their poor positioning by making them larger and smaller you end up with a whistle that plays poorly. It’s the laws of acoustics.
If you must, go for it. To me, though, a Low D is a different instrument in its own right and there’s no substitute for getting a lot of “face time” with the instrument itself. I wouldn’t buy a sax if my end goal was to play clarinet.
Irish tunes are most commonly in the keys that work on a D whistle: D Major and mixolydian, G Major, E dorian, A dorian, A mixolydian, B minor.
You get more or less the same finger spacing - perhaps. But the reason is pure ergonomics: the hole placement is there to make it more comfortable, or even possible, to finger the beast. It would be totally impossible if the finger holes would be at their acoustically optimal position; you would need a key mechanism for that (see Boehm flute). So we need to compromise by making some holes smaller and some bigger, to stretch their position out a bit. This introduces acoustical anomalies all the time, like the low E is a weaker note than the low F#. To say that “you get more evenly clear and strong notes with the hole placed as evenly as possible” is just wrong. Or you would get more uniform note strengths, but the tuning would be totally wrong!
In the pic below you see top to bottom an Overton with “easier stretch” hole six, a Burke Viper with hole six rotated to my convenience, and a Bracker with hole three and six offset for more ergonomic finger position. You see some variance in hole positions, all by design.
The Overton has hole six a bit closer to hole five, to help players with smaller hands. Hole six is accordingly a bit smaller in diameter, and slightly more problematic acoustically on the low E because of that. Both Overton and Burke have a smaller distance between hole four and five than the Bracker, because they are equally tuned, whereas my own whistles are just tuned, with a flatter F# compared to equal tuning. I point this out because it makes a significant difference where the holes can be located and still produce good notes. A whistle tuned ‘just’ can have more even finger hole spacings than an ‘ET’ tuned whistle.
You can never go wrong with a Susato low D well priced, easy to play and the sound really good!
About the finger spacing, yes, it varies a small amount, but all the whistles Hans shows have “more or less” the same spacing. Though I realise a small difference can feel like a big difference under your fingers!
Yes it’s ergonomics vs acoustics! The eternal battle of Low Ds.
I had a Low D once that had odd finger spacing: it seems that the maker was trying to make for a shorter arm stretch (a real issue for people with shorter arms). All of the toneholes were placed higher on the tube. It didn’t play nearly as well as a normal whistle from the same maker.
Usually the hole placed furthest from its optimal position is the hole from which E emits. It’s too high on the tube which is why it’s smaller than the others. It ought to be a hole the same size as the F# hole placed halfway between the F# hole and the open bell end, but down there nobody could reach it!
It’s remarkable that on my MK, for example, the Low E is just as strong as the other low notes despite the hole being in the usual Low D compromise place.
Indeed! And so does hole rotation (offset from centre), especially if you like to play with your finger tips, not piper’s grip.
I have not had the pleasure to play or look at a MK low D. I guess the hole is well finished, with rounded edges, inside and outside. That helps combat turbulence and the noise it creates, with the result that you can push the note for better volume, i.e. a volume closer to what can be achieved with a bigger hole, even if that hole has sharp edges.