New Double-Whistle Idea

Whistle
21

I don’t really get how you could think it’s “easy” to adapt to new systems. There’s nothing remotely “easy” about relearning all 1,000+ tunes you know on a new system. Sure, it’s easier than starting from scratch and learning a new instrument as a beginner, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a pain in the neck.

Well, I’ve already seen the high resistance from whistle players to the design you want to use, so I wouldn’t attempt to market it at all beyond making it an option for people to buy if they want one.

You’re seeing resistance from a very, very specific community (people who still use an internet forum) that is not remotely representative of your average whistle player. Most people on here are long-established whistle-makers or players who are 50+ and are obsessed with tradition. Nearly every young whistle player I’ve talked to at sessions thinks my Morneaux’s system is the best thing ever. And the main thing they love about it is that it doesn’t require you to relearn any fingering you already know. Literally the ONLY people I’ve met who have had anything negative to say about it are old-timers.

If the piano had a black key between every pair of white keys, there would only be two scales to learn and you’d then know the lot. Reach would be easier too. By having an extension of each black key stick out nearer the player and lower than the white keys, you’d also have more choice about which fingers to use for which notes so as to make things easier than they are now. That’s another instrument that’s trapped by convention, but it’s much more expensive to innovate and make prototypes.

That’s actually an excellent analogy, but I think it works against you. Talking to piano players, I think there’s a giant reason the piano isn’t designed this way, and it’s that it’s way less ergonomic. The way the hand is shaped makes it easier to play scales by switching between higher black notes and lower white notes periodically while going up and down a scale. The design you’re proposing sacrifices ease of playing in basically any key for the marginal benefit of being more “intuitive” and perhaps being easier to do chromatic runs up and down (something you almost never have to do any way). Which is, incidentally, exactly what I think your new whistle design would do.

If you want a design that truly is better than the current piano, have a look at the janko keyboard. That instrument is absolutely amazing, because it solves the ergonomics problem while making all keys equally easy to play in.

Here’s the thing: I’ve been trying to play the Turkish Dances piece (that people associate most with James Galway), and there’s one high-speed part of it that I just can’t do fast enough with forked fingerings, while half-holing is fast enough but insufficiently accurate when there are too many notes of that kind in a row.

I can’t imagine this would be any easier on your new design. Show me what tune it is, and I bet I can work it out on my Morneaux without too much difficulty. I can even send you a video. (And remember, I don’t even practice my Morneaux regularly, and I’ve only had it in its current state for about a year).

Regarding your charting out of the specific passage, I have a few observations:

  • The first fingering sequence doesn’t look particularly difficult to me, nor does it look significantly more difficult than the other sequences you’re suggesting. If you find it difficult, how can you be certain that isn’t just because you haven’t spent enough time getting used to the system?

  • You’re also overcomplicating your system and (I’d argue) making it more difficult to play by insisting on lifting your thumb and pinky for notes that don’t require them to be lifted. Playing a B, for example, doesn’t require you to lift your left thumb or your left pinky, so you might as well keep them on the instrument for that note. The same goes for A. And you can play a G without lifting your pinky off the instrument. If you’re having stability problems, I’d suggest it might be because you’re lifting your fingers off the “extra holes” when you don’t need to.

  • If you dislike using the left thumb, you could always play A flat with cross fingering, even on the current design. This works on my Morneaux whistle (in fact, it’s the ONLY way to play B flat on my Morneaux D whistle), and it means you never have to use the left thumb at all. And on your design, which has a pinky hole for F sharp, having a left hand thumb hole is actually totally unnecessary anyway.

  • The first sequence is even easier on my Morneaux than it is on your design (remember I have no left-hand pinky hole, and my left-hand thumb hole is used for what would be an F sharp on a C whistle, and what would be A flat is cross-fingered). For me, this would be:

X xO O , O xO O , X xO O , X xO X (X X) , X oX X , X xO X (X X) , X xO O , X oX X ,
X xO X (X X), X xO O , O xO O , X xO X (X X) , X xX X , X oX X , X xO X (X X) , X xX X ,
X oX X

  • You mention a design possibility that requires half-holing for C sharp. Whatever you think about any of the other systems, let me assure you that this design is NOT going to be any easier. Half holing ANY note is pretty much invariably going to be more difficult, especially if your goal is to play in tune. The only people who’d prefer a design like that are people who grew up always half-holding certain notes. But that’s just because they’re used to it, not because it’s easy. And my guess is that if you find half-holed C sharp easy yourself, it’s probably just because you’re more used to it. It’s NOT inherently easier, and in fact it’s inherently more difficult.

The issue is with Eb (on a C whistle) where the thumb is lifted off and two fingers are pressing down - that’s the hardest note to play because of the instability issue. A loop for the fourth finger to press up against would help to resolve it. With my alternative designs there’s a lesser issue of this kind because while the thumb still has to lift off for a note (and can be optionally kept off for several more), when it’s off, no fingers from that hand are pressing down, but a loop would still improve things.

Well, I do see your point. But I have to say I’ve never had the slightest difficulty with this myself. I still get plenty of stability, because my left hand thumb is still on the instrument. So it just doesn’t matter that my right hand thumb is briefly lifted. I find lifting my LEFT thumb while my left fingers are pressing down MORE counterintuitive, actually. But neither one is a problem now that I’m used to them.

I guess I’m just not seeing the slightest logical reason why it would be that much easier on your new design than on the old one. It’s the same level of finger movement for both designs, if you’re playing in a hard key like C sharp. It seems like the ONLY “advantage” of the new one is that you wouldn’t have this problem with E flat. I don’t think playing E flat with the right thumb is a problem to begin with. But even if it is, and even if your new design did make playing E flat marginally easier, is it really worth the tons of extra finger movement you get for half the keys on the instrument, including D, G, A, etc.? Is it really worth making every single super-fast Irish reel more difficult?

At any rate, why don’t you try adding a fourth finger ring to your current design and seeing if that makes the problem go away? And while you’re at it, I’d modify your design so that cross-fingered A flat is in tune (assuming it isn’t on your current version). That way, you won’t ever have to lift your left thumb at all. To be honest, if I had the option to cross-finger A flat on the design you’ve already made, I’d never use the A flat hole anyway. I prefer cross-fingered A flat on a C whistle.

22

When I play a tune on an instrument I just play the notes needed for it in whatever way the instrument allows it without going through any learning process. There are often particular parts that may need a bit of attention to get them right for next time, but it’s mostly instinctive.

Nearly every young whistle player I’ve talked to at sessions thinks my Morneaux’s system is the best thing ever.

What proportion of them have gone on to buy one?

That’s actually an excellent analogy, but I think it works against you. Talking to piano players, I think there’s a giant reason the piano isn’t designed this way, and it’s that it’s way less ergonomic.

On the contrary, what I described is more ergonomic, and I’ve realised I can improve it further by having each key appear on two rows such that there are four rows of keys where you would normally play on the upper three or lower three rows. That makes playing in all keys identical, and there’s more choice of how to play half the notes to stop your fingers getting in the way of each other and to provide more flexibility as to where you use the same finger again when running up or down a scale. Perhaps I should have patented the idea, but I have bigger fish to fry.

The way the hand is shaped makes it easier to play scales by switching between higher black notes and lower white notes periodically while going up and down a scale. The design you’re proposing sacrifices ease of playing in basically any key for the marginal benefit of being more “intuitive” and perhaps being easier to do chromatic runs up and down (something you almost never have to do any way). Which is, incidentally, exactly what I think your new whistle design would do.

My proposed keyboard design makes it even easier to play scales by making them identical for all keys and allowing easy switching between higher or lower black notes when not playing white ones (or to switch between higher or lower white notes when not playing black ones) [while higher and lower refer not to pitch, but to the row height]. My design would provide easier fingering, reduced stretch, easier learning, dead easy transposing, and it would be more intuitive: a gain on every point.

If you want a design that truly is better than the current piano, have a look at the janko keyboard. That instrument is absolutely amazing, because it solves the ergonomics problem while making all keys equally easy to play in.

Ah ha! So it’s exactly the same thing as I’ve just invented over a century late, and yet somehow mine is riddled with imaginary problems while the exact same design from someone else is amazing.

I can’t imagine this would be any easier on your new design. Show me what tune it is, and I bet I can work it out on my Morneaux without too much difficulty. I can even send you a video. (And remember, I don’t even practice my Morneaux regularly, and I’ve only had it in its current state for about a year).

The tricky section starts at 1:01, and the part I gave lists of fingerings for is 1:06 to 1:09. The speed you can play that at dictates how fast you play the rest of the piece, and you don’t want the rest of it to be too slow. You can’t use any of my sets of fingerings as you don’t have any instrument that works the right way for that. You’ll have to use a forked fingering for one of the notes, and on every instrument I’ve ever encountered, that produces an uglier tone than you get from having a tone hole dedicated to it, but it’s also harder to play and hinders speed. For another of the notes you’ll need to lift your thumb, but it’s not so badly placed in the sequence of notes, so it may cause less trouble in this piece and more in some other. Crucially, in the newer two designs which I haven’t made a prototype yet for, that section of tune will be dead easy to play fast and will produce beautiful tone on all the notes. I don’t want to compromise on that.

The first fingering sequence doesn’t look particularly difficult to me, nor does it look significantly more difficult than the other sequences you’re suggesting. If you find it difficult, how can you be certain that isn’t just because you haven’t spent enough time getting used to the system?

I’ve practiced that section on it a little almost every day since I made the instrument, and while I can occasionally get through it perfectly at speed, I just can’t do it reliably enough to play the piece with any kind of audience as there’s a high probability that I’d trip over that bit and look silly. You may have more skill than I do for that kind of thing, but I’m hitting my limit on it and would benefit from an instrument that makes it easier, as no doubt would a host of other players. With the right design of instrument, I have no doubt that I could play it perfectly every time, and one that has counterintuitive fingering which drives errors is not it.

  • You’re also overcomplicating your system and (I’d argue) making it more difficult to play by insisting on lifting your thumb and pinky for notes that don’t require them to be lifted. Playing a B, for example, doesn’t require you to lift your left thumb or your left pinky, so you might as well keep them on the instrument for that note. The same goes for A. And you can play a G without lifting your pinky off the instrument. If you’re having stability problems, I’d suggest it might be because you’re lifting your fingers off the “extra holes” when you don’t need to.

I didn’t bother to show which holes can optionally be closed rather than open so I’m not insisting on them being lifted at all when they don’t need to be.

If you dislike using the left thumb, you could always play A flat with cross fingering, even on the current design. This works on my Morneaux whistle (in fact, it’s the ONLY way to play B flat on my Morneaux D whistle), and it means you never have to use the left thumb at all. And on your design, which has a pinky hole for F sharp, having a left hand thumb hole is actually totally unnecessary anyway.

If you’re happy with the note quality that you get from that forked fingering, that’s fine. You probably are though, because I find that I can get it to work well on mine too, but on all my Generation whistles it’s sharp and has a horrid crackling tone to it, which is the reason I never took to using forked fingering in the first place and focused instead on half-holing. But here’s a key test for you: how well can you trill between A and Bb on your Morneaux? I can do it easily on my chromatic whistle between the equivalent two notes (G and Ab). Of course, you’ll find it easier to trill between B and Bb than I do, unless I use the forked fingering too. But the two newer designs would make it easy to trill between more pairs of notes, in one case without any forked notes, and that’s a significant gain.

The first sequence is even easier on my Morneaux than it is on your design (remember I have no left-hand pinky hole, and my left-hand thumb hole is used for what would be an F sharp on a C whistle, and what would be A flat is cross-fingered). For me, this would be:

X xO O , O xO O , X xO O , X xO X (X X) , X oX X , X xO X (X X) , X xO O , X oX X ,
X xO X (X X), X xO O , O xO O , X xO X (X X) , X xX X , X oX X , X xO X (X X) , X xX X ,
X oX X

That does indeed seem easier, but remember that this is piece-specific and I chose an example that’s hard on the instruments I have access to. Because I haven’t got an instrument like yours, I haven’t run into the places where it might get into difficulty with a tough sequence of notes and where other designs might outperform it.

You mention a design possibility that requires half-holing for C sharp. Whatever you think about any of the other systems, let me assure you that this design is NOT going to be any easier.

But it is the established way of playing that note on a great many instruments already, and seeing as we don’t have 11 fingers, a compromise has to be made somewhere. I consider any forked fingering near the top of the octave to be a worse compromise if you’re trying to get the best out of a chromatic whistle.

The issue is with Eb (on a C whistle) where the thumb is lifted off and two fingers are pressing down - that’s the hardest note to play because of the instability issue. A loop for the fourth finger to press up against would help to resolve it. With my alternative designs there’s a lesser issue of this kind because while the thumb still has to lift off for a note (and can be optionally kept off for several more), when it’s off, no fingers from that hand are pressing down, but a loop would still improve things.

Well, I do see your point. But I have to say I’ve never had the slightest difficulty with this myself. I still get plenty of stability, because my left hand thumb is still on the instrument. So it just doesn’t matter that my right hand thumb is briefly lifted. I find lifting my LEFT thumb while my left fingers are pressing down MORE counterintuitive, actually. But neither one is a problem now that I’m used to them.

When I play the sequence C D Eb F G, lifting the thumb for the Eb changes the balance of forces so much that the upper fingers of that hand which still need to be covering two holes can fail to seal them for a moment. I have to add extra force with the other hand to compensate and it’s causing unpleasant stress to by left thumb. Same extra stress problem for the left thumb when going down those notes the opposite way when fingers of the right hand hit the tube from above with the right thumb not pushing back up the opposite way. You may not have damaged hands like mine, so these problems may not affect you, but I can bet that if I make an instrument that causes less trouble for my fingers, it will do the same for a lot of other players too.

I guess I’m just not seeing the slightest logical reason why it would be that much easier on your new design than on the old one.

Well, for one thing, the thumb would only lift off when none of the fingers of that hand are pressing down, and with the loop over the fourth finger of the right hand, there would still be upward pressure applied to the tube when the right thumb lifts off. I think the lack of such a loop is likely the main thing that’s held back the adoption of chromatic instruments of this kind because they have serious instability issues for many players.

It’s the same level of finger movement for both designs, if you’re playing in a hard key like C sharp. It seems like the ONLY “advantage” of the new one is that you wouldn’t have this problem with E flat. I don’t think playing E flat with the right thumb is a problem to begin with. But even if it is, and even if your new design did make playing E flat marginally easier, is it really worth the tons of extra finger movement you get for half the keys on the instrument, including D, G, A, etc.? Is it really worth making every single super-fast Irish reel more difficult?

If you want to play a wide range of pieces that need a chromatic instrument, the gains will outweigh any such issue, but I doubt there is any such issue in the first place as lifting or closing two fingers at a time rather than one doesn’t add significant effort. The way to make certain of that though is to build prototypes and test them extensively.

At any rate, why don’t you try adding a fourth finger ring to your current design and seeing if that makes the problem go away?

Yes indeed - that’s exactly what I intend to try next.

And while you’re at it, I’d modify your design so that cross-fingered A flat is in tune (assuming it isn’t on your current version). That way, you won’t ever have to lift your left thumb at all. To be honest, if I had the option to cross-finger A flat on the design you’ve already made, I’d never use the A flat hole anyway. I prefer cross-fingered A flat on a C whistle.

It’s pretty well in tune, but although the note sounds well, it introduces a flavour of a different kind of instrument that I dislike. There’s no substitute for having dedicated tone holes for each note, where you can.

23

This seems like an excellent approach if you want to learn a ton of different instruments, and a rather poor one if your goal is to master a single instrument.

What proportion of them have gone on to buy one?

The thing cost over $400. Very few people are interested in buying a high whistle that expensive.

Ah ha! So it’s exactly the same thing as I’ve just invented over a century late, and yet somehow mine is riddled with imaginary problems while the exact same design from someone else is amazing.

I must have misunderstood what you were saying, because I was not imagining the keyboard you’re describing as looking anything like a janko keyboard. If all you did is reinvent the janko keyboard in your mind, congrats. You’re a lot more innovative than I’ll ever be lol.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHND2SR > … 7%99%D7%9D

The tricky section starts at 1:01, and the part I gave lists of fingerings for is 1:06 to 1:09. The speed you can play that at dictates how fast you play the rest of the piece, and you don’t want the rest of it to be too slow. You can’t use any of my sets of fingerings as you don’t have any instrument that works the right way for that. You’ll have to use a forked fingering for one of the notes, and on every instrument I’ve ever encountered, that produces an uglier tone than you get from having a tone hole dedicated to it, but it’s also harder to play and hinders speed. For another of the notes you’ll need to lift your thumb, but it’s not so badly placed in the sequence of notes, so it may cause less trouble in this piece and more in some other. Crucially, in the newer two designs which I haven’t made a prototype yet for, that section of tune will be dead easy to play fast and will produce beautiful tone on all the notes. I don’t want to compromise on that.

Cool, I’ll see what I can do. I guess I’ll try playing it a whole step up, since I have a D whistle.

That does indeed seem easier, but remember that this is piece-specific and I chose an example that’s hard on the instruments I have access to. Because I haven’t got an instrument like yours, I haven’t run into the places where it might get into difficulty with a tough sequence of notes and where other designs might outperform it.

But any instrument you make is going to have difficult passages for that specific instrument. There’s hardly any instrument in existence (the janko piano perhaps being a rare case) where no specific chromatic passages are any harder than any others. And I don’t think the new design would avoid instances of this any more than mine. But we can agree to disagree on this point, since we clearly have differing subjective opinions regarding the ease of things like left-hand thumb use.

If you’re happy with the note quality that you get from that forked fingering, that’s fine. You probably are though, because I find that I can get it to work well on mine too, but on all my Generation whistles it’s sharp and has a horrid crackling tone to it, which is the reason I never took to using forked fingering in the first place and focused instead on half-holing. But here’s a key test for you: how well can you trill between A and Bb on your Morneaux? I can do it easily on my chromatic whistle between the equivalent two notes (G and Ab). Of course, you’ll find it easier to trill between B and Bb than I do, unless I use the forked fingering too. But the two newer designs would make it easy to trill between more pairs of notes, in one case without any forked notes, and that’s a significant gain.

Yeah, some whistles handle the forked B flat better than others, that’s for sure. My Morneaux is specifically designed to play it that way, and the tone is excellent; B flat is maybe marginally quieter than B, but it’s so slight I don’t think I’d ever notice unless someone pointed it out. Trilling is not something I’ve ever practiced, but I just tried it, and it seems doable. Can’t think of any reason it would be harder than, say, trilling between C sharp and D, something I can easily do now that I’ve practiced it. I think It’s easier if you use an alternate fingering for A, like xxo oxo.

I have often wondered what factors affect the clarity of this particular note. Forked B flat does sound a bit sour on many whistles, including really good ones. But somehow Morneaux figured out a way to make it pretty much perfect. At any rate, I find that forked B flat tends to sound good more often than it sounds bad, as a general rule.

But it is the established way of playing that note on a great many instruments already, and seeing as we don’t have 11 fingers, a compromise has to be made somewhere. I consider any forked fingering near the top of the octave to be a worse compromise if you’re trying to get the best out of a chromatic whistle.

Yeah, but you know what else is an established way of playing on many instruments? Using 6 fingers to play a basic diatonic scale on the instrument. :wink: I thought we were abandoning convention to adopt the optimal design, not going with convention. My point is that requiring you to half hole anything is not even close to optimal, and there are ways to play C and C sharp on a woodwind without needing to half hole and without needing 11 fingers. So the most optimal design wouldn’t involve half-holing.

You may not have damaged hands like mine, so these problems may not affect you, but I can bet that if I make an instrument that causes less trouble for my fingers, it will do the same for a lot of other players too.

Very fair.

If you want to play a wide range of pieces that need a chromatic instrument, the gains will outweigh any such issue, but I doubt there is any such issue in the first place as lifting or closing two fingers at a time rather than one doesn’t add significant effort. The way to make certain of that though is to build prototypes and test them extensively.

My assumption is that more coordinated finger movement = more difficult. In my experience, that’s the case. That said, I totally agree that it can’t hurt to build prototypes and test them out.

And while you’re at it, if you ever want to try out my crazy double whistle idea, you have my full support. :laughing:

24

After practicing Rondo Alla Turca a bit, it is indeed very difficult. But I’m confident I’ll be able to play that portion up to speed with some practice. I’m playing that portion in G# minor instead of F# minor, since I have a D whistle.

I’ll also add that I think this is probably peak difficulty for my Morneaux whistle. G# minor is probably the absolute worst key for the instrument. So if I’m able to get this down after a week or two of practice, hopefully that’ll demonstrate my point.

25

I hope you do achieve it, because it’ll be a good tune to use to demonstrate what the Morneaux whistle can do. I have heard it played perfectly at full speed on a standard quena, but that takes a higher level of skill. I might be able to get up to the same speed if I switch to using forked fingerings and learn to nail those (though I’m sure my playing of it would still be inferior in other ways), but before I invest time in that I’d rather explore chromatic options which should make it easier and allow me to focus more on trying to make it sound beautiful rather than industrial. Our objective is to identify and create instruments that enable less capable players to play pieces another level up from their normal range because that provides greater enjoyment.