Okay, rank newbie speaking here. I’ve had a chance to try out the three whistles I purchased from The Whistle Shop: a Clarke Sweetone, a Walton’s “Little Black D”, and a Susato Dublin Soprano D. Surprisingly, I’ve found it very easy to belt out tunes and I look forward to teaching my son how to play. Here are my initial impressions of the whistles:
Sweetone: Very pretty sound on the upper octave and easy to reach and play the high-D. My only beef is that I have to play the low D and E VERY softly to keep it from cracking up into the upper register. When I unwrapped the fipple, I noticed that the fipple blade had a rather large imperfection/bubble in the plastic. I carefully took an exacto knife and smoothed it out but the blade is not a perfect edge and I wonder if this is influencing its sound characteristics. Thus, I’m tempted to get another Sweetone to see if it performs exactly the same. Also, the holes are a bit difficult to feel which makes playing a bit more difficult.
Little Black: A bit more tricky to play than the Sweetone and the tone is very airy–way too airy for my tastes. I must also play extremely softly on the low D and E like the Sweetone. My least favorite of the three whistles. I may look into tweaking this one to see if I can improve it at all. Perhaps this whistle has the most traditional sound of the three whistles?
Susato: Tone has a quite different characteristic than the other two whistles, more recorder like. This whistle is SO easy to play on the lower octave. It plays at least twice as loud as the two other whistles. Construction is top notch and makes the other whistles seem like toys in comparison. This was also the only whistle that could play a C natural (0XX000) in tune. My fingers also felt much more comfortable over the holes and I could more easily hit half-fingered notes and do slides. My only beef with the Susato is the difficulty playing in the upper octave with the high C# and D being next to impossible to hit. Quite a bit of pressure and/or air flow is required to play on the upper octave producing a very LOUD tone. My ears literally ached when I did manage to hit the C# and D. The surprising thing is the following statement from the Whistle Shop’s web page about the Susato: “The narrow, curved windway requires very little air, and the whistle plays quite easily in it’s entire two octave range - usually even a few notes above this!” Overall, this is my favorite whistle but I’d choose to play the Sweetone if most of the song is played in the upper octave. I just wish the Susato would play in the upper octave as advertised assuming there is nothing wrong with my technique. What do other people think about playing in the upper octave with the Susato D?
My main observation here is that all of the whistles seem to have a preferred one and a half octave range. The Sweetone and the Little Black seem most comfortable on the higher end and the Susato on the lower end. Is this range bias typical of most whistles? Is there a whistle that can play a strong low D just as easily as a high D?
Cheers,
-bob
[ This Message was edited by: Limbo on 2001-12-10 04:01 ]
[ This Message was edited by: Limbo on 2001-12-10 04:01 ]
Hi Bob - welcome to the wonderous world of whistling!
I think your conclusions are pretty precise, compared to the general concensus about these whistles. The Little Black certainly has the most “traditional” whistle sound. Unfortunately the whistle is crap (IMHO), so if you’re aiming for that sound, I’d say get yourself an Oak or a Generation. You’ll want these sooner or later anyway.
And yes, Susatos are extremely loud compared to more or less any other whistle on the planet. If the description on The Whistle Shop’s webpage gave you another impression, you might want to contact Thom and see if he can update the description.
If you want a traditional sounding whistle that isn’t too loud or too soft and has a strong D, get a Waltons brass. IMHO, it is the most traditional sounding and best cheap (under $10) whistle. I have an LBW, too, and would classify it as traditional as well, but it has a bit more chiff than the regular Waltons brass D.
If you like the sound of the Susato but want more consistency, and maybe a little less volume, get a Dixon. It’s a fine whistle, and even though it’s made of polymer, it sounds like a whistle. To me, the Susato sounds more like a recorder. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but if I want that sound, I’ll pick up a recorder.
Limbo, I’ve got some Dixons and some Susatos, and the Dixons are definitely much better. Susatos have been recommended to me by a renaissance fair player, who said the volume is necessary in his circumstances. A susato has no trouble being heard at a loud session, but for home playing I always use my Dixon.
I have owned both the Sweetone and the Susato (in D) for about a year and a half. Because of its difficulty in holding the upper register, I hardly ever play the Susato. On the other hand, I’ve worn the finish off the Sweetone. I also have an Oak and a Clarke original in D, but the Sweetone is my favorite, by far.
For those with a Sweetone, do you find that it doesn’t play the low D & E very well (i.e., have to blow very quietly to get a solid tone) or it just my whistle? It seems great in the upper register but very wimpy in the lower.
Well, LBWs and Sweetones play low Ds OK in my experience. Rather, I think the “problem” is with you - “problem” being tongue in cheek of course! Whistles have much variation in how much air they require to play. Susatos, while not taking a lot of air, still takes more than most “traditional” whistles, here meaning the standard cylindrical metal body, plastic mouthpiece kind. If you find the Susato takes a comfortable amount of air, well, then that whistle represents your preferences at the moment. “At the moment” because you can of course train yourself to play those other whistles OK - in your case that means practicing playing using less air.
My experience with the Susato D is very similar to Limbo´s: it’s quite difficult to play in the upper octave. A lot of air pressure is required to hit and hold the high E, F, G, etc., which annoyingly always try to sink back into the lower octave. The excessive amount of air pressure required to reach and hold these notes produces an unpleasantly shrill and unmusical sound, quite the opposite of the sound produced in the lower octave, which is easy and clean and does not require much air pressure.
Unfortunately I’ve had a similar though much worse experience with a Susato Tabor pipe: the first four notes (low D, E, F and G) are full and clean, but the transition to the next set of notes is next to impossible: from G to A (same fingering as low D with higher air pressure) one finds a completely different timbre and tonality, as if one had suddenly switched instruments. The A note is shrill and unpleasant, as are all higher notes, and this makes the pipe altogether unplayable. I’ve been intending to get in touch with the Susato people to complain about this but haven’t gotten around to do so yet. If they read this, I’d like to see what they have to say about it.
I play a Walton black Guinness, a cheap and humble whistle made out of some sort of very soft metal alloy, maybe even tin, and it plays fine in the lower octave and glides easily into the higher octave without any change in timbre or texture. It also has a much more whistle-like sound than the Susato, which has a nice sound in the lower octave but ressembling much more a recorder than a whistle.
I play as well a short and high-pitched Generation F and it plays great, riding unhindered from lower to higher octave and sounding always like a true whistle.
Even though my experience with whistles is short and rather shallow, it’s becoming very clear to me that a whistle’s soul is made out of metal and that if we take the metal out of the whistle, we’re eliminating outright its whistledom (we’re killing the whistle) and changing it into a different instrument, which though tamer is no longer a whistle.
Sorry for being argumentative, but I do think real whistles are metal whistles.
Cheers and merry Christmas to all!
I suspect the reason behind the whistle’s sound lies not so much with the material chosen, but in other design factors, with one of the more important being wall thickness. Of course, whistles made of wood or plastic will often have a larger wall thickness, with a corresponding “less whistley” sound.
Take a Dixon high D plastic whistle. It’s pretty thin walled and actually sounds very much more like a “real” whistle than like a Susato.
