So, what other styles of music to like to play on your whistles other than ITM? I also like to play some early music dances. The whistle just seems to fit.
I really like to play carols on it, and arabic music the most - it´s probably not built for it, but at least one can practise half holing really well ![]()
If you like Arabic music, you need to get one of Dan Bingamon’s Ahava Rabah whistles. It’s tuned to a Middle Eastern scale, so anything you play comes out sounding very exotic. They’re very reasonably priced too-- lots of fun!
I also play songs from a spanish band who doesn’t have a specific style, but it’s my favorite one ![]()
For example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gH961chmni8
Or for example:
I like to play jazz on the whistle.
Thanks for the link, sir! I checked his site and it sounds just awesome…as soon as I muster some money, I´ll sure buy one.
In addition to playing ITM, I’m in a group that performs Civil War era music. The whistle works perfectly for some of those great old folk songs. In both styles I mostly use a low G and low A which matches a tenor’s vocal range.
I like to scour used book and music stores for old Flute and Recorder rennaissance and barouqe music. A lot of it is pushing my abilities in the sight reading and playing skills department, but I enjoy the challenge.
I lean toward playing country and western, bluegrass, and old timey music and a bit of classical, jazz and popular music, as suits my mood. I also like to play around improvising with those styles.
I play FTM, mostly Breton (Andro, Hanter Dro), but also cercles (might be Breton as well), scottiches, avants deux (Breton also), bourrées, waltz and mazurkas (altough those are not typically french, obviously).
Swedish folk music and classical music.
Christmas carols, the Beatles and the Moody Blues. You have to pick and chose on the rock tunes - the Beatles sometimes use accidentals that require half-holing on some strange notes.
I like to figure out some of the whistle intros the group Within Temptation loves to put in their music…to taunt me, I suspect.
Edited for spelling.
What’s ITM??? ![]()
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internet toot music, innit? ![]()
…pretty sure it wasn’t infernal toot music… ![]()
I like to play whistle on anything that isn’t lightning-fast (probably because I haven’t mastered playing really fast
). Waltzes are always nice. I like to hear the whistle sing on those slower tunes.
On our just-released CD Tanana Mud we have whistle and/or flute on several tracks. One is a jig (an original composition by the banjo player), but we don’t play it in a particularly Irish way. Another is a reel, but one with more of an old-timey feel than Irish. The other tunes with whistle or flute are waltzes, and a slow instrumental in 4/4 that I wrote. In it, I have whistle and cello playing two different countermelodies while hammered dulcimer plays melody, with help from banjo and guitar. (It’s track 8 on the CD if you’re curious.)
I love playing Baroque music on my low whistle… it seems to go really well and you can find a lot of higher-level recorder music which fits perfectly.
I tried pulling out my Bach suites for Cello the other day to see if I could play it on whistle but the range was too great. Which was a shame, it sounded lovely for a while! But yeah… so many octaves it switches clefs in places ![]()
IDAwHOa, You are joking aren’t you? ITM, Irish Traditional Music.