Hi I am new the the tinwhistle would like to know if anyone knows how to play Blues or Jazz with the tinwhistle.
See https://forums.chiffandfipple.com/t/jazz-whistle-player/74830/17
Billy Novick’s jazz work on the whistle was great; his renditions of Irish tunes were terrible but he’s a great jazz musician and if you can find either of those old albums of his you’ll find plenty of inspiration. It can be done.
I’ve been working on some jazz and blues on whistle. Some of the jazz tunes I’m working on are: Take the A Train, All of of Me, Sweet Georgia Brown, St. Thomas, Scrapple From the Apple, Yardbird Suite, Move, and a few others. Some of the blues tunes are: Now’s the Time, Au Privave, Billie’s Bounce, Straight No Chaser. This stuff is within reach for whistle but to really pull it off I need a little higher level of chops than I have now. So, back to the woodshed.
I play blues a lot on whistle and Irish flute. I played blues guitar for decades and it’s easy enough to transfer.
I especially like basic twelve bar blues. I play with guitarists a fair amount. Lots of improvisation.
D instruments play blues in E (E, A, B7th sort of stuff) very well
Whistle and flute are very good blues instruments. ITM ornaments, slides, and so on equip one to be very
expressive in other genres and it’s possible to wail on whistle/flute, slide into notes, bend them and do on.
The wooden flute is much less airy-fairy than the silver, and its reediness and controllability with open holes
make it a fine blues instrument. I figure blues flute/whistle is a bit like harmonica before anybody realized
that you could play blues on it. There is extraordinary potential.
Jazz is tougher for me. I play some but finally I do better in folk genres, and delta blues
sure qualifies.
I’m also playing blue grass, often using sweetheart ‘fifes’ in A and also in G, to the delight of
some and to the horror of purists. But these are wonderful bluegrass instruments, in truth.
I play the notes one would play on blue grass mandolin.
And of course everyone who’s been around C&F for a while knows about the Coltrane whistle sessions…right?
http://www.allaboutjazz.com/reviews/r0403_004.html
Here’s the Wikipedia entry - plenty to ponder:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tin_whistle
including:
In jazz
Steve Buckley, a British jazz musician is known to have used the penny whistle as a serious instrument. His whistle playing can be heard on recordings with Loose Tubes, Django Bates and his album with Chris Batchelor Life As We Know It. Les Lieber is a celebrated American Jazz Tinwhistle player. Lieber has played with Paul Whiteman’s Band and also with the Benny Goodman Sextet. Lieber made a record with Django Reinhardt in the AFN Studios in Paris in the post Second World War era and started an event called “Jazz at Noon” every Friday in a New York restaurant playing with a nucleus of advertising men, doctors, lawyers, and business executives who had been or could have been jazz musicians. Howard Johnson has also been known to play this instrument.
I don’t think you’ll find much regarding blues - I’ve never found the instrument suited to the style, except for playing a few ‘blue notes’ here and there. The Billy Novick recording called Pennywhistles from Heaven has quite a few interesting jazz licks including a great version of ‘Scrapple from the Apple’.
there’s also
“Ubizmo” has a bunch or YouTube videos and he does Blues and Jazz on whistles and ocarinas.
He does a Harlem Nocturn on a ocarina that is really nice.
Check out his channel.
He is also a member here.
I’d suggest getting a Bflat whistle (Generation Bflats are great), possibly an Eflat (preferably low Eflat), and also learning to half-hole. First thing I did when I got a Thin Weasel Bflat was put on some Yusef Lateef and jam with him.
C whistle is handy for jazz. Many tunes are in F and Bb which can be played in the easier keys of G and C on a C whistle.
Once again, our modest but talented MTGuru keeps mum.
There’s a couple of really great kwela/jazz tracks at I’m Learning to Share!, by Willard Cele. They really swing and you can make comparisons with Stéphane Grappelli if you like - I won’t tell 
Unfortunately this style of kwela seems to have died with Willard 
The style seems to work very well with the whistle; there’s a bit of a transcription on my kwela project blog.
And new Kwela:
http://www.zen98059.zen.co.uk/The%20Positively%20Testcard%20Official%20Website.html
Great stuff-- I’d highly recommend downloading their albums
Hey Maki - just checked ‘ubizmo’ on youtube and found ‘lord mayo’ - WOW - never heard it before - there goes cleaning out the garage today - Regards.
There is also this newly started blog about playing Kwela with some transcriptions and streams of Kwela music
Thanks for the link, mrblister.
What a cool thread!
There’s this builder - Martin Educci
He plays the whistle.
Watch this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=010CZZbvr9g
Is this the tune, a polka?
http://www.thesession.org/tunes/display/638
Here is a link to the tune, if any others are interested.
Comment at the Session say this is a march, any thoughts/
http://www.youtube.com/user/ubizmo#p/u/16/UScEMhMPe5o
There are some blues/jazz sounding whistle tracks at the South African Music Archive Project.
Kalla’s Special by Spokes Mashiyane & Ben Nkosi:
http://www.disa.ukzn.ac.za/samap/content/kallas-special-southern-african
No Name Kwela by The Solven Whistlers & Arthur Mason:
http://www.disa.ukzn.ac.za/samap/content/no-name-kwela-jive
There are also a couple of 12 bar tracks on this predominantly kwela recording c.1958 at electricjive:
http://electricjive.blogspot.com/2011/02/kwela-c1958.html
electricjive also has some excellent South African jazz played on more usual jazz instruments