Hi all,
I am recording c whistle and low d whistle in a home studio and having a great deal of trouble getting a sound I am happy with, especially with the low whistle. It is not a bad instrument (local brand sold in McCullough Piggots, Dublin, forget the name of the maker) and has a strong tone, but all my attempts at recording it result in a very breathy sound.
Anyone have any advice on mic placement etc?
Cheers,
Ben.
I don’t know about the mic, but I wanted to say welcome to the forum(s)! 
Ben, what type of microphone are you using? Shures are fine for stage but not so good in a studio. I’d suggest a good quality all purpose condensor mic like a Rode which you can get cheaply in Australia. That’s what I use. Just aim it between the mouthpiece and finger holes and stand back a little bit, set the levels just below clipping and of your go.
I’ve had pretty good luck recording low whistle with the mic about halfway down the whistle and to the side.
–James
Welcome: Wombat is correct, in that Rode makes a number of models that would do the job quite well. However, so does Shure. Let me suggest the Shure KSM 32. At a much lower price point, the Audio-Technica 3035 does a beautiful job. Both are condenser mics, needing phantom power.
If you have the facilities, record the instrument to two tracks, leaving a bit of physical space between the mic and the whistle. On play-back, slip the one track between 5-10mS, and add a quality reverb. The reverb should be dark, with app. a 2-3 second decay. Do not mix much of the reverb into the overall sound. In doing these manipulations, you have increased the ‘size’ of the acoustic space occupied by the whistle, without creating a muddy sound…
Good luck with your project.
Byll
Thanks for the suggestions - funny that Wombat should mention Rode condensers - I have a Rode Nt1 and a Rode NTK, so short of borrowing something special like a ribbon mic, these are the ones I have at my disposal.
Last night I tried a range of mic positions - even wild ones like pointing along the whistle from over my right shoulder. The best seemed to be in front at about 1 m distance pointing near the top of the whistle. If you aim at the fingers you get a stronger, less breathy sound but you also get some notes coming out much more strongly than others.
Will try the suggestion of aiming halfway between the top and the fingers and a little to the side - that would make sense in that you are removing some of the tops which would be much more directional, and getting a little more of the room sound.
Once I find the best posi I’ll post the result.
I am fearing that the problem is just that my whistle doesn’t sound as good to other people as it does to me when I’m playing it - perhaps a mic positioned inside my mouth somewhere…
Thanks for the welcomes by the way - great to find this forum!
B.
Hi…thought I’d add my two cents to the recording issue… I spent a lot of time working to get my whistle sound just right - it’s not an easy instrument to get at first… The best I found was to begin with a great old tube microphone - I place the microphone about two and a half feet away from me up, above and away from me. That tended to pick up all of the great sounds and not the breathiness…hope this helps…
Good luck!
Joanie Madden
I’m going to try to make it to the Kansas City Irish Festival this year. Maybe we’ll get to do a little jamming together with some other Chiffers!
Tell Roisin she got the last laugh on me - I bought a fiddle! 
Tell Mary we love her. We love you, too, Joanie!
Now, back on the subject. Normally, I use a small lapel-type mic rubber-banded to the whistle, then if there is too much breath rumble, I will apply the bandpass function in my sound editor and cut out the lowest frequencies. Hopefully this helps.
Take care,
Jim
Weirdly enough, the best results I’ve ever had recording whistle have been in a heavily-curtained room about 12 feet by 12 feet, standing in the center, with a Sony minidisc recorder on a chair behind me, with a Giant Squid wood-cased stereo mic plugged into it. Doesn’t seem to matter which way it’s pointing. I guess, whatever you can get to work, works!
I like the reverb idea too. Generally use just a teensy touch on mine. Never tried the 10ms delay… I’ll have to check that out.
Joanie, great to see you on here! So, what the heck is a “tube mic”? Like a shotgun mic, or just a cylindrical? Or are you referring to vacuum tubes? I know some people still swear by vacuum tube amps.
Cheers,
Bill Whedon
Sorry Byll, I was talking in shorthand. I meant the usual Shure SM 57s and 58s which I would use for stage or even for guitar amps in the studio. I didn’t mean that Shure condensors wouldn’t be appropriate. I recommended Rode because Ben is in Australia so he would not have to pay import duty on their products.
Ben, let me offer a belated welcome to our world; I think my earlier post was in the middle of the night and I just got on with the business.
Joanie’s suggestion is a good one if you can find a good old valve mic. I sometimes use valve preamps to get a warmer sound.
The Rodes I use are NT3s so I can’t really offer a comparison with yours; I’ve never tried them. Sound comes out of the top half of the whistle as well as the holes and the different frequencies predominating in different places blend nicely at a bit of a distance so it’s best to have a not-very-directional mic which will pick you up well at a bit of a distance.
I think from reading your post that Byll’s advice about using subtle reverb might be the answer. I usually don’t go to quite the same trouble he does but I add a small amount of room reverb to the largely dry sound during mixing. Don’t even add so much that you are aware that the sound is processed.
I guess a lot of us shy away from that lost-in-the-mists, reverb drenched, new age, Celtic muzak sound on low whistle. This isn’t how I use reverb and I’m guessing that Byll has much the same idea in mind as I do. When you record you are looking for a clean signal so you try to find a space in which sound will be absorbed rather than reverberate. But we all know that the best place to practice whistle is the bathroom or a stairwell. What I aim to do with reverb is just to restore the sound to what you would have heard in a room with good accoustics.
As a matter of fact I am recording the whistle for my whistle/synth/layered-vocals act “Celtic Wind” - we do the same old favourites with more reverb than anyone else has ever done before…
I’m joking
I haven’t got alot of CDs with low whistle - my favourite is a tune on Andy Irvine’s album “Rain on the Roof”. This is a weird way to explain it but the whistle sounds like the words “Chocolate” and “Charcoal” said slowly. The breathiness is there but dry and a perfect part of the sound, which is warm, niceley punctuated by the rolls and tongues and a little quirky. The recording has little or no reverb - and is not over compressed - has alot of space in the mix. Like I said, hard to explain… and even harder to reproduce it seems.
Re valve mics - my Rode NTK is a kind of solid state/valve crossover. I haven’t been using it for long but it certainly seems to have a nice warmth to it. Might post some snatches of my recordings once I get a chance to experiment again.