Hello everyone,
I am kinda new to the forum. I used to be a member (say 3 years back) then I went by leluka but I couldn’t figure out how to ressurect the old account so now I will be Soledadwhistle. Anyway several years in grad school and the start of a career (and a family) have kept me away from the whistle for a while. Now, with a little more time on my hands, I have picked up the whistle again… so I found my way back to C&F.
Anywho time for the question. My wife and I have decided to try to start a new family tradition and do a Christmas eve carols sing/play. (Can’t call it a session as mine is the only irish instrument.) So I have been working on some carols. One has several moves from B to C and I am having trouble slurring between the notes with out the C# jumping in and sounding off. Any advice?
The best will be to half-hole the c-nat. Smoothest transition and very slurry if you want to. But not everyone’s cup of tea.
Next, and provided you play a cheapo whistle, use the better c-nat fingering, which is oxxxox to get the transition smother, go
xooxox B
oxxxox c-nat
That way you are only moving the fingers of one hand and not all six fingers at once.
Will not work as nicely on "high-end’ whistles that may sound flat on the oxxxox c-nat.
Finally, make it a feature not a bug by working around the transition and putting in little filler notes like BAc or Bdc or something appropriate to the tune.
Bloomfield’s suggestions are all useful of course, but I think you should just practice Bcd and dcB. without tonguing, ad nauseam until you can coordinate the movement. Then do the same for Bc#d.
I used to tell beginning students that these transitions were the only difficult thing about playing the whistle, and so they are. And they’re not that difficult, if you spend a few minutes or hours at it.
If you play a B nat and just raise the first finger and half-hole it, I really don’t understand how the C# can just “bump in”. You only raise the finger a little, making sure that the finger is still touching the side of the B hole. And if people think you’re out of tune, who cares? And why do you have to slur? What song are you playing, anyway? Why can’t the others change the key from C to D? All they have to do is move the capo, or simply sing higher.