I see people here and on another forum sometimes decry tonguing, and to be honest I don’t think it’s that atrocious, either to listen to or to perform. Especially for non-Irish songs. Why is it so horrible? Because it’s not traditional?
(I also love Enya’s music and have been known to speak kindly of Susatos, so mabey I just don’t see it.)
The whole debate applies to Irish Traditional music only. But I think you’d have to be at least somewhat familiar with the music to discuss it sensibly.
The short version is: If you are going to play the Killarney Boys of Pleasure the way you play Teleman menuettos on a recorder, it’s not going to sound right. Is all.
I am “somewhat familiar” compared to most street people, though admittedly much less so when compared with some of the people on this forum.
However, the term “sound right” gets to me a bit, because who gets to decide what is “right”, and why?
Tonguing is generally considered more acceptable in Irish whistle playing than in flute playing. The thing is, if you want as bubbly and liquid phrasing as possible, you need to rely more on your fingers to articulate the notes through cuts, taps, rolls, all that good gig. Some tonguing is more necessary for the whistle, epecially in attacking certain notes in a combination, but if you do a lot of tonguing the result is choppy. A short run of choppiness might make for a humorous variation, but for general trad playing, I’d avoid that.
I think that’s a silly question.
If you are familiar with Irish Trad, then just listen to what the whistle players are doing with tonguing. I’d suggest listening to Willie Clancy’s whistling first.
I think it really sounds better to cut notes with the fingers than to tounge them. You get that lovely “flippy” sound that make the tunes sound very rich and complex. The cuts and taps just adds another dimension, and it does sound really choppy some times when (espessialy in jigs) whole passages are tounged.
Good suggestion. Then compare that sort of playing with choppy playing, especially on the same tune if possible, and you’ll probably get the “why” of it.
Now if your idea is to revolutionize ITM whistleplaying with a choppy style, good luck with your market. That’s a big part of your “who”. Then there are the musicians who grew up in the tradition. More “who”.
As it happens, incessant tonguing also holds your speed back if you’re trying to play rapidly.
only tongue if you can’t cut or tap or put something else that sounds cool there. The only time tonguing sounds cool is when you have to in order to get a particular high note out on the low whistle or if you are triple tonguing which is just so f*^&ing awesome. Just listen to Brian Finnegan. Tonguing is good when you are trying to give a trad. tune a new flavor also.
There’s a time to be born and a time to die, a time for war and a time for peace, a time to tongue and a time not to tongue. Check out Bro. Steve’s site, especially the sections on jigs, and be enlightened.
http://www.rogermillington.com/siamsa/brosteve/
I don’t think there’s any controversy that tonging, when correctly used, is fine and even desirable as an articulation for whistles. More controversial is tonging with the flute (see http://chiffboard.mati.ca/viewtopic.php?t=14690&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0).
Note that Grey Larsen’s new book has a section on tonging, and he states the outrage against tonging on the ITM flute is silly, as do many other resources I have consulted. It’s just another articulation technique that is used by many (but certainly not all) geezers and respected modern players. It is certainly used much much less on a flute than a whistle. And I believe tonging in ITM bears fairly little relation to tonging as you know it for classical flute music.
Bad tonging, inappropriate tonging, overuse of tonging, is to be avoided, as is true with other articulation/ornamentation techniques.
for a great discussion of tonquing, go to “brother steve’s whistle page”. the lind is prominant on the links page of the “main web site”, a button for which appears above.
the bottom line is do what you like and sounds good to you.
i know that to sound traditional you are “not supposed to tongue”. since i am a piping fan, i do it all the time. it is one good way to reproduce the “tight triplets” that are characteristic of some popular styles of piping.
meir
Brian Finnegan, the whistle player for Flook, tongues like a madman sometimes. You should listen to the “performance” section of the “interview” section on his tutorial from MadforTrad (I love run-on sentences). His tongued triplets blow me away. I added some into the "Banshee Reel’ in place of one of my rolls and it totally punched it up.
I agree that it really depends on how you feel like sounding that day. Tongue or don’t tongue as you wish.
Damn the mavins! Full speed ahead!!
-Derek-
Of course, but it is somewhat pointless, when you’re after a certain sound (irish), and people explain you how to attain it (less / different tongueing than in other styles) to then point at them, calling them dogmatic traditionalist, just because they pointed out a fact.
There is no right or wrong, but if you want to sound irish, it doesn’t help playing just what you like and telling everyone it must be irish because, um, well, you feel like it.
Sonja
Lads
I don’t know where the idea that tongueing on whistle was untraditional came from…it is used extensively (albeit to varying degree’s) by almost all traditional players that I am familiar with. Sean Ryan from Tipperary is an exponent of a heavily tongued style while Deirdre Collis from Sligo would be less so, with a host (galaxy even !) of players lying between either end of the spectrum. Not only does the frequency of tonguing vary from style to style and player to player but so also does the execution (i.e. some tonguing is hard, more soft), with all types being employed by most players to varying degrees.
Tonguing on flute is a different matter but this is a Whistle board so lets not go there !!!
Beir Bua agus Nollaig Shona
Conal O Grada
I tend to use a bit of triple-tonguing and some light tonguing to accent phrases, I think it sounds great and I’ve heard a lot of “traditional” players do it.
my girlfriend sure likes it, it brings a bit of spark and variation 
Quote @ Bloomfield
I think that’s a silly question.
Shhh. At least it’s on topic. 
Peter, thanks for the brilliant clip(it is John Skelton isn’t it?). I really enjoy his playing, one of my all time favorite whistle tunes is “The Road to Buggleskelly,” which is one of his (brilliant tune).
I think it may be a different John Skelton.
The problem with people asking “is tonguing ok in IrTrad?” doesn’t seem to be whether there is tonguing or not. I think the problem is that many people come from classical backgrounds to the music and that will tend to make them tongue in the wrong places. While you would tongue the strong beats in classical music, in IrTrad you would tend to slur into the strong beats and to tongue the weak beats.