Top 5 trad tunes to learn on whistle?

[brewerpaul]

@PB+J

@brewerpaul

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I feel like what I’ve learned about ITM from going to sessions or reading about sessions hasn’t made me like it very much. I like hearing the music, but as far as I can tell the culture of sessions is cliquish and unwelcoming. People typically have sort of grimly serious expressions on their faces, and there isn’t a lot of conversation. Over at "the session.org’ there was recently a thread about how to ditch the people who ruin sessions because they don’t “get it.”. There are lots of threads the gist of which is something like “oh some guy came to the session and started playing “the sally gardens” and I’m so sick of that tune how do we get rid of the guy.” There’s a thread now about playing really fast and how it’s mainly useful to weed people out. The whole point looks like exclusivity, not welcome. There’s no formal list of tunes to learn, there’s no standard way of playing the tune: you are just supposed to magically “know.” It’s like joining a different lunch table in high school.

Each session has it’s own vibe. I’ve been to a few like you described and never went back. However,there are a lot of sessions that are very open and welcoming.I go to a wonderful one at The Garryowen Irish Pub in Gettysburg PA. It’s an open session,with some fantastic players and some relative newbies. The person who calls a tune sets the pace and the group is really good about keeping to it.Nobody gripes about playing an old warhorse of a tune. People let each other try out their instruments and people are generally all smiling.Many hang out after the playing to have dinner together. That’s the kind of session you need to find.