Over the past two weeks, three new whistles have arrived in my house: a Dixon high D, a Doolin one-piece D, and an O’Briain Improved.
So..I just thought I’d give my impressions of these whistles; I’m a beginner, so this might be more helpful to other beginners.
The Dixon: Nice sound on the low notes, but as you get towards the second octave, you have to blow some of the notes (particularly CNat) into tune. This makes it difficult to get all the notes sounding right, since doing a passage that requires a CNat to a lower E means you have to back off very fast on your breathing. Also, when I get to the higher notes (g, a, b in the second octave), I’m really struggling to push enough air through to get them right, and this gives them a really shrill tone.
It might be (probably is) my technique, but for whatever reason, the Dixon is just not my cup of coffee. Maybe when my technique improves…
The Doolin: This thing defines chiff for me. It’s pretty much in tune, doesn’t take too much air; but you have to have pretty good control over your air. Pretty easy to overblow the first few notes of the first octave. None the less – this whistle is growing on me daily.
The O’Briain Improved: this is my favorite. Requires just as much (if not more) air control than the Doolin, but it’s very smooth into the second octave. Not much chiff; very little, in fact. It has what I think of as a “round” tone. Requires the least air of all the whistles I have.
As I said, these are all the impressions of a novice; I hope they’ll be helpful to other novice players.
