The topic of the inconsistency in the naming of the various whistle sizes, as practiced by the various makers, has once again come up.
I decided to take a look at the sites of a few of the well-known makers to see what terms they used.
What I found was that the naming practices mainly fell into two camps, the vocal-range camp and the high/low camp.
Using the names of the vocal ranges were Dixon, Alba, and Goldie.
All three agree on calling the high D “soprano” and the middle G “alto”.
Dixon and Goldie call the High C “soprano” but Alba calls it “mezzo soprano”.
Alba and Dixon call the ordinary Bb and mezzo A “alto” but Goldie calls them “mezzo soprano”.
Dixon and Goldie call the Low D “tenor” but Alba calls it “low tenor”.
Alba calls the Low C “bass” but Goldie calls it “baritone”. They agree on calling the Low Bb, A, and G “bass”.
Using only the term low were Burke and Freeman.
They are in agreement that the traditional Generation keys are simply known by the key name, needing no prefix.
Both call anything below the Generation Bb pitch “low”.
Susato uses “high” for the old Generation pitches down to C and “low” for Bb and below.
To show how crazy this all is, the old Generation Bb whistle pitch is called “mezzo soprano”, “alto”, and “low” by the various makers. (Ditto the A whistle a half-step below the Generation Bb.)
The middle G and F are more consistent, either being called “low” or “alto”.
The low Eb and D are likewise, being called either “low” or “tenor”.
The outlier I came across was Setanta, who mixed the two naming conventions, calling their high D and C whistles “soprano” but their low E, Eb, and D whistles “low”.
It’s no wonder people new to whistling get confused.
