Sean, thanks for answering earlier questions on my Dixon A whistle, it's still on it's way out of the door, I am wondering if a video on playing tunes not in the key of D would be useful. I know that you have touched on this before, but for me not reading music ,it can be confusing. for instance one of my books with folk tunes has the Wild mountain Thyme tune in E flat, then i found your video of the tune and started it in G and not on my e flat whistle, a generation and a bit squeaky! So really the question is "what keys can be transferred to the D whistle and which Key of tin whistle should one own besides the D, bearing in mind that probably 90% of your watchers are like me ,playing not in sessions but for pleasure" Thank you ,take care, Brian
Cheers Brian - the general rule of thumb is that you don't need anything but a D whistle and all tunes can be played on a D whistle. However, you may end up not playing them in the same key as you expect which is where things get tricky. That said, if you're playing for yourself then it really doesn't matter what key you're playing in which is a nice advantage! So to your point, if you don't read music (or even if you do, for that matter) trying to read/play Wild Mountain Thyme in Eb if that's not a key you regularly read in will be quite a battle. I'd offer the suggestion that you'll be better served by 1) learning the tune by ear in a key that fits on the whistle you've got (which would be D, G, or A major on a D whistle) or 2) getting sheet music for the song in one of those keys, if you intend to learn it by reading the notes. I know for me, reading in Eb (or F# major or Ab major or any other screwball key) and trying to transpose to D or G major on the fly would break my brain.
Thanks for another great tutorial. Do you recommend learning songs by heart as a beginner and coming back to add ornamentals as you improve, or do you find it important to place those ornamentals as you learn the song the first time? I imagine it's the first, and that ornamentals can be added somewhat on the fly by someone who is practiced, but I'm not totally sure.
That's a great question - in my case, after 20+ years of playing the ornaments just fall out of the instrument as I'm learning/playing without me thinking about it too much. But then once I get the melody locked down I do like to go back and mess around and see what might work better. But for folks just starting out I generally recommend just getting the basic melody down first and then adding the ornaments in once you're comfortable with the notes. That said, everyone learns their own way and I've had some folks who just can't get the feel of the tune without working in some basic ornamentation, as it can be a critical part of getting that traditional Irish lift.
