Chiff and Fipple Forums

The Oberlin session is no longer active.

If you can wait for the August 5th-7th Irish festival in Dublin, Ohio, Mr. Burke is almost always there and you can try all of them out. That is what I did several years ago and purchased the narrow bore aluminum D, but I have since gone to playing his session bore D exclusively.

Both have barely been used. Both come with a cloth bag and a stick of joint grease.
$35 for the E whistle.
$50 for the A whistle.

I bought this from Mr. Burke at a festival in 2012 but don't play it any more now that I have his session bore D. The whistle is in excellent condition and I will include a cloth bag and an indestructible PVC case of my own design. $160

Just to clarify, I'm talking about a whistle that would go from the A two lines below the staff to, let's say, the C two lines above the staff - two FULL octaves plus a third.

In our session there are several tunes circulating that go from A4 to B6. (Damn those fiddles with their four strings!) Are there any good quality whistles that will cover more than two octaves, or are those last few notes always too shrill and badly tuned for polite company?

Does anyone have comments regarding the Donegal School of Traditional Irish Music? I'm thinking of spending a week there this summer.

I'm familiar with the folks at the conservatory and I'm not aware of anyone. Baroque flute - yes. Tin whistle - not so much. I'm hoping for someone whose primary interest is whistle rather than a "well, I could teach that, too." A multi-instrumental student - the sort who was weaned on Iri...

As someone who lost a finger many years ago just above the first joint, I think I understand your problem. Since you prefer a cylindrical whistle, it would not be difficult for someone to make a plastic piece that would slip onto the whistle (snug fit so it doesn't move around - no permanent change ...

The title pretty much says it. West side is preferred, but beggars can't be choosers. I don't expect to find anyone closer to Oberlin than that.

My wife and I are life-long amateur musicians with formal musical training who have been playing Irish music for three years in sessions and at contra dances. I know 200+ tunes on my beloved Burke narrow bore D whistle and can usually improvise on acoustic bass guitar on the tunes I don’t know. My w...

I want to do some serious and rigorous research into whistle physics. I could figure this out with some trial, error, and expense, but maybe someone here already knows what range of air pressure and flow rate are needed to play a whistle. Of course, this is going to depend on the note being played, ...

Change of day and time: we now meet on the 2nd Sunday of every month from 7-9pm.

Pancelticpiper is on the right track. I have a tweaked generation that played the 2nd octave flat - until I inserted a short thin tube at the top of the whistle shaft to constrict the bore. My beloved Burke whistle has a narrower bore built in at the top, and the octaves are very well in tune with e...

Alas, I learned to play clarinet, oboe, and saxophone nearly fifty years ago, and I struggle with exotic fingerings such as half hole and G# on a D whistle, which would simply be absurd on those instruments. I manage the C naturals alright, but the rest feel unnatural. I guess my previous training h...