Wanted Set of Whistles

[brassnebony]

In the market for a whistle set.

Tunable high D, C, B, Possibly A
I go for medium volume and low air requirement.

Tunable Low F, G, E
Again medium volume and low air.

I currently have a stack of cheap to mid range whistles in all keys and am getting so much use from my whistles I want to invest in a really good set for life basically.

Have a nice uilleann chanter (bag and bellows too) that I would use a exchange or a nice Tunable Bodhran too.
As always $$$ available.

What have you got.

[Mitch]

Hi brassnebony,

I have a high D/C set available now in blackwood/silver.
I also have a B-natural nearing completion (also in blackwood/silver - assuming you are talking B-nat, not Bb?)
Unfortunately, I don't do A at the moment.

If you are interested, please PM or contact me via my website.

[pancelticpiper]

I want to invest in a really good set for life basically.

If you like Burkes you can have Michael make you a set in any keys you want.

If you like Goldies I would guess that you can have Colin make you a set in any keys you want.

Or you can order a set of Sindts for the higher keys and Burkes or Goldies for the rest. (I think Sindts only go down to, what, A?)

I've done gigs where professionals have had rolls with Burkes, Goldies, or vintage Overtons in every key, chromatically.

I did a gig where there was a guy who primarily plays accordion but does some whistle, and he had a set of Sindts in every key that Sindt makes, chromatically.

I think there's an advantage of having a set by the same maker: at a gig you can pick any whistle and know how it will play.

I myself like vintage Generations and Feadogs, and I have Generations in A, Bb, B, C, and C# and vintage Feadogs in D and Eb. For the "mezzo" keys I have Burkes. For Low D I have a Goldie; I'd like to get more Goldies for the various low keys.

[Peter Duggan]

getting so much use from my whistles I want to invest in a really good set for life basically.

Don't expect to just order a 'good' (i.e. expensive) set and find you've got that set for life because you're just as likely to find you've made an expensive mistake and aren't even happy with the whistles at all...

I've made the mistake before of buying a fairly pricey set blind I thought would become my 'core' set, found half of them poor, unsuitable and/or inconsistently matched at any price and the others mostly unexciting, so eventually sold them all singly after settling on my current Brackers as my true core set (though I still play some others for some things). But would I advise you to order a whole set of Brackers untried? Not at all... they're good whistles and work for me across the range of sizes better than anything else I've tried, but you might yet find Goldie, Burke, some other maker or even your current 'stack of cheap to mid range whistles' to be yours. You really need to try, and preferably live with, some to know. Or be as prepared for disappointment and buyer's remorse as long- or even short-term satisfaction.

[awildman]

I want to invest in a really good set for life basically.

If you like Burkes you can have Michael make you a set in any keys you want.

If you like Goldies I would guess that you can have Colin make you a set in any keys you want.

Or you can order a set of Sindts for the higher keys and Burkes or Goldies for the rest. (I think Sindts only go down to, what, A?)

I've done gigs where professionals have had rolls with Burkes, Goldies, or vintage Overtons in every key, chromatically.

I did a gig where there was a guy who primarily plays accordion but does some whistle, and he had a set of Sindts in every key that Sindt makes, chromatically.

I think there's an advantage of having a set by the same maker: at a gig you can pick any whistle and know how it will play.

I myself like vintage Generations and Feadogs, and I have Generations in A, Bb, B, C, and C# and vintage Feadogs in D and Eb. For the "mezzo" keys I have Burkes. For Low D I have a Goldie; I'd like to get more Goldies for the various low keys.

Sindt has stopped taking orders for the forseeable future, yes?

[brassnebony]

Good Advice Peter

I have indeed tried various whistles from the same maker and found, whilst one very suited to me and a really nice whistles, others not so suitable to me as a player.

Lately I have found myself partial to wooden whistles, i just love the woody and full tone they can produce when made right.

Hopefully in the near future I will be in a position to order a whistle or two from Mitch who already replied above!

[ericgrey]

If its wooden whistles you are after,
IMHO you simply cant do better than Roy McManus whistles,first class whistles and an easy guy to deal with.

[brassnebony]

looking into them at the minute. They seem well priced and as good as any

Thanks

[pancelticpiper]

I've made the mistake before of buying a fairly pricey set blind I thought would become my 'core' set, found half of them poor, unsuitable and/or inconsistently matched

I respect your not wanting to name names, but the very reason I mentioned Burke is because I've found them to be exceptionally well-matched throughout the range of sizes I've owned, Low D, Low Eb, Low F, mezzo G, mezzo A, high C, high D.

Unlike some makers who stretch or bob the same whistle to get various keys, from what I've seen Burke uses dedicated tubing for each key so that each whistle maintains the same ID-to-length ratio.

So every Burke I've owned played exactly like every other. Now there are people who don't like Burkes as a species which is why I started off saying "if you like Burkes..."

Likewise I've had Sindts in A, Bb, B, and D and all played very much alike, all were very nice. (The A, Bb, and B were a set with a shared head nevertheless each size played great.)

Where I agree for sure is with Overtons. I've played and owned quite a few Overtons over the last 40 years and I consistently liked the large ones and consistently didn't like the small ones. For me Overtons were the answer for the Low Whistle keys but not for the mezzo and high keys.

I have no experience with Goldie mezzo or high keys, only with the Low, which are wonderful.

[Peter Duggan]

I respect your not wanting to name names,

It was a maker who's not so far been mentioned on this thread.

but the very reason I mentioned Burke is because I've found them to be exceptionally well-matched throughout the range of sizes I've owned, Low D, Low Eb, Low F, mezzo G, mezzo A, high C, high D.

Likewise my Brackers, but I'm not here to suggest the OP buys Brackers, Burkes or anything else. Merely to caution against the notion of ordering a 'set for life' on reputation (or, given the question 'what have you got?', availability) alone.

looking into them at the minute. They seem well priced and as good as any

But is 'seem well priced and as good as any' enough? Don't you need to try some?

[pancelticpiper]

For sure the caution is well-advised.

It's happened to me several times over the years: I hear great things about a particular flute-maker or pipe-maker, play several examples of their instruments which are uniformly good, put in my down payment to get on the wait list, wait a year or so for my instrument to come, and when it does it's not anywhere near the quality of the numerous examples by the same maker I'd played in the past.

There was one pipemaker who I specifically told this to, how many times I'd got a chanter or flute from a maker of high reputation and it be a rather different than the several others from the same maker I'd tried. (One pipemaker told me "oh, on your chanter I thought I'd try a different bore just to see how it came out.")

This guy assured me "no, I never change my design. I've settled on it, I know it works." I believed him, because a friend has three chanters from that maker and they play identically, and a big-name player told me he has two chanters from that maker that play identically, so much so that at a performance he just grabs whichever one happens to be going a tad better that particular day.

But guess what? After a 2-year wait the chanter came and it wasn't good. The friend who has three chanters from that maker, which he says all play identically and he can switch the reeds between them, came over and we could see that the chanter I got had its holes drilled in different places, and the bore was different enough that reeds that worked in the other three wouldn't work in this one.

So no matter how much research you do, how many examples of a maker's work you try, how much praise a maker gets from big-name players, you never know what you will get.

I will say that there are some makers which I've never encountered inconsistency with, for example Patrick Olwell and Michael Burke. I've probably played 30 or so instruments from each maker and they've been quite uniform. (I did play one not-great but very good flute from Olwell, one of his earliest efforts.)

I've never played a less-than-good Goldie or Sindt, but my sample size from those makers is small, only around 10 Sindts and only 2 or 3 Goldies.

[MadmanWithaWhistle]

For sure the caution is well-advised.

It's happened to me several times over the years: I hear great things about a particular flute-maker or pipe-maker, play several examples of their instruments which are uniformly good, put in my down payment to get on the wait list, wait a year or so for my instrument to come, and when it does it's not anywhere near the quality of the numerous examples by the same maker I'd played in the past.


So no matter how much research you do, how many examples of a maker's work you try, how much praise a maker gets from big-name players, you never know what you will get.

This. SO MUCH. Ugh. Finding a decent flute has been a nightmare.

[pancelticpiper]

What's maybe even more odd is when the opposite happens!

Years ago there was a flutemaker who was doing a bit of a USA tour, I don't know, perhaps it was a combination of holiday and promotional tour for his flutes. He showed up at a local session with, what, around 8 or 10 flutes, all of them keyed if I recall. I was underwhelmed. None of the flutes at that "it" factor, that "can't put it down" thing. They seemed mediocre. (Unlike today, at that time flute was my primary instrument and I played flute more or less all day every day, so my embouchure was about as dialed-in as an embouchure can be.)

So imagine my surprise a couple years later when I run into some Irish guy who has one of that maker's flutes, and I try it and it's superb!

That happened with another maker too- I'd tried a few of his flutes, never thought much of them, and then run into a good player with a fine-playing flute by the guy.

Reminds me of the old bandmate who worked at a music shop in the 1980s that carried $100 Yamaha guitars. They would sell a dozen or more a week. He told me that he played every guitar that came in from Yamaha, explaining "I know that sooner or later they'll screw up and make a really good one!" Well, one day Yamaha screwed up and made a really good one, and he bought it. Everyone who played it would say "really? One of those $100 Yamahas? Wow" because it played like a $800 Martin.

[MadmanWithaWhistle]

What's maybe even more odd is when the opposite happens!

That's true, though I find it pops up in whistles more often than flutes. I was really disappointed when I played two different models of flute from a great maker recently. Their keywork is fabulous but the tone of each flute just left me underwhelmed, and some of the tuning was squirrely despite playing them every day for two months. I have a different, higher-pitch flute from them that is the best I've ever played. Ugh. They mentioned that it might be possible to get one more to me to try, with a larger, more aggressive embouchure. The embouchure on the F and D was nearly the same size...

Bah. I can't win. I got irritated enough to make my own tin whistles recently, which actually turned out really well. Maybe one day I'll be irritated enough to make my own flute, but the knowledge and skill (and irritation) required there is somewhat greater...