There's an old tried-and-true custom of beginners having their instruments picked out for them by experienced players.Pondoro wrote: I know I am playing a cheap instrument. I know I am a complete beginner...
The reason is because otherwise the beginner is in your situation- no way of knowing what ill sounds are due to the inexperience of the player, and which are due to the instrument.
That's the advantage of starting out with a Freeman whistle- you know for a fact that the voicing is exactly how Jerry wants a whistle to be voiced. He takes the randomness out of it.
With whistles, due to their fixed tone-production mechanism, no amount of practice is going to change a whistle's built-in characteristics.Pondoro wrote: ...practice eventually making a cheap whistle sound better...
Each note, when blown into tune, has a certain volume and timbre the player can't change.
What does change is intonation- a player with a good ear can blow a whistle into tune even if it was built with a faulty scale.
In my 40-odd year experience, I've not seen a positive correlation between how good a whistle plays with how much it costs.Pondoro wrote: ...ponying up the money for a better whistle...
There seems to be a general tendency of expensive fancy wood whistles not playing to my liking.
My favourite high whistles are my vintage Generations and Feadogs which all cost under $10 each. I've not played their equal at any price.
But then again I'm a product of my generation (no pun intended) when the only D whistles available were Generations and everybody played them, from the star players to the beginners. You played the best one you could find. The very best old Generations, in my opinion, have never been equalled (but IMHO Sindts and Killarneys are very close).
I've done hundreds of studio gigs. Every one has been done on my c1980 Feadog D and my c1980 Generation C.
I never found a good Generation Bb and for that key I use a Freeman.