Chiff and Fipple Forums

I'm going to be playing the baritone in a concert setting towards the end of July after not having played one for 30 years. I've been playing whistle for the past 10 years, and may be playng at the local Highland games the same weekend as the baritone (in July). I figure there is about 2 months of baritone practise leading up to the July event, if I want to sound half way decent. My question is how will playing the baritone affect my whistle playing?

Sorry, what do you mean by baritone? Baritone horn?

Yeah, the horn. I'm a brass guy (also played trumpet for many years), so didn't associate baritone to anything but the horn.

My question is how will playing the baritone affect my whistle playing?[/quote]

Not much, if at all. I'm a tuba player, and while I haven't played my horn for a couple of years now, I never found it to adversely affect my whistle playing when I was doing both, unless I tried doing them at the same time! You are more likely to experience problems switching between two different types of brass instruments than between a baritone and a whistle. I don't believe the brass embouchure has much bearing on the whistle embouchure. It certainly hasn't in my experience.

Play one heavily , then switch to the other, and you should have your answer.

I'm guessing you might tend to overblow the whistle at first. With some practice you should be able to switch back and forth easily though.

brewerpaul wrote:I'm guessing you might tend to overblow the whistle at first.

Like shouting all night in a noisy bar, then continuing to shout all the way home.

Of course, strictly speaking that's not embouchure. The dimensions of whistle embouchure are pretty simple - position, angle, depth, none of which should be affected. Nor should "pucker", once the lip tingling wears off.

Thanks for the answers. Looks like it shold be relatively easy to switch back and forth. Guess I should really start tooting to find out for myself. I really don't want to mess up too bad at either event. The name of the band is The Fighting Instruments of Karma Marching Chamber Band/Orchestra. They are part of a touring Chautauqua troupe that will be passing through town in July - http://www.chautauqua.org/. They always try to include locals in their events, thus the baritone playing on my part.