Are costly low D whistles really worth three or four times the price of inexpensive ones ? In my search for the “perfect” low D, I have tried some of them (Alba Vibe, Alba Standard, Syn, Chieftain) and I am currently very happy with a Chieftain V3 non tunable and a Chieftain NR tunable.
I decided to try three “inexpensive” low Ds, a Dixon polymer, a Susato Kildare in ABS and a Guido Gonzato PVC.
Although I still think that my two Chieftain are great, I was surprised by the quality of the “plastic” whistles: especially the Susato and the Gonzato
(these are, of course, very personal opinions based on my personal taste). The Dixon has a mellow sweet tone, but it is very quiet and jumps very easily to the high octave especially on the E note. It must be played very lightly and I like to “push” the whistle a bit. The Gonzato is very loud, and clear, with a very good intonation, and it is easy to play. Not very “breathy” like the Chieftain, perhaps not too complex in sound. My favorite among the three is the Susato Kildare (which in fact I decided to keep) which sounds loud, very clean, a bit reedy, with a bit of chiff, and a bit “breathy”. If I am allowed the comparison, taking into account the difference in price, it sounds a bit like the Burke Viper.
Now I consider myself lucky to own a few good “expensive” whistles, but if you ask me if I think that a Chieftain or an Alba, or a Burke, are three or four times better than a Susato, as their price suggest, well I am not sure.
Any opinion on this matter ?
Hi Gerardo, in my case i charge for the work i put into the instrument…my name is virtually worth nothing! but i need to actually get something for the time i put into… for example voicing the instrument by hand one thou of an inch at a time. if I had one of those levers that you pull to make a whistle i would consider lowering my price…I put much thought into what i would charge for the time i have been putting into each one, it works out to strange enough to be $192.00 …So the argument might be: plastic whistles sound better then Greg russell’s custom hand made whistle…and i would probably say, “I want one!!” but my custom whistle would cease to exist or improve if i were to compete. so…so be it if a plastic whistle sounds superb…i want one, really i do! but the custom stuff needs support in my mind to be the next blue print for next plastic awesome whistle!!!
Are costly low D whistles really worth three or four times the price of inexpensive ones ?
Yes.
I could not help noticing you omitted the best low D whistle on the market- the Sweetheart ‘Resonance’ Low D as designed by Walt Sweet. Rich harmonics, perfect intonation. Clear, but still has a warm, breathy flute-like sound. And best of all, it runs on less air than your average low D.
And of course, price merely reflects what people are willing to pay (what the market will bear) after the cost of production. Even the worst makers have to make a living, they can’t do this as a public service!
At the end of the day a whistle is worth what people are willing to pay for it, no more, no less.
If you get the tone, intonation, playability, etc., that you’re looking for in a £10 mass produced whistle then that’s great. If you have to pay £300 for what you’re looking for in a hand made whistle that’s great too - you get what you’re looking for because someone could be bothered to go to all the expense, time and trouble to design and build it for you by hand, one whistle at a time.
And compared to other instruments (like concertinas) whistles, even the most expensive ones, are a real bargain. 
you get what you’re looking for because someone could be bothered to go to all the expense, time and trouble to design and build it for you by hand, one whistle at a time.
Some of the whistles mentioned in the original post are factory products. Assembly-line (Burke) or CNC (Chieftain) jobs. Not that it matters but don’t get too rose tinted artisan images when talking about expensive whistles.
Yes I did not mention hand made whistles like Overton or Kerry Pro
or several others because unfortunately I never had the chance to play them.
Let me tell you a story: On Youtube there is a young man who has posted several video clips of him playing Irish tunes with his Susato low D.
He is good and the whistle sounds good. In one of the video clips, on the text below it, he says : I wish I had a Chieftain.
Yes, of course, Chieftain is one of the best whistles, I personally have two of them and love them. But my point is: once the young man has saved enough money and he has bought his Chieftain, paying it more or less three times the Susato low D, I do not think that he will get a sound and a playability that are THREE TIMES better. There will be an improvement, perhaps even a very noticeable one, but not as dramatic as he could expect.
I play acoustic guitars since 35 years. If you buy a Larrivee for one thousand dollars, you get a very good guitar. If you buy a model costing three thousand dollars, you will get a better guitar but NOT a guitar three times better.
My message to young guys/students on a budget who own a Susato, a Dixon, a Gonzato, a Calmont etc.. is: if you can’t afford yet an expensive low D, don’t worry: your current whistle is good enough !
I think Mike Burke also uses CNC for precision machining, no? Good craftspeople use good tools, and CNC is just another (modern) tool. But, as you say, not a particularly “romantic” one. 
My impression is that Mike’s machining takes place on-site in his own shop, and is not outsourced. But I could be wrong. Anyone know?
The making of all metal parts is outsourced to his brother’s factory. He described the process here some years ago (the search function isn’t working right now)
This all depends on what you mean by three times better. I don’t see how you can compare this arithmetically placing objective increments upon qualities that are entirely subjective to the individual concerned.
If i want the tone of a Rose, i simply can’t get that buying a Susato. You may argue that the Rose isn’t 4 times better than the Susato, but to someone who wants the tone of the Rose and not the Susato there is no 4 times anything, it simply is what it is and the customer will decide what they wish to pay for what they want.
Thanks, Peter, I’ll track down the info.
I thought that Chieftains, although manufactured were still hand voiced and hand finished?
I have no idea about the Burke process.
My first low D was a Susato. I think they certainly have their place in the world because they are reasonably priced and they are in tune. However, it just wasn’t the sound I wanted so I upgraded to a Copeland and an Overton and I don’t regret a single penny. In terms of tone, expressiveness, playability, and overall enjoyment of playing the instrument, it’s worth the extra to me.
This must be it:
http://chiffboard.mati.ca/viewtopic.php?p=76021&highlight=#76021
And here’s a link to the Burke Tool & Manufacturing site, with info and photos of the shop and the machine tools:
I totally agree with whistlegal. My first low D was a Dixon Aluminum low D. I did have some issues with it at first; -that was all my fault… I didn’t like the timbre of the Dixon though and I have since moved on to a Chieftain and then Overton. I would say that the difference between the Chieftain and Overton is bigger than between the Dixon and the Chieftain. Though the Chieftain as a pretty good whistle, the Overton is soo much better in many respects (Sorry Phil…). The Chieftain is an easy blower in comparison with the Overton but the sound of the Overton is much better IMHO and you can push it a lot further.
In short, the Chieftain is good but the Overton is great and I think it was worth every penny!
Cheers,
Anders
Just a thought about all the “this whistle, that whistle, which whistle” threads, and about whistles in general, not just low whistles:
There are many makes of whistles out there, some less expensive, some more so.
The only person qualified to judge if a given whistle is worth the money to them is the person who bought it.
If you spent the money for a Copeland, for instance, it doesn’t matter if I like it, it doesn’t matter if MTGuru likes it, or James St. Pernod…what matters is that you, the purchaser, likes the whistle and whether you find it to have been worth the money.
Should you find that you don’t like a whistle you have bought, there is an active market for reselling whistles, either on Ebay, or via announcements and PMs on this board.
Whistles of all kinds get resold, from the most expensive to the least expensive. So it’s not like you have to be stuck with an instrument that you don’t want.
With inexpensive whistles, there is also the option of giving them away. This can be a great way to introduce people to the music, and it is also a great way to get a real musical instrument into the hands of someone who otherwise might could not find a way to have one.
Just my $.02.
–James
Hi, Michael Burke here.
I don’t think that I need to justify the prices I charge for my instruments, but I would like to correct a couple of misconceptions that some may have regarding the way we make them.
It is true that we make the raw parts using modern CNC equipment and then all the work that is done is by hand and I spend as much time as any so called hand made whistle maker voicing and checking out the instruments that I make. It is the reason that we can make these instruments for a very reasonable price for the workmanship that is in them and also the reason that they are very consistent in quality from one instrument to another.
The best players among my customers are the ones that will tell you that they are cheap for what you get. A few of these players are Mick O’Brien, Declan Masterson, Eric Rigler, Patrick D’Arcy, Joanie Madden, Brian McCoy, Kathleen Keane, Pete Purvis, Liam Kelly, Jerry O’Sullivan, Ivan Goff, and many other studio musicians from LA and NY who record these instrument for movies and in those situations, tone and intonation muct be nearly perfect.
The prices charged by the makers who spend a lot of time and money making these instruments is very little if you want an instrument that is the best made. If an instrument is cheap, either the maker is not being paid well for his work, or the work is not going into the instrument.
Every buyer can choose from all the models that are available and if you cannot hear the difference between a mass produced whistle and a hand crafted instrument, then you can save some money, but every person must make that choice and cannot impress his own ideas on the next person who might be able to benefit from a hand crafted instrument.
I want also to say that my whistles are not any different in the final steps that determine the playability, dynamic range, and transient response from any so called hand made instruments. All of us use machines to some extent in the process or contract a manufacturer either directly or indirectly to make the tubes or the plastic rod that we use to make instruments.
Nobody mines the ore or smelts the material or hammers out the ingots they have smelted into sheet and rolls them into tubes and cuts trees and makes blocks for all this truly “hand made” instrument. It is therefore not helpful to make any comments about one maker having a “factory” or a “production line” implying that anything made using such methods are suspect in some way of deceiving the buyer into thinking that the instruments are more worthy of their price than those made in a different way, or that they may be no different than other mass produced whistles that are not in any way hand voiced.
I spend a lot of time with each instrument making it the best that it can be. If you find that a mass produced instrument sounds as good then you can benefit from that opinion, but make it your choice, not a fact that is true for everyone. I know a number of the makers of hand crafted instruments personally and I can tell you that all of us take very seriously the commitment we have made to making the best instruments that we can make. Many of the extra steps we take may not be noticed by the less experienced players, but we are going to try to give you the same instrument that is played by the pros or we are not doing our job.
I hope that this will clear up any misconceptions on our process of making instruments.
All the best
Michael Burke
Hi Michael and nice to see you on one of the threads.
I would expect/ assume that most people on this forum would readily agree the standard of any Burke whistle makes it beyond reproach. Indeed there are some here who have yet to own one of your whistles, but it still won’t stop us (myself included) writing to Santa this year in the vain hope that this year wil be the one where our dreams will come true.
For some of us it comes down to economics - my wife daily demands I make a choice - feed the kids or buy a Burke. The good news is I have been getting them to diet for 6 months and ask for less for Christmas. The bad news is - do you do a balsa wood version?
I am unfazed - one day one will be mine. The touble is by then I’ll probably be a toothless asthmatic with latter stage Alzheimer’s. Still there is always hope.
If anyone out there ever has a Burke cluttering a drawer, or taking up space in your whistle bag, I’m happy to be a new parent to your baby.
Mr. Burke, I dream about owning, one day, a Burke Viper low D.
And no one more than me acknowledges the quality of your work.
My point was to say to young people, students, musicians on a budget,
and every one that cannot afford one of your whistles, or a Colin Goldie whistle, and have spent their hard saved money on a Dixon, or a Susato, or a Kerry, or a Bingamon :
your current whistle is good enough to live with and to enjoy it !
I will also vouch for the fine quality of Michael Burke whistles. I have his alto A and G in Brass and the low F in aluminum. They are all outstanding whistles. The brass is rich, warm, and buttery and the aluminum very clear and silky. The intonation and response are virtually perfect and the attention that is given to each whistle is obvious. They clearly are not “mass produced”. I don’t regret a single penny spent for these whistles either.
I think there is room in the world for both schools of thought. There is certainly a need for the less expensive instruments and, most certainly, there are folks who actually prefer these instruments - there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. But, there are also many of us who deeply appreciate the time and dedication that our modern day makers lovingly put into their work and we don’t care to save our pennies and compensate the maker fairly for something that we think is truly special.