The 3rd octave is very very very offensive indeed to the cats. For my part, I really had no idea the whistle would do that. I mean, would play that high. The Burke has about 3 notes of a third octave. Yikes. I found it by accident. Everyone in the apartment suddenly became very unhappy, except for me, well, I was fascinated.
But you can’t do that for very long, I suspect it shortens your lifespan. Anyway.
Sarah
[ This Message was edited by: aremnius on 2002-03-29 11:19 for clarity]
[ This Message was edited by: aremnius on 2002-03-29 11:20 ]
I am so glad to hear you’re pleased since I just sent an order off to M. Burke for the very same whistle! My cat and boyfriend will be most pleased when I recieve it! So will I since it’s the first “nice” whistle I will own. Enjoy!
On 2002-03-29 11:06, aremnius wrote:
A Burke session pro in brass.
The 3rd octave is very very very offensive indeed to the cats. For my part, I really had no idea the whistle would do that. I mean, would play that high. The Burke has about 3 notes of a third octave. Yikes. I found it by accident. Everyone in the apartment suddenly became very unhappy, except for me, well, I was fascinated.
But you can’t do that for very long, I suspect it shortens your lifespan. Anyway.
Sarah
Yes, the Burke brass is the only whistle I can play the full Fairy Queen on. It has three notes in the third octave. Funny thing is, I can’t get above the third D on the Al pro.
You’ll quickly learn to do the really high notes staccato. That way you can play without hearing protection.
I got a used brass wide bore burke. I love it. It is well tuned…so I can practice with cds and not drive myself nuts. I practice at work in my office on my lunch hour. Everyone was telling me HOW much I had improved OVERNITE. It was the Burke. I love it. I also had gotten another high end whistle which…was actually a more expensive. The Burke has better intonation. I am VERY VERY happy with it. AND btw M. Burke is a really nice guy. New to the whistling I didn’t realize just WHOOOOOOO he was, but did notice that he was a whistle maker not TOO far from where I live. SO …I emailed him. HE TOOK the time to even answer my email even though it wasnt giving him an order for a whistle. He was VERY VERY nice. For those in the area Mr. Burke indicated that he would be at the National Comhaultus Convention this weekend in St. Louis, and the Mississippi River Celtic festival in St. Louis the following weekend.
Time frame for me = just a few days. They must have had one on hand and mailed it within a day or two of getting the order. This was a Session Pro D in brass, don’t know if the other models would come this quickly (or how many they have on the shelf!)
You could always ask them, of course, but I decided to give it at least a little while and it showed up very quickly.
I love the soprano burkes! I have a AL Pro D and a WBB in D as well. They made my playing better and make me want to play more!
Glad to hear you’re happy with yours!
I’m waiting for my Bb Brass. Actually, I’m waiting to see if my fax order was ever received (my confidence level in my fax machine is not high). I can’t wait to get my fingers on it!
Hey DD…you wouldn’t happen to be the one who showed up on Ebay a couple of weeks back and tried to corner the market on whistles, would you? It’s rare to see somebody attack whistles as fervently as you!! I actually made it a point to watch the “Silkstone Duel” in the closing minutes of the auction. How do you like the Silkstone? (If this is NOT you…nevermind!!)
Suddenly I can practice a lot longer at one sitting. Buying the Burke was one of the better decisions I’ve made. Even if I don’t play only that one whistle forever, I will improve much faster now.
This is probably true whenever you upgrade to a SuperWhistle… no matter who made it. Something else to consider in the cheapies vs. fancy whistle debate. I’m not about to give up cheap whistles completely (especially the Feadog Mark IIIs!), but the Burke definitely makes it easier to practice.
On 2002-03-29 11:06, aremnius wrote:
For my part, I really had no idea the whistle would do that. I mean, would play that high. The Burke has about 3 notes of a third octave…But you can’t do that for very long, I suspect it shortens your lifespan.
I don’t know about shortening your lifespan but I hope you’ve had all the children you want…
Got my Brass Pro Session D today (Monday). Ordered it Tuesday afternoon via fax and gave out credit card number to avoid painful delay. I was sort of on the same page as Aremnius and Sunshines Dtr in making a decision in terms of timeframe and wants and followed discussion with interest.
Will take a while to fully appreciate but I wish to thank all who have recommended this whistle. It is just what I wanted and you were all right about what you collectively said it would do. I really have to wonder how much more refined the Rose and other $300 or so models get but your custom to those builders proves there are differences. For now, the whistle is WAY better than I am as a player so I have plenty of room to grow.
Vaporlock…I didnt get the Silkstone someone else bought it with the buy it now option. As that was only about 10 dollars less than the price at Toms I passed on it. So there WAS no show down on the silkstone.
[ This Message was edited by: dd on 2002-04-01 23:16 ]
Speaking about Burke’s BRASS soprano whistles, can you tell me the difference between the “Session Pro” and the “Wide Bore”, please? (seems that Whoa is coming back)
DD,
Actually, now that the brain cloud has cleared, it was the Burke Brass D “Showdown”. I was bidding on it, but wasn’t willing to go too high since suprano D whistles upset my dog…and more importantly, my wife.
There’s another thread going on now that discusses ebay usernames and procedures. I’ll address “sniping” there…just suffice to say that I really don’t see any way around it since the competitive nature of Ebay is what makes it fun.
I never did figure out what the widebore was, I just ordered Brass Session Pro. I don’t know what oldstyle is either. it is a deficiency in Michael Burke’s website I think that there is not a better explanation but nobody’s perfect. Somebody else will know the differences but I am posting this note for another reason.
For others who are pondering this purchase, I wanted to allay one possible concern. After reading the description of the narrow bore by Dr. Busman, in which he describes how easy it is to blow, i began to wonder if the Pro was somehow requiring substantial air. I almost ordered the narrow because I wanted to focus on getting better at fingering and ornaments (and possibly sacrifice volume), not get distracted by uneven air needs, which I have found to be a problem in premium whistles. It’s really a problem with the water weasel which I trial-purchased. You have to think when you get above the first octave. I am sure you get used to it, but for the extra 25 bucks, I’ll take the Burke (WHoa fantasies of Session Pros in many keys are dancing though my head and its not even Xmas).
For the record and your possible concerns, the Session Pro does not require any more air than my old Feadog. In fact, it has this “velvety slur” thing that just happens in the lower register during passage work, like its playing itself. It is awesome.
We are lucky consumers these days regarding the choice of whistles.
Lessee… I don’t know about the other types of brass Burkes. The wide bore model seems to have a lot of fans. I have not read any reviews of the narrow bore.
I too was a little overwhelmed at first. I thought of writing to Mr. Burke to ask for more information. I would still recommend that someone do this (maybe Dale?) since this question is asked so frequently. But I stopped and thought, well, do I want a wide or narrow bore? And I thought, well, no. I have a Walton’s Mellow D, which features a wider-than-usual bore (in fact it seems to be the bore size of your typical C whistle), and I have some smaller whistles in other keys, and I just like the feel of a regular D whistle.
Ironically, it turned out that Mr. Burke’s session pro model in brass does have the one feature I particularly liked in the Walton’s Mellow D, which is that it does not drive my cats out of the room. So it all came out well.
I don’t know what the wait is on one right now. It looks like we’ve been buying them like crazy, and I do not know how many they have on the shelf. Mine came right away.
In regards to Feadogs, well, I was not great admirers of them until I got a couple of the new model, the Feadog Mark IIIs, which have been discussed exhaustively in earlier threads. I really like these whistles. I have a collection of various cheapies, too, and the new Feadogs seem to have all of the best possible qualities of the cheap whistles. To me. Everyone has their own favorites. But I don’t have any doubt that a good player could make one sound world-class.
Will take a while to fully appreciate but I wish to thank all who have recommended this whistle. It is just what I wanted and you were all right about what you collectively said it would do. I really have to wonder how much more refined the Rose and other $300 or so models get but your custom to those builders proves there are differences. For now, the whistle is WAY better than I am as a player so I have plenty of room to grow.
Thanks again, all.
I’m glad that you’re giving yourself awhile to appreciate your new whistle. The Burke WBB blew me away when I got it, and is still my favorite sort-of traditional whistle.
I have one of those (almost) $300 whistles, a Thin Weasel D. I’ve had it for three months or so and am just beginning to appreciate it. I was initially underwhelmed, and a listmember said that it takes awhile to appreciate these whistles. I really can’t explain it, but it really seems to bring out the best in my playing – it kind of urges me to go for it, to play with abandon. Maybe it’s my love of wood, I just don’t know.
I feel like there’s a lot more difference between a $10 and $100 whistle than there is between a $100 and $300 whistle. The differences in the high end are mostly not differences in quality, and they’re more subtle.
