Hello all, As you can see im a noob to this forum, and to the scene in general. heres abit of background, im 20, from leicester, england, been playing guitar, piano and bass for years, been getting heavily into irish folk music for about a year, recently been trying to learn banjo and ukulele…saw a tin whistle youtube video, and thought, hmm, ill try that. so without jumping in head first, i purchased a cheap original feadog, and a teaching book…now after reading this forum for about a week or so (has the whistle for 2 days) its become apparent that most think it is better and easier to learn to play by ear, studying other players..so heres my query…
Who are the musicians/bands and songs i can download or purchase to hear plenty of tin whistle playing?
You don’t have to learn from tin whistlers, learning tunes from fiddlers or flutes is great.
If you are looking for whistling CDs, I would recommend Tobar an Duchais by Brid Donohue. Mary Bergin’s two CDs are classics, of course, but not that easy to learn from, imho.
My inspiration - whistle wise - has been Joanie Madden, founder of Cherish the Ladies. Wonderful player!
Cherish the Ladies albums have some great tracks to play along with, such as Ned of the Hill and The Battle of Aughrim/The Star Above the Garter and Joanie’s solo albums Songs of the Irish Whistle (1 and 2) have some lovely airs (Down by the Sally Gardens and Women of Ireland etc.)
I have always learned by ear, even though I do read music. I use Windows Media Player to slow the tracks down and listen to the ornamentation closer, though I can still only play most of the rolls at the slowed down speed
There are loads of great artists out there, I think the trick is initially to learn from those who play ‘easy’ tunes beautifully.
