I used to play Alto Sax for about 3 years, but haven’t touched one in about 4 years or so. Recently, I have picked up a tin whistle from a new-age store and I dont remember what brand it is, but it’s made of metal with a plastic reed/tip/whatever. After playing around with it, I can get a decent sounding CBAG, a sometimes decent E and my F#/D is atrocious, as well as my low D turning high and the trick for the high D with all fingers on but the first just doesnt work for me. I have tried nearly every position I can think of for my body, lips, muscles, ect. I have tried varying amounts of breath and airflow. You name it, I have tried it. My only thinking is that perhaps its just a poorly make whistle and it’s out of tune. Is there any way that I can do anything to the whistle itself to help me in getting it in better tune?
It’s possible your whistle is a poorly-made one, but first of all, are you using the correct fingerings? And secondly, I think many notes are going to be a little out of tune. It’s just a straight pipe with holes in it after all.
Oh yea, I am using the correct fingerings, even went and looked it up. I had assumed that the poor sound quality, the warbling of notes and whatnot were to be expected, until I went onto youtube and looked at some of the videos there.
if you’re a sax player, you may be blowing too hard.
Blow softly…breathe gently into the whistle. If you get a note lower than what you’ve normally been getting, you’ve been blowing too hard.
absolutely right, i am a tenor player myself, slow your wind stream down, but I would suggest a different whistle if problems persist
try this link it has somethings I asked about, it is really helpful
http://chiffboard.mati.ca/viewtopic.php?p=717849&highlight=#717849
Bah, I have tried lightly blowing and get the sharp sound that makes me think it’s not getting enough air, I have been a bit more forceful and can get the D and F# notes, but only if I get them on a descending scale… and even then it’s barely. Those low notes just dont want to be played. sigh
Can you post a video of what you are doing on Youtube or somewhere else? That way there are many, many people here who would be only too glad to give you advice on what is going on with your technique/whistle/whatever.
We are all here to help, so don’t worry, we will not criticise.
It could be the whistle. Buy another one, but save this one for 6 months down the road. It may turn out to not be a total loss. A couple of suggestions on a different whistle (and this is 100% personal choice here – I like these): a Dixon Trad (available in several online whistle shops), a Jerry Freeman Tweaked Mellow Dog (ebay or PM “Jerry Freeman” here), or a Feadog tweaked by Tommy Dion (only by a PM to “Tommy” here).
Go ahead and get a couple of other whistles … it will only be a good start of your new collection. 
You have to be aware that the quality control on the mass-produced inexpensive whistles is hit-and-miss. Play through a couple dozen Generation D whistles and you’ll find a couple which play very well, solid strong low notes and sweet high notes (without hissing undertones). Then there’ll be quite a few which play sort of OK, and a few which are horrid. Anyhow buy the best one or two, then take them home for some more fun. First you’ll find that the whole scale is very sharp because the plastic top is shoved all the way down. The glue used to hold it in this incorrect position can be softened with hot water. Soak the head (the plastic part) in hot water (not hot enough to melt the plastic though) and you should be able to break the glue seal and get the head to an adjustable state. When drawn out correctly the whistle should be fairly in tune. Then you’ll probably note that the entire 2nd register is flat, to help correct this you fill the cavity at the top of the head with something (see the various “tweaking” threads here). Then you’ll probably find that F# is too flat to the rest of the scale, so carve out the upper portion of the hole a bit. THEN you’ll have a good, in tune Generation! I have one that plays great, picked out from dozens, then tweaked.
Or, you can buy a Michael Burke whistle which plays perfectly as it comes, or any other high-end professional-quality whistle.
Well, the plastic mouthpiece never had any glue on it, so that was eay to take off.
Looking at the tweak page, I wondered if my whistle would even benefit, so without any wax or anything I decided to ball up a bit of kleenex and shove it in there.
Well, seems this whistle WILL benefit from tweaking since once I did that, my low notes were being hit from the very first time. It’s alot better, at around 70% of the time right now, which is MUCH better than the 10% of the time I was getting. I hope to raise the bar more by getting something better in the mouthpiece.
I dont think there is much else I can do to it besides that, since the airhole flap on the mouthpiece is completely level with the top of the airhole you breath into.
Oh well, I am happier now that I know I can get it to play at least.