Help Required: Repertoire

adriancarrington · Post by **adriancarrington** » Fri Jan 24, 2003 4:44 pm

Hi, everyone,

I wonder if anyone out there could give me a little guidance to help widen my repertoire a little.
As we all know, there's enough Irish stuff to keep most of us occupied for a lifetime, but I'm beginning to feel the need to try other styles just to keep things fresh, if you know what I mean.
Am I correct in assuming that the non Irish folk repertoire is suited to the whistle? The thing that springs to my mind here is Morris music, but perhaps there's other stuff too, such as song music of some kind. Can you recommend any audio or printed material that I could check out?
Is there any older stuff to work from without resorting to strenuous bouts of half-holing, or playing a recorder? I know some of you are cringing at the very thought of THAT option!
I haven't had time to research these options much, and any guidance you may be able to give could save me from fruitless research, or point me in the right direction at least.
Any ideas, folks??

Best wishes, Adrian

[ This Message was edited by: adriancarrington on 2003-01-24 17:46 ]

PapoAnaya · Post by **PapoAnaya** » Fri Jan 24, 2003 4:58 pm

Hello:

Well, take this for what it is, my opinion. Personally, I do not play a lot of Irish tunes on the whistle. Nothing against them, I play a lot of latin music because that is what I'm most familiar with. Music from the Andes in South America that is usually played with pan flutes can be arranged to play with the whistle. Some flute arrangements for latin music could be potential targets as well.

Personally, I play the following tunes by ears on the whistle (Yes, I can read music... I could transcribe them, if I get some time).

"En Mi Viejo San Juan" - Puerto Rico
"Condor Pasa" - Peru
"Tu vives en mi pensamiento" - Puerto Rico
"Guantanamera" - Cuba

The other thing that comes to my mind would be to play baroque period music that is usually played on recorder. Some people might cringe about it, but being that they sound about the same to the untrained ear, I do not think that it would be that far fetched. I have seen some books on the music stores here in the US.

For those purist.

I heard once that in Ireland people are using Puertorican cuatros to play Irish music. I am not sure how true it is, but it would not be that far fetched, it sounds like a mandolin with a lower tone. I played cuatro for many years.

But, to make everybody happy, I'm still trying to play Banish Misfortune (jigs are hard, man) for St. Patricks

Well, I guess I can always fall back with Guantanamera.

Regards,

Luis

thurlowe · Post by **thurlowe** » Fri Jan 24, 2003 5:13 pm

Excellent suggestions from Luis. (Hope to hear from you more often!)
I might suggest Renaissance Dances. You'll find lots of hits with these 16th century publishers:

John Playford (English Dancing Master)
Thoinot Arbeau (Orchesographie d'Arbeau)
Tielman Susato (Danserye)
Praetorius (Terpsichore)

Good luck!

Cara

[ This Message was edited by: thurlowe on 2003-01-25 12:54 ]

SteveK · Post by **SteveK** » Fri Jan 24, 2003 5:36 pm

You could try old time American music. In some ways this is more like Irish music than Latin music is since it's a related form of dance music. Here's a web site that has a bunch of tunes. Also some country rags like Pig Ankle Rag are suitable for whistle. Often they are in C or F so you have to use a different whistle to preserve the original key.

http://www.math.ufl.edu/~crew/tunebook/Tunebook.html

Steve

Redwolf · Post by **Redwolf** » Fri Jan 24, 2003 6:57 pm

My new fiddle book (Robin Williamson's "English, Scottish, Irish and Welsh Fiddle Tunes") has a lot of stuff in it that's suitable for the whistle that's not in the stock Irish repertoire, including morris music, country dance music, strathspeys, etc.

A huge number of American folk songs work nicely on the whistle, as do hymns. Right now I'm learning "St. Patrick's Breastplate" for St. Patrick's Day

.

It's good practice to try picking out songs you already know by ear. That will build your repertoire faster than just about anything.

Redwolf

Switchfoot · Post by **Switchfoot** » Fri Jan 24, 2003 10:42 pm

I actually play alot of.... (prepare to hear the purists faint

) ska! and yes, I know its dead, but a D or C whistle is perfect for playing the horn parts in most songs. I also play along with whatever is playing on the radio (I once got into a really nice groove playing along with "crawling in the dark" by hoobustank, wish I had recorded that) Play along with Irish and Celtic Punk bands (flogging molly, pogues, drop kick murphy)

french · Post by **french** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 2:16 am

On 2003-01-24 18:13, thurlowe wrote:
Excellent suggestions from Luis. (Hope to hear from you more often!)
I might suggest Renaissance Dances. You'll find lots of hits with these 16th century publishers:

John Playford (English Dancing Master)
Thoineaut Arbeau (Orchesographie d'Arbeau)
Tielman Susato (Danserye)
Praetorius (Terpsichore)

Good luck!

Cara

is there free sheet music for the renaissance stuff available on the web or will i have to purchase it?

computer-mom · Post by **computer-mom** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 2:36 am

I play a lot of folk songs on my whistle: Irish, English, Scottish, American, and some other things that I like. I play some Renaissance French and Italian dance tunes. Renaissance music that doesn't have a lot of chromatics works well on the whistle. I play some old-time Gospel and some cowboy songs too.

SteveK · Post by **SteveK** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 3:01 am

You can find a variety of small tunebooks at this site http://members.aol.com/kitchiegal/
They do cost money but they're not terribly expensive and they should be whistle friendly since it's a hammered dulcimer site and the dulcimer plays in the same keys. I found some renaissance tunes at this site. You'll have to search around a bit. http://www.bcpl.net/~cbladey/guy/html/music.html

Steve

brewerpaul · Post by **brewerpaul** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 5:26 am

(quote)The other thing that comes to my mind would be to play baroque period music that is usually played on recorder.

You can play some baroque recorder music on a whistle, but most of it is too chromatic. Renaissance dance music , as suggested, is a better choice for whistle. One of my very favorite things to play on a whistle is indeed Baroque though-- it's the opening theme of the Goldberg Variations, also found as an air in the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach. On a whistle, it is simply gorgeous.

spittin_in_the_wind · Post by **spittin_in_the_wind** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 9:46 am

On 2003-01-24 18:36, SteveK wrote:
You could try old time American music. In some ways this is more like Irish music than Latin music is since it's a related form of dance music. Here's a web site that has a bunch of tunes. Also some country rags like Pig Ankle Rag are suitable for whistle. Often they are in C or F so you have to use a different whistle to preserve the original key.

http://www.math.ufl.edu/~crew/tunebook/Tunebook.html

Steve

I played around with some of these tunes last night, and some are pretty fun. I especially liked "The Forked Deer".

R.

SteveK · Post by **SteveK** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 9:55 am

On 2003-01-25 10:46, spittin_in_the_wind wrote:
http://www.math.ufl.edu/~crew/tunebook/Tunebook.html
I played around with some of these tunes last night, and some are pretty fun. I especially liked "The Forked Deer".

Forked Deer is probably my favorite tune. A friend and I recorded it with bouzouki (me) and wooden flute for the first Citterns on Ice project. That's one of those things where people on a mailing list submit their tunes and then a compilation is made. We put it with Bonaparte's Retreat. Lots of fun. It used to be available online but I don't know if it still is.

I checked and it still is. At this site click Citterns on Ice CD and then find COI I. All the submissions are there. There are some good ones but our tunes aren't all that great. I had only just gotten the bouzouki and we did a home recording job.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~cittern/index.htm

Steve

[ This Message was edited by: SteveK on 2003-01-25 11:03 ]

colomon · Post by **colomon** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 11:48 am

Hey, Steve, why aren't you promoting Canadian tunes? For someone looking for non-Irish reels and jigs, your country has a wealth of awesome tunes: the Dionne Reel, Payne's Choice, Andy DeJarlis, Jim Hodder's Reel, etc., etc.

thurlowe · Post by **thurlowe** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 11:48 am

[/quote]

is there free sheet music for the renaissance stuff available on the web or will i have to purchase it?
[/quote]

Hi French,

There's lots of free stuff, and many people have taken great care in presenting these old dance manuals on the web. Very fun to explore. Here's a link to the Playford Dancing Master:
http://www.pryanksters.org/playford.html

Enjoy,

Cara

SteveK · Post by **SteveK** » Sat Jan 25, 2003 12:15 pm

On 2003-01-25 12:48, colomon wrote:
Hey, Steve, why aren't you promoting Canadian tunes? For someone looking for non-Irish reels and jigs, your country has a wealth of awesome tunes: the Dionne Reel, Payne's Choice, Andy DeJarlis, Jim Hodder's Reel, etc., etc.

I don't know very many Canadian tunes. I learned to play the banjo a long time ago when I was living in Atlanta. Much later, I got interested in Irish music. I've heard the Dionne Reel but apart from that I've never heard of the others. Are there online sources for them.

Steve