Putting a pickup on a whistle

[brewerpaul]

Tyler has performed solo and with numerous ensembles (the EMMY award-winning Kitty Donohoe Band, The Motor City Brass Band, FUBAR, the Detroit-Ann Arbor Groupa Cheoil, the Kenneth MacLeod Band, Pub Domain, The Duhks, Modesty Forbids, (etc...)[/i]

Modesty Forbids contains (or at least used to contain) the one and only Glenn Schultz and his daughter Bree , who is a great flute and whistle player

[Cyfiawnder]

Electric Guitar pickups function on an electro magnetic level. In order for a vibrating piece of meatl to be "picked up" by a pickup it would have to have at least some metal that has magnetic properties. a Chromoly-steel aloy whistle might make it possible. I'm sure it would have to be single faze as well. A Two Faze pickup like a humbucker would require a lot more whiring than a standard single strip, plus they weigh twice as much. I'm sure it could be possible. The best place for placement would be on or around the head joint, but attatched to the head of the whistle. That would make it more head heavy than body heavy. With that said, I do not think it would sound very good, and you would loose that quality that makes a whistle, a whistle. A tape on mic or one of those headset mics would be the best course of action (IMHO). When I record stuff to send to people and or post on the CLips and Snips site, I use a headset microphone. The nice thing is it gives me a lot of freedom for microphone placement. Too close the the Window and you get breath blowing over to the mic, too close to your face and you hear "HHHHHUUUUUUUUHHHH" everytime you take a breath. The best place I have found is over the window and toward my face, but out of the line of "fire" from my big schnozz. That way when I breath through my nose you don't hear "snnnniiiii ffffuuuuuu."
Cy

[dlovrien]

and a mic and stand won't give me enough signal to be heard through an amp and will amplify more of everyone else than me if I turn the gain up too high.

Don't give up on the mike and stand approach - being able to switch whistles quickly without redoing the clip-on is a big plus, as is having more dynamic control over your presence in the mix.

A reasonably sensitive dynamic mike along with a decent pre-amp (something better than the preamps built-in to most house system mixers) will give you plenty of gain going into the main mix. I've just started using a ART Tube PAC (preamp/compressor) at gigs and it's working really well so far...

[Daniel_Bingamon]

Ways to pickup sound on a whistle:

1. Condensor Mic - Will pickup other sounds in room.
2. Piezoelectric - Has a crystal element and is very good with High Frequency.

Ultimately, a person could pickup the vibrations in the whistle with a laser. - However, this would be very expensive.

[greenspiderweb]

Well, Tyler, what have you tried? How did it work for you?

[Jerry Freeman]

Done!



Best wishes,
Jerry

[nancymae]

Ouch Jerry!!!!

Welcome to the forum neighbor!! I live close to the UP in northeastern Wisconsin! I also play the Native American Flute and there is a flute store called Oregon Flute Store www.oregonflutestore.com which has a small microphone that can be attached to the whistle. They have pictures of it. I'm not much into electronics, so I can't be sure if it is what you need.

Congrats on doing the school thing! Please keep us posted!!

Nancy

[clark]

When I'm playing a gig I don't like being "locked" onto a mike and mike-stand... my neck gets sore after awhile and I tend to bounce around with the beat. Also I play various whistles and flutes in the course of a gig and sometimes even within one tune. My solution? Head mic. I have tried several but have finally found THE one for flutes and whistles. It is the Shure Beta 54

This mic has a super-cardoid pick-up pattern which means it picks up no discernable background noise. My band plays in noisy pubs and I've had no problem with ambient noise. The frequency response works really well for flutes and whistles.

Here is the Shure site description [http://www.shure.com/microphones/models/beta54.asp]

[ctilbury]

Millish ROCKS!

[BrassBlower]

Welcome, Tyler!
Just as an alternative to a clip-on mic/pickup, I've seen a few folks use a Janet Jackson/Garth Brooks mic with whistles. You know... the kind that wraps around your head so you can sing (or in our case, play) hands-free. You can position the mic right over the whistle. And you don't get a sore neck from having to hold your head steady with a mic on a stand.

This is the same sort of mic the whistle player from the Afrocelts uses. It seems to work quite nicely for him, despite his extra-loud bandmates.

We use a wireless radio mike taped to the whistle with electrical tape. It works great -- picks up nicely, and there's really no weight added. Debbie

Where do you get one of these?
Thanks for all these ideas, and the warm welcome too.

The one I have is a Radio Shack cheapo, but it seems to work OK for my purposes. I attach it with a rubber band near the fipple of my whistles and rec****r, and just drop it in the soundholes of my guitar and MD.

Granted, my experience with pickups has almost entirely been F-150's, but I find that putting pickups on whistles almost invariably renders them unplayable.

[blackhawk]

So, when will we see a CD available from Millish? Assuming you're still checking this thread at all. And did you ever sell that Copeland low D? What low whistle are you using now for your gigs?