Jumping D's

[Strom]

Hi Everybody,
I've been playing for about 4 months now and so far everything has been going very, very well . Now, for the but . When playing the low D I seem to have a problem with it jumping to the high D without me wanting it to. It seems to start to happen shortly after I start to pratice and the longer I play the worse it gets. It also happens on the E but not near as much. Once I get to F# no problems. So, is this A) Me, B) the whistle or C) both? I have several whistles but they are all inexpensive and it happens to at least some degree on all of them. If it's Me are there some exercises to help with this unwanted jump? If it's the whistle is this something common to the cheaper whistles that can be solved by going to a midpriced or more expensive whistle? Or is this something that will just sort it self out over time as I improve as player. Any help would be great as this is becoming a bit frustrating.
Thanks,
Strom

[ISU Trout Bum]

Hola and welcome to the whistle!!!

Depending upon the type of whistles you own, it may be a combo of both the instrument(s) and the player. I started w/an Oak and it jumped on me constantly for a LLLLOOOONNNNGGGG time. I've since purchased a number of "better" whistles.

That being said, the Oak no longer jumps on me too much. In other words, 80% of the problem lay w/my inexperience. My advise it to pay very, very close attention to your breath pressure. Play scales really slow until you become comfortable w/the whistle(s) not jumping on you. Slow and contemplative is really the key . . . at least this is what I've found. Eventually it will just become sort of "Zen" - you'll know your own body, how much air pressure to exert, and you'll know the whistle(s) well enough that it won't happen too too often.

Just my 2 cents worth. There are a number of members of this board who are much more experienced than I who probably have more indepth insights for you.

At any rate, best of luck to you - and, enjoy the ride!!

[anniemcu]

Nothing will get you past any better than 'practice, pracctice, practice'... you will gain more control of your breath, mouth, and pressure, but it takes a lot of time spent doing so... practice it every chance you get, find out which takes more pressure, what happens when you blow harder, softer... it's the whistle and your mouth learning to work together (hint, only one of them adjusts well).

A year or so down the road, you'll wonder how you ever *coouldn't* do it.

[Key_of_D]

Learn to blow the notes.

When jumping an octave, I find tonging the note you're jumping to, works for a nice clean transition. Although you don't always have to do this of course. Once you've learned to blow any note at will, (cleanly that is) you'll find that you won't have to tongue when jumping an octave, so then you'll have the option to tongue, or not to tongue.

Right now, I'd work on learning to blow the note you're wanting to play, and work on all of them, making sure to keep postive intonation as you go along.

Another thing to try is, after taking a breath, the first note you resume playing can be tongued.

Just don't get too carried away with the tonging, this isn't classical music afterall.

Just my 2 cents.

[Flogging Jason]

Try clearing the windway. It's possible that a buildup of saliva/condensation could be partially responsible.

Also, controlling your breathing is a factor. When playing in the lower octave I hold my tongue lower in my mouth to allow my airflow to be fuller. I raise it slightly in the upper octaves to narrow that airflow. Breathing from the diapragm(like in singing) also gives you better control and can lend a fuller sound to your playing.

[buddhu]

Nothing will get you past any better than 'practice, pracctice, practice'... you will gain more control of your breath, mouth, and pressure, but it takes a lot of time spent doing so... practice it every chance you get, find out which takes more pressure, what happens when you blow harder, softer... it's the whistle and your mouth learning to work together (hint, only one of them adjusts well).

A year or so down the road, you'll wonder how you ever *coouldn't* do it.

What Annie said.

A more expensive whistle, or an alternative cheapie is unlikely to help, and if you did find one that didn't jump so easily you would only end up cursing its lack of responsiveness later on when you wanted to be able to jump about between registers in fast tunes.

Breath control is the thing. There was one whistle I had (a Jerry Freeman MellowDog) which I complained about as being hard to control. Everyone thought I was mad, but I just couldn't get a tune out of it without it swapping octaves and squawking when I least expected it. After a couple of months practice I discovered that everyone was right - I was mad. It was, and remains, a terrific whistle. I just had to get used to it.

Practice just blowing the bell note (the D with all holes covered) until you can get it steady every time. It's a dull practice session, but the bell note is often the most unstable and the one that convinces newbies they need to go hunt for a new whistle.

[Bloomfield]

Learn to blow the notes.

When jumping an octave, I find tonging the note you're jumping to, works for a nice clean transition. Although you don't always have to do this of course. Once you've learned to blow any note at will, (cleanly that is) you'll find that you won't have to tongue when jumping an octave, so then you'll have the option to tongue, or not to tongue.

Right now, I'd work on learning to blow the note you're wanting to play, and work on all of them, making sure to keep postive intonation as you go along.

Another thing to try is, after taking a breath, the first note you resume playing can be tongued.

Just don't get too carried away with the tonging, this isn't classical music afterall.

Just my 2 cents.

Take this advice with a grain of salt. If you play Irish Trad, as Key_off seems to assume, you don't want to teach yourself to tongue the upper note when jumping octaves. On the contrary. Anyway, on D it's easy: just lift the top finger, and you'll have your octave jump.

On the rest of it: I think you're just blowing too hard. It takes a while. Keep your cheap whistle and blow softly.

[fearfaoin]

On the rest of it: I think you're just blowing too hard. It takes a while. Keep your cheap whistle and blow softly.

Agreed. Play lots of slow runs from B down to D in the first octave.
When you get to F#, start thinking about blowing hot, slow air. This
should get your breath in the right place for playing the low E and D.
Sometimes, it might help to drop your jaw a little, to open up your
air passages, and reduce the pressure on the air.

Also, make very sure you're covering the top hole. If it is allowed to
vent, it might make the D jump.

[Tia]

On the rest of it: I think you're just blowing too hard. It takes a while. Keep your cheap whistle and blow softly.

Agreed. Play lots of slow runs from B down to D in the first octave.
When you get to F#, start thinking about blowing hot, slow air. This
should get your breath in the right place for playing the low E and D.
Sometimes, it might help to drop your jaw a little, to open up your
air passages, and reduce the pressure on the air.

Also, make very sure you're covering the top hole. If it is allowed to
vent, it might make the D jump.

agreed with both, as you practise more it'll become easier, it proabably happens at the begging, just as your warming up because well you are only warming up, and at the end because you start to get tired, but thats good, your well on your way to soon having no problem with it, try playing the scale down, even if just starting on the B, and once you get to the E and D hold it for a while.

[straycat82]

I would perhaps recommend that if you are having particular trouble controlling the Oak, practice on that whistle some more. It will give you better excercise than an easier playing whistle would. If you get to the point that you can control it well then the easier players will fall into place as well.
That said, you need to be able to have fun with the instrument in order to stay encouraged, motivated, and to keep moving forward. Perhahps spend some of your serious practice time on the Oak and then your time of pleasure playing on one of the other easy blowers you mentioned.

[PhilO]

As Bloomfield et al said, breath control is the thing with trial and error. To help get there, perhaps one exercise will be helpful; granted, I'm not big on exercises other than my sorry a-- b roll and replaying over and over troublesome sections of tunes. Go up and down the scale slowly and easily blowing both octaves on each note before proceeding to the next note. (i.e., low d/high d, low e/high e, etc).

Philo

[sbhikes]

As I've gotten a little better lately I learned that I can hit notes in the second octave by blowing what feels like softer instead of harder. It's not really softer so much as differently, like from my diaphragm with a change in direction or something. I discovered it while trying to see how quietly I could play a high G. I can do this on my D whistle but not yet on my Bb whistle. That one seems like it is perpetually a boy whose voice is cracking.

[bjs]

... on D it's easy: just lift the top finger, and you'll have your octave jump.

Well well that I didn't know. Interesting. I notice that if you are blowing too gently you get a (flatish) Bflat istead of d. Can't think of a use for that though.

[scottkent]

Hi Everybody,
I've been playing for about 4 months now and so far everything has been going very, very well . Now, for the but . When playing the low D I seem to have a problem with it jumping to the high D without me wanting it to. It seems to start to happen shortly after I start to pratice and the longer I play the worse it gets. It also happens on the E but not near as much. Once I get to F# no problems. So, is this A) Me, B) the whistle or C) both? I have several whistles but they are all inexpensive and it happens to at least some degree on all of them. If it's Me are there some exercises to help with this unwanted jump? If it's the whistle is this something common to the cheaper whistles that can be solved by going to a midpriced or more expensive whistle? Or is this something that will just sort it self out over time as I improve as player. Any help would be great as this is becoming a bit frustrating.
Thanks,
Strom

I had a simular problem with a feadog of mine. After a close inspection I found a hairline crack in the fipple. I got another feadog and had no problem. Sometimes the reason really isn't the fact that I can't play all that well

[Key_of_D]

I'm not so sure a hairline crack as you say would have such results as you described. I think it would have to be a bit more then a hairline crack to cause any real serious problems with the performance of the whistle. I say this as I have at least 3 whistles, (one of them a Feadog) with a hairline crack going lengthwise along the fipple ending at the soundblade, and neither of these whistles play incompetently.