BillChin wrote:My Susato High D is one of my favorite whistles. I find it similar to my Burke composite. I prefer the Susato, because it has a sharper edge to the sound a bit more volume.
I also have a Susato Low D and find the finger reach for the lowest note to be a stretch (mine is keyless, and now they offer a whistle with one key for the lowest hole).
I've compared the Kildare Susato High D with my Burke DBSBT and found them to have very similar construction. I'm not surprised to hear that the composite Burke sounds similar in tone to the Susato.
I have had my Susato for years. It was my first favorite whistle, though it requires an awful lot of air and a rock solid embouchure to not break in the higher register. For that reason I looked into new whistles and discovered the Michael Burke whistles.
I recommended the non-tunable Susato for one of my students since he was so hard on whistles. Those Susatos are tough beasties.
Last edited by The Laughing Imp on Mon Sep 10, 2007 3:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Lovin' life with my Burke DBS
Looking for a Clarke Enchanted Tinwhistle (http://is.gd/1nPK). PM me if you have one for sale...
A-Musing wrote:I've had a Susato Low D for years. Car whistle. Hiking whistle. Beach whistle. I think of it as my "beater." (And, at this point, it LOOKS it!)
Seems indestructible. EZ to play. Totally in tune. Always answers the call!
I mentioned above that I recommended a Susato to one of my students for this very reason, but for me I use a Clarke Sweetone as my beater. They're cheaper to replace and I'm not as hard on my whistles as my 11 year old student. Then again, I own a Kildare model Susato, not the Dublin models.
Lovin' life with my Burke DBS
Looking for a Clarke Enchanted Tinwhistle (http://is.gd/1nPK). PM me if you have one for sale...
I'm not fond of the Susato high whistles...I don't like the tone of them. I'll go with my Sweetone over a Susato any day, especially considering the $50 price difference.
However, I own and love a Susato low D; while the high whistles are lacking in chiff, the low D has plenty of it, and best of all the chiff is pretty controllable. However, the volume on the low D isn't very much, and I find that at any session I'm drowned out, especially if I'm sitting next to a flute player. I use my Susato pretty much for slow airs, which it performs wonderfully for.
I liked my high-D at first. Then I got in trouble with the people upstairs. Too loud. Now I'm not allowed to play after 11pm, thanks to that darned Susato. I hardly play it any more. I have a wide-bore. Maybe the narrow-bore would have been better. At this point, I'd rather have the money back.
mamegann wrote:I liked my high-D at first. Then I got in trouble with the people upstairs. Too loud. Now I'm not allowed to play after 11pm, thanks to that darned Susato. I hardly play it any more. I have a wide-bore. Maybe the narrow-bore would have been better. At this point, I'd rather have the money back.
Get a piece of poster tack and plug a little less than half the opening inside the fipple opposite the blade (on the other side of where you blow). It'll change the tone a little, and it will take some adjusting to get the volume right, but you'll find that volume cut drastically. I use this trick all the time to play my Susato or Burke brass session in the wee hours of the morning when I should be asleep like the rest of the world. I haven't woken anybody up yet.
Lovin' life with my Burke DBS
Looking for a Clarke Enchanted Tinwhistle (http://is.gd/1nPK). PM me if you have one for sale...
I'm not that fond of Susatos, personally. I can't really even tell you why, but I just don't like them that much. I still own a high F, though I rarely play it.
anniemcu
--- "You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
--- "Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
--- http://www.sassafrassgrove.com
I used to have a high D, but it was just too loud for my tastes. It sounded good, but my playing didn't, so that didn't help any. I have a low G now that I play sometimes.
"Life is far too important to be taken seriously"
~Oscar Wilde
I have a Susato D and a low G. I'm afraid I'm not really keen on either.
The D is loud, but IMHO that is all it has going for it.
And whether the blood be highland, lowland or no.
And whether the skin be black or white as the snow.
Of kith and of kin we are one, be it right, be it wrong.
As long as our hearts beat true to the lilt of a song.
pancelticpiper wrote:I think the Susati get better as they get lower..
Many years ago when we did a poll re: inexpensive whistles, Susatos ranked very well among people's favorites, and also among people's least favorites. So, there you go--the whistle that divides whistlers like no other.
And, along those lines, I would say that the Susatos get better as they get higher.
Tell us something.: Playing Scottish and Irish music in California for 45 years. These days many discussions are migrating to Facebook but I prefer the online chat forum format.
Daleth hit the nail on the head. My low D and low C Susati are flutelike chiffy expressive things. My low E and F are fine players. My low G and A Susati are only mediocre. (I had a narrow-bore A and a medium-bore A, and the narrow-bore played better IMHO.) The high C and D are blasters, only good for sheer volume. Their high notes tend to screechiness and tend to "clam" if not played just so.
About really low whistles taking a lot of air, it doesn't need to be so. I played a contrabass flute (about 8 feet long) and it took no more air than a normal flute. I was amazed at its volume, clarity, efficiency, etc. I think Susato should start out making bass A and G whistles, and finally a bass D. It would be awsome.
Tell us something.: I'm not new here. I have been registered here for many years. I am not a spammer, though being from Hawaii, I do enjoy eating spam. Now the site is requiring at least 100 characters in this box. It would have been nice to know that bit of information before I hit submit the first time!
I have an A, Bb, and low D. All are pretty loud, though the Bb will knock the house down if I'm blowing too hard. I play all of them mostly at home. I wish I could love my low D - I pick it up quite a bit, but I've never, ever been able to figure out the pressure in the upper register. It squeaks too often for me to take to session, which really makes me mad 'cause I do like the tone. Overall, they are not bad whistles, but I do think they take as much if not more work than an Oak . . . which is saying something!
ISU Trout Bum wrote:I wish I could love my low D - I pick it up quite a bit, but I've never, ever been able to figure out the pressure in the upper register. It squeaks too often for me to take to session, which really makes me mad 'cause I do like the tone.
Have you tried the o-ring tweak? I don't know if it works on the low D, but it is an easy tweak and reversable.
To save a shopping trip looking for the right sized o-ring, I use poster putty and put a ridge on the outside of the whistle, right at the end of the slope of the blade and adjust the height/width of the ridge until I get the volume/air requirements that I like.
I am finally enjoying my Susato D (suprano D, orig design, white with cherry plug, nontunable).
pancelticpiper wrote:I think the Susati get better as they get lower..
[nice latin plural by the way!]
Many years ago when we did a poll re: inexpensive whistles, Susatos ranked very well among people's favorites, and also among people's least favorites. So, there you go--the whistle that divides whistlers like no other.
And, along those lines, I would say that the Susatos get better as they get higher.
Yes, it seems to be either love or hate! I´ve got a couple, and I have really tried to give them a fair chance, but no... Can´t stand it! And I can´t really find anything wrong with it. I´m more of a Clarke/Generation/Feadog guy.
If you talk to people about jazz and classical music there is an interesting pattern. People who prefere (If they have to make a choise) Parker over Coltrane also prefere Mozart over Beethoven (and vice versa). There seems to be a connection: Mozart/Parker and Beethoven/Coltrane. This connection is well known but as far as I know there isn´t any logical explanaition.
I wonder if if there is some similar connection with the Susato vs. Generation typ of whistle. Is there a deeper personality pattern?
I prefer Beethoven/Coltrane over Mozart/Parker and Generation over Susato.
Then again, I own a Kildare model Susato, not the Dublin models.
