Hi Matthew,
Don't be fooled by the nomenclature when talking about Northumbrian small
pipes. A set of pipes playing in F+ is actually playing about 75 cents
below concert pitch i.e. if you finger a G on the pipes it will show F+ on
a meter. If you have a tuneable D whistle and can pull the tuning slide out
far enough, you should be able to get in tune with a set of pipes playing
F+. Conversely, take a C whistle and push the tuning slide in to sharpen
it. It depends on how good your whistle is as to whether it remains in tune
throughout the range.
Richard
ps SHAMELESS PLUG: The Pipers' Gathering will be featuring Mike McHale and
Andrea Mori teaching whistle and flute. Check out their classes and then
jam with some of the NSP players. See www.pipersgathering.org for details.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Boris" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 5:01 PM
Subject: [NSP] Tweaking pennywhisle to NSP F+ pitch?
At the Potomac piper's gathering a few weeks back, I noticed that few
folks had instrument set up to jam with the NSP players in their F+
sets, except for one pennywhistle player. Is there any standard way to
play in F+ on a tinwhistle? Is it best to get an F whistle (low or
high), take off the head, trim a bit of the top of the body so you can
slide the head tighter? Or do the same on a C whistle to sharpen your
F scale (the "three fingers down" pitch)? Or do folks do the opposite
and get a 'whistle that can play a G scale and pull the head out to
bring the G down to F+?
Any advice on how to go about this, and which marques of 'whistle are
easiest to modify? Strings instruments are easy to play in F+ with,
clearly, though for my concertina it'd take a pretty specific re-tune
to play F+!
-Matthew
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