Back in 1997, I decided that I wanted to learn how to play the tin whistle. The initial investment was pretty low and I was listening to a healthy dose of Irish traditional music, so I wanted to give it a shot.
I found Chiff & Fipple, and though I didn’t actually register on the forum at that point, I did use the recommendations there to help me decide which whistle to buy and which tutor I should use. Back then the Clarke Sweetone was still relatively new, and I remember that I ended up having to check several online sellers before I found one that had a D in stock in black. The place I ended up buying from (Melody’s Traditional Music and Harp Shoppe) was at the time only selling the Sweetone D in a set with the Sweetone C, but both whistles together were still only about $15, so I bought them and added Geraldine Cotter’s Traditional Irish Tin Whistle Tutor (though I didn’t get the accompanying cassettes until some time later).
It was the first time I’d played an instrument since I got through the beginning stages of learning the clarinet back in junior high, and, despite my getting off to a decent start, I found that I apparently wasn’t motivated enough to make a good try of it. Oh, I could soon play scales and a few very simple tunes, but I gradually played less and less over the course of a few months until I wasn’t playing at all. I don’t remember ever making a conscious decision to stop learning the whistle, but that was effectively what I did.
Fortunately, that didn’t end up being the end of the story….
