How to Distinguish Between Irish Flutes, Whistles, & Concert Flutes
If you ever like to listen to traditional Irish music, you might notice that there can be a lot of flute in it! But there are different types of flutes often used. You might hear the concert flute or the more traditional Irish flute or maybe even a tin whistle. But these are all very different instruments. So how do you actually distinguish between Irish flutes, whistles, & concert flutes?
The Concert Flute
The concert flute is the instrument we usually think of when we think of western culture flutes. It was invented in the 1800s by German musician and inventor Theobald Boehm, and it is typically made out of silver (although there are ones made out of wood or other materials) with lots of keys. There is also a concert flute family consisting of instruments like the piccolo, alto flute, bass flute, and contrabass flute. For more information on the concert flute and its family, please see the blog post called “The Big Flute Family: Types of Concert Flutes“.
Although flutists will play Irish music on this modern instrument, frequently flutists will choose to play the more traditional Irish flute or whistle.
The Irish Flute
Irish flutes descend from the simple system instruments that were used before the modern flute
was invented. They were actually originally adopted by Irish folk musicians
because they were cheaper than the Boehm flute, and there were many used instruments
available that were abandoned for the modern flute. But they do work particularly well for Irish
music, oftentimes more so than modern flutes.
Irish flutes are made out of wood and are also usually conical like most simple system flutes. The most common key for them to be tuned to is D major, although when they are in D, that does not mean they are transposing. It is just the scale that is the easiest to play on the flute, but they sound at
concert pitch like the concert flute. They sound in the octave as written, and they do not usually come in different sizes and transpose, although there always exceptions of course. By the way, there really is no “one” Irish flute as they can have any number of keys between none at all and 8, and their lowest note is D below the staff unless they are 8-keyed in which case they can go all the way down to low C. Generally, they have about a 2 and a half octave range.
The Irish Whistle
The Irish whistle is a small vertical flute with a fipple top like a recorder. It is usually made of
metal, but sometimes it is made out of plastic or wood. It is often called a tin whistle because it is
frequently made out of tin or brass and today sometimes aluminum. It is also called a penny
whistle because when it came out in the 1800s, it cost a penny (it doesn’t anymore!).
The Irish whistle is usually keyless and cylindrical with fingerings similar to a keyless Irish flute. Whistles usually have about a 2 octave range, with the lowest note being the same D as piccolo, as in it is
written as the D under the staff but sounds an octave above as the D in the staff. The most
common key for them to be tuned to is D major, although just like the Irish flute, that does not mean it is a transposing instrument, but it is just the scale that is the easiest to play. However, unlike the Irish flute, there are whistles of many different sizes and pitches which do transpose.
How to Decide Which Instrument to Play
If you would like to play Irish music on the flute, how do you decide which instrument to play?
The first and most obvious answer is which instrument do you have already and know how to play? If you can play the concert flute, then it is fine to start on that one, and as mentioned earlier, some Irish musicians always play the modern flute instead of the Irish one. But if you don’t mind buying and learning a new instrument, then any of them will do, and you will just have to pick based on personal preference. It is worth noting that while Irish whistles are frequently mass-produced like concert flutes (although there are handmade ones obviously too), Irish flutes of a decent quality aren’t to the same extent. So if you wish to buy a nice Irish flute, you generally either need to get a historical instrument that has been refurbished (make sure to get one in the modern pitch of A=440hz) or get a handmade one. Also, you need to consider your budget as Irish whistles tend to be cheaper than Irish flutes which tend to be cheaper than concert flutes, although the cost can depend a lot on the instrument’s quality and maker of course.
The second thing to consider is which sound you like better. The Irish flute is in a similar range as the concert flute and the Irish whistle is in a similar range of the piccolo, but they definitely have their unique differences in timbre. Check out the video below to compare the sounds of these instruments and the rest of the playlist to hear more Irish flute and whistle.
Another factor is how you want to embellish the music. Ornaments are frequently added in Irish music, and one common one is a slide, which is basically a pitch bend. On an Irish flute or whistle, slides aren’t that hard as all you have to do is slide your finger across a tone hole. This is also possible on an open-hole concert flute but is a little more challenging to make it smooth, and it is completely impossible to do with just your fingers on a closed-hole flute. It is worth noting briefly that there are other things you should do to make Irish music sound more authentic including many ways to articulate and ornament, and you need to learn scales outside the normal major and minor. But that is all beyond the scope of this blog post with more on all that later. Or if you want to dive in deep with the world of Irish music, I would recommend the book “The Essential Guide to Irish Flute and Tin Whistle“.
Start with the flute that you have or are drawn to the most, and remember that you can always learn the other ones later! Just get started and have fun!
Hear the Irish Flute & Whistle in Action!
In the book “Flutie’s Family Reunion”, you can learn about and hear many different flutes, including concert flutes (piccolo, concert flute, alto, bass, and contrabass) and world flutes (Irish flute & whistle, shakuhachi, dizi, panpipe, and ocarina), available as both a paperback and digital book.
