Photo from Nigel Gatherer's excellent Scottish Music website

The Tin whistle has a long history in Scotland as evidenced by the fact that one of the oldest tin whistles still in existance is the 'Tusculum Whistle', dating back to the 14th and 15th centuries.

Today, in Scotland more & more musicians are learning & playing the Traditional Music of Scotland on the Tin Whistle, but it has always been seen as something of an inferior instrument there, compared always less favourably with the Flute.

Though few well-known performers choose the tin whistle as their principle instrument, it is quite common for pipers, flute players, and other musicians to play the whistle as well.

That Tusculum whistle in the Museum of Scotland made of brass or bronze, found with pottery dating from the 14th and 15th centuries was excavated in North Berwick in 1907 & is 14cm long with six finger holes.

Nigel Gatherer tells us that:

"The Caledonian Museum of c.1810, which contains tunes "adapted for the Flageolet" (a whistle-like instrument with various designs), and the 1800 Broderick & Wilkinson Selection, in which the tunes are adapted for the Harp, Pianoforte, Violin, or Tabor & Pipe (the tabor pipe is a three-hole whistle mainly used in English Morris music)."

He also makes mention of one:

".....'Wee Willie White' who busked the streets of Glasgow in the first half of the 19th century. A little later Carl Volti (born Archie Milligan in 1849), who became well known as a composer of classical music and fiddle tunes originally started with the whistle and formed a whistle band in his youth."

Living, as I did in Aberdeenshire for many years, I remember seeing - "Photographs of Aberdeenshire bothy bands from the late 19th century show whistle players posing along with melodeons, fiddles, pipes, chanters and so on."

Today many musicians on the Traditional Music scene play the Whistle as well as their main instrument, including great musicians like - "Allan MacLeod (Alba, Tannahill Weavers), Iain MacDonald (Ossian) and Dougie Pincock (Battlefield Band), to name but three. Other notable Scottish whistle players include the late Tony Cuffe (Alba, Jock Tamson's Bairns, Ossian), Robin Williamson (Incredible String Band), Rory Campbell (Old Blind Dogs), Roy Williamson (The Corries) and that late great piper Gordon Duncan."

I remember well, in the 70's hearing the late Jimmy Greenan playing his Tin Whistle in the famous Sandy Bells Bar in Edinburgh & it was very clear the style of playing was very different to the Irish Style, much more staccato & not nearly so flowing.

Nigel also talks of Jimmy - "The late Jimmy Greenan lived in Edinburgh near Sandy Bell's Bar which he frequented. He was a very good whistle player who had a polio-affected arm. Jack Campin told me, "He used to play with his bad arm lifted whistle-height in a sling and had an extraordinary technique of lifting fingers on that hand off the holes by pulling the whole whistle downwards with the other hand. It looked like somebody dancing a marionette."

This just goes to show you how determined some musicians can be to carry on playing in the face of adversity & one only need think of the legendary Django Reinhardt, who only had the use of a couple of fingers on his left hand but who went on to become one of the greatest Jazz Guitarists of them all. Certainly puts the rest of us to shame whenever we complain about having to practice!

Another Whistle player I remember hearing regularly from the 70's, who had that distinctive 'Scottish'style was Alex Green of Aberdeenshire. However, many players today play pipes as their first instrument so use Piping ornamentation to decorate their tunes when playing the Whistle which gives a very different effect.

It is very hard to believe that those Scots folk who came over to Ulster during the past few hundred years, didn't bring their humble & cheap Whistles with them, & once here, they would have carried on playing their favourite tunes from back home as well as slowly picking up some of the new melodies they would have started hearing over here.

Seeing as how it is such an easily carried little beastie needing so much less effort than a Fife or Flute to play & much quieter in domestic situations, it's little wonder that many Fife & Flute players make good use of this cheap & friendly little instrument for practicing their tunes.

In my day job, I teach the Tin Whistle to children in a number of Controlled Primary Schools in the North Antrim area & have done so for the past eight years & am amazed how quickly many of the children pick it up & how much fun they have learning their favourite little tunes on it. I personally find that the Tin Whistle is the ideal instrument to use to introduce children to music, any kind of music.

For more details on the Tin Whistle in Scotland, visit Nigel Gatherer's website:

Or for more general background information on the Whistle, visit:

Anyway, here is Nigel's list of Scottish Whistle players: