Anyone Can Whistle, huh?
Julia Lenton challenges the supposed universal skill of whistling.
At the mention of this blog’s name, my first thought was that this statement is just plain untrue. A certain non-whistling bird confided in me that even the creator of this blog lacks this semi-musical ability. Liar!
Whistling is indeed a skill and it seems that you either have it or you don’t. As a kid, my mother was the only one in our family of four who missed out on God’s whistling package, causing great frustration. Imagine three different melodies, in various states of being in tune, bouncing around the house while doing Saturday morning chores. “Can you at least whistle the same thing?” was her inevitable cry.
Whistling is an odd thing if you really think about it. Although I suppose everything is odd if you really think about it. How funny is the word potato? Po-ta-to. Someone came up with that once! Weird. Anyway, whistling. I thought it was just passing wind through your mouth in order to create various musical tones. Which is obviously appealing in itself when you put it that way, but on further research, there’s more!
There are actually many ways to whistle, ranging from the run-of-the-mill “pursed lip” or “pucker” whistle (pretty self-explanatory) to “wolf-whistling”, which is usually accompanied by an old-fashioned London policeman’s outfit. Then there are some pretty complicated whistles involving throats, palates, teeth, cupped hands and bottom lips which, while intriguing, almost sound painful and frankly seem unnecessary. I guess whistling is the ultimate in a portable instrument. All you need is a mouth and air? I’ve totally got those things!
Throughout history, whistlers everywhere have been doing exciting things with what can only be described as mad skillz (with a “z”, my friend). There have been so-called “professional whistlers” in circuses and bird experts who, apparently for the sake of it, teach their feathered friends particular melodies. Not to mention countless musicians giving their vocal chords a rest at times and working on their pucker techniques while recording instead. Fun fact: Les Paul was apparently capable of duotone, which is when the whistler uses both lips and tongue to create two tones at once! Now that’s something to write home about.
So if you’ve been known to whistle while you work, you should feel proud of the illustrious tradition you’re taking part in. And if you can’t whistle then I guess it’s okay, you’ll just have to think of some other way to express that you’re feeling idle or wandering with joy throughout your daily life.
I think we could all take a bit of advice from the Finn Brothers… try whistling this.
