MTGuru wrote:One idea as you move forward again, Imp ... I have no idea what level you're at. But have you ever had a teacher take a close, physical look at your playing, one on one?
I'm an intermediate player. I've taken eight months of webcam lessons with Bill Ochs and my playing is fine, but after finishing lessons with Ochs I decided to teach myself the low D. I now realize that was a mistake. At the time I didn't think it would matter because of the similarities between the whistles, but in practice it mattered quite a bit. An expert could have told me that my fingers were all wrong for the Howard Low D. He could have saved me months of struggle and injury. And if my fingers weren't all wrong for the instrument, then he could have shown me the proper grip for my hands.
But hindsight is 20/20.
Now I have RSI in my left forearm. For example, I performed tonight for my wife's concert with my Burke whistle and my arm never hurt once. But testing my Howard yesterday before listing it for sale aggravated my arm and I'm going to need to give things a rest for a few days.
So from now on, I am taking things very easy. I'll just have to accept that I can't play as much as I'd like. Or as fast.
Then again, I could learn to play the whistle with my right hand only. Haha! Perhaps it's time to get a tabor pipe.