Birds do it. Whales and dolphins do it. Educated tourists do it. Even kettles do it! I don’t know about you, but I certainly am addicted to doing it! Now, don’t get me wrong, I am talking about the age-old art of self-entertainment or calling for attention.
Most of us observe the world around us, but in some way take it for granted until several things we have become accustomed to suddenly disappear. Now, along with these venerable old traditions, another feature of daily life is slipping away without a murmur. I speak, of course, of the ancient art of whistling.
My maternal grandfather was a phenomenal whistler. As a child I thought he was the world’s greatest whistling virtuoso. His whistling was powerfully clean and crisp and echoed tunefully throughout the home. He whistled while he worked at his hobbies and even when at the wheel of his Lanchester limousine!
It used to be cool to whistle. And Grand-dad did it with such effortless ease. From those puckered lips surged fluid melodic strains that could have beaten the pants off any accomplished flautist’s performance. Besides, his music was clear and consistently tuneful and with exceptional control on high notes.
An aunt of ours claimed the old boy came out of the womb whistling Brahms’ ‘Cradle Song,’ and as a boy warbled along with his father’s opera albums. When I was around six or thereabouts I asked the old boy how he does it. He said: “You just put your lips together and blow.”
So I blew and I blew and after months of trying all that emerged was a pathetic ‘pffffff’ sound. And when I had almost given up huffing and puffing there suddenly emerged a raspy high-pitched shriek reminiscent of an asthmatic cockatoo in full throated song. After a while the tone and clarity improved by tremendous shrieks and trills.
So you see, I have always been an obsessive whistler. As my family points out, it’s one of the reasons I have so few friends, although, as they grudgingly concede, at least they can always locate me whenever we become separated while shopping. When whistling was in vogue I was one of many thousands of practitioners indiscreetly maintaining this fine old musical tradition. Yet lately I have noticed my habit being commented on with mild amusement by family and friends.
As Moya my eight-year-old grand-daughter, going on 18 in the sarcasm department quipped: “No one does that anymore!” I shot back: “Does what anymore?” Moya returned fire: “Whistle! That’s a 60s thing!”
What the heck has happened to whistling? It has been suggested, as reinforced by the ‘Gospel According to Moya,’ that the habit seems to have died out. These days, chaps sauntering in the street are more likely to be on their phones or listening to iPods.
Yes the real culprits are surely the ubiquitous iPods and MP3 players. These infernal contraptions have not only virtually obliterated the art of conversation but also have bitten deeply into the heartlands of traditional whistling. Whistling is a pleasure those who choose to walk through life with tiny earphones stuffed in their lugholes will never know.
It used to be a sort of self-possessed attribute to whistle. Whistling has been used during peace and war, as secret codes by soldiers and spies and by kids in their backyards. And also by urban street gangs who would whistle for backup when there was trouble in the air. As an object of folklore, whistling ranges from a representation of joy to an omen of evil spirits. The superstitious say that you are not supposed to whistle after dark because it’s a clarion call for snakes. But no one has ever dared not to go whistling past a graveyard. Whistling in the dark or whistling by the graveyard is meant to portray confidence when faced with fear or danger or defeat. Men, doing something technical, which needs concentration, such as rewiring a plug or working on a tiny screw, also whistle. This, again, is a warning signal. It says: “This is far more tricky than you realise. Don’t say anything to distract me.” A man who whistles, and surely it’s nearly always a man, is telling people he is quite content in his own company. That’s why it is often almost tuneless. If he produced a recognisable melody, some stranger might come along and join in and make it a duet. What an intrusion that would be!
Hey! But recently I discovered one place, at least, where whistling survives. It was in a men’s changing room in a swimming complex. As they dressed and undressed the males were all emitting that good old fashioned tuneless sound. It was obviously a sign of nonchalance as they stripped in the presence of strangers. So they whistled while they dried themselves and wiped.
Whistling is also supposed to be an art of manliness. Ages ago in my early teens I was reading Ian Fleming’s thriller ‘The Man with the Golden Gun'. In it was a section in which the head of the Secret Intelligence Service, codenamed ‘M’, was reading a dossier on Scaramanga the titular villain of the piece. The dossier reveals that Scaramanga was suspected of having homosexual tendencies on account of his being unable to whistle.
That said, Fleming has a bit of fun with the bit of folk wisdom there when ‘M’ tries a quick whistle after reading the particular part. It sent me into hysterics and I fell off the couch while executing a long reassuring wolf whistle. Not knowing of any gay pals in my circle, I impishly attempted to test Fleming’s theory by requesting all of them to produce a whistling toot.
There were uncharitable guffaws all round when some of them could only emit only a feeble ‘pffffft.’ It was spiteful. The poor chaps were branded for life as having deviant sexual proclivities on an absolutely preposterous theory.
Try as I might I still remain essentially a fair to middling whistler and can never hope to reach the high standards my Grand-dad had set. But defeat for the old maestro whistler came when trying to whistle for a taxi during rush-hour! I stood beside him in my teens as he tried unsuccessfully to hail a cab by raising his arm. That’s when I showed him that there were whistling whizzes of a different variety. I used the two fingers in mouth technique and emitted an ear-splitting shriek that summoned a cavalcade of cabs to the curb we stood on.
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