The Whistle-Lessons Tapes
of Miss Esther Boone

Fig. 1 · Cassette 11, side A.
"Concentration, mostly."

Good evening, good morning, and a fair-to-middling welcome from the Northwire late desk. Yours truly stands in tonight for Wilkins, who has gone "fishing," and so the gavel of the small-hours auction passes — briefly, breezily — to Vance Halloran, late of WBKX-9 (Doppler, weekday afternoons). Please do not adjust your set; the matter of the resignation is closed. Tonight we sell the Whistle-Lessons.

For four winters and three summers, Miss Esther Boone of Powell Avenue undertook the slow, deliberate, and at times weather-defying project of teaching herself to whistle. Cassette after cassette, the woman tried. The tapes catalogued here are the complete primary archive — eighteen Maxell C-60s, indexed, dated, and (in places) wept upon. They are being offered to the broader Prestel-connected public on the gentle recommendation of the Boone family estate.

• Cassettes: 18 (Maxell C-60, all clear-shell)
• Recording period: Oct. 1981 — Apr. 1984
• Total runtime: 17h 42m, indexed by Miss Boone in pencil
• Best result, audible: side B, cassette 14, at 22:13 — a real one, a brief, true whistle, A-flat, held for nearly a second and a half
• Audible weather: wind through a kitchen screen door; one oncoming squall (cass. 6); one distant tornado siren (cass. 9, 1982)
• Provenance: Boone family, Powell Avenue, intact since recording
• Condition: excellent. Two cassettes show minor "wow." None show malice.

What the prospective bidder is purchasing here, in the considered opinion of this auctioneer, is not the failure of a person to whistle. The whistle, after all, was eventually got. What you are purchasing is the long approach: the embouchure adjustments at the kitchen sink, the four-step "puh-puh-puh-WHOO" drills practiced over the radio weather, the gentle and persistent encouragement of one Mr. R. (Boone family acquaintance, occasionally on tape, no further comment from the block), and the truly unrepeatable sound of a woman saying "well, that one was closer, wasn't it" to nobody in particular.

The cassettes were always meant to be private. They have been opened to bid only because Miss Boone — eighty-three, sharp as a hailstone, alive and well in Powell Avenue — has decided she'd rather her practice tapes find a home with someone who would actually listen to them than have them turn up in a yard sale next to a fondue pot. That is her phrase, not the block's. The block agrees regardless.

A small advisory, in the spirit of full disclosure: cassette 13 contains, at 41:08 of side A, a forecast read aloud by a familiar voice. The forecast is wrong. The voice belongs to no one in particular and will not be discussed further at this time. The squall on cassette 6 did, however, arrive on time.

Reserve has been set at £86 (or 142 USD at present exchange). Bidding closes when the eastern sky turns the color of weak tea, or 0600h, whichever the auctioneer notices first. Northwire takes a courtesy commission of 4%. Cassettes ship in a hatbox, by post, in tissue. The hatbox is included. Miss Boone has asked us to say, exactly: "Please be gentle. They are practice."