Whistle Tone
http://www.rugby365.com/stories/laws/LW_010323_22860.shtml (23 Mar 2001)

The law requires us to blow the whistle. Whistle tone is vital. It is our first form on communication with the players on the field.

How they use them can add to or subtract from a match. Have you watched a match where a referee plays repetitive tunes on his whistle - twit-twit-twit- twit-twit-toooooooo? Once you log into it, it is irritating enough to spoil the match.

Then there is the diffident blower. Players and spectators hardly hear him in some Uriah Heap form of self-effacement. That's a nuisance, too.

And then there is maniacal blast to stop the worst thief. Off blasts the whistle, and all the referee is doing is straightening up a line-out.

It is thoughtless, feelingless, meaningless blowing of a whistle. It is not communication.

Listen to a good referee. He has a dramatic tone to start the match. He was a swinging one to end the match.

He has an urgent one to stop play when he wants to protect a player from danger.

He has a little one to signal time out for injury, a smaller one for a scrum for a blatant knock-on and a louder one if the forward pass was not so obvious and play looks likely to run away.

His tiniest one, if he uses it at all, is for an obvious line-out.

He has a determined one when tempers have boiled over and discipline is needed.

He uses a tiny one for a fair catch, unless the player is in danger.

He has a crisp one for a free kick for an infringement and a crisper one for a penalty.

And when, glory alleluia, he awards a try, his whistle is triumphant.

A referee should listen to other referees and practise on his own whistle.
A lot of the tone he plays will come naturally from the situation, but really he should be varied and sensible - not just a wild, unthinking blast upon the air.

Above all, he should use it only for a reason - a good, sensible reason - not because something looks wrong, not because he has guessed, not because he is afraid.

[Footnote for Andre Joy]

The most famous whistle is the Acme Thunderer. Joseph Hudson, a toolmaker of Birmingham, founded his firm, Acme, and started making police whistles in 1883, at a time when the police used cumbersome rattles. When the idea came to him, he was playing the violin and took his first whistle's tone from his last violin's note. In 1884 he launched the Acme Thunderer, still the best-selling whistle in the world and still the best whistle for a rugby referee to use.