noun
flute; fife; pipe; recorder; shakuhachi; clarinet
General term for wind instruments that produce sound by blowing, including Western flutes, recorders, Japanese shakuhachi, and similar instruments.
彼女は笛を吹くのが上手だ。
She is good at playing the flute.
小学校でリコーダーという笛を習った。
I learned a wind instrument called the recorder in elementary school.
noun
Refers to a whistle used for signaling, such as a referee's whistle or a train whistle.
審判が笛を吹いて試合を止めた。
The referee blew the whistle and stopped the match.
Kana spelling is common in everyday writing, especially for children or when avoiding kanji.
The kanji 笛 is a phono-semantic compound with 竹 (bamboo) and 由 (phonetic component), indicating a bamboo wind instrument. The reading ふえ is native Japanese, and the obsolete reading ちゃく is derived from Chinese.