Chiff and Fipple Forums

My own solution was a sort of mix of 1 and 2 in that I just added one reg when I was at a point that I could both spare the cash and control the rest of the instrument. I still haven't added the other two, one is enough to getting along with. This is an option that hadn't occurred to me - it's a go...

PJ wrote: ↑Fri Dec 24, 2021 5:53 pm Some tunes are easier than others for learning the regs. I found that reels and hornpipes (4/4 tunes) were easier than jigs, but that’s just my experience.

Good advice, that. Many thanks!

These are good answers so far. The regulators rather scare me too because adding them to the tune effectively seems to test one's natural musical sense and I'm afraid to find out that I have very little natural musical sense. I've listened to top level Uilleann players (unnamed) whose regulator work...

Good day. I'm an intermediate Uilleann piper (ok, beginning to be intermediate) after about 5 years of instruction/practice and I play a half set. I've been wondering when I should add regulators to the mix. I've asked this on The Session and got several replies: 1. As soon as possible. The sooner y...

If you can find a pipe teacher that has "loaner" practice sets, that's the way to go. I was extremely fortunate: my teacher had several practice sets on hand for new students, and he kept sets from several different makers so his student could get a sense of what type of pipes he eventuall...

Kirk Lynch has told me to move the bridle up just a tiny bit to open the lips. I did and that appears to have worked. (He actually said a lot more, but that's the gist of it.) (He also suggested trimming material off the reed lips, but I'd prefer not to go there. I currently lack a back up reed - ne...

When you acquired your pipes, did anyone show you how to examine and adjust the reed? My teacher showed me a bit, but the first time I tried to adjust the bridle I made a hash of it and nearly rendered the reed on one of his practice sets unplayable altogether. That made me somewhat gun-shy of mess...

Hello, Uillean pipers. I've been playing a chanter reed made by Kirk Lynch for about 6 months now and I notice that, even under favorable environmental conditions (humidity around 44%, temp around 72), it's starting to shut down more and more on some notes. I'll be playing happily along and suddenly...

I'm isolated by choice, really . . . meaning I live in an area where there are teachers and probably sessions going on. But frankly I'm too much of a novice to show up at a session. I'd just embarrass myself. As I get more tunes under my belt I might have a go at that . . . Nevertheless, what keeps ...

Several of the comments here reference deliberately leaving in squeaks and squawks and the occasional dropped note to humanize the (Uillean) music or otherwise make it less perfect or clinical. That's a big difference (I think) between the GHB and Uillean pipe cultures . . . a top playing GHB player...

I realize I'm uttering platitudes . . . but someone's got to do it.

It seems there's value to both approaches: the GHB culture fiercely defends the tradition, how it's always been done and played. Without defenders of that tradition we wouldn't even have the instrument or much beautiful traditional music. But taken to its extreme it produces ossification, rigidity, ...

I've re-listened to the track and am too convinced it's deliberate. He plays the whole tune through three times and in the second and third times through he does not play the high G in the second part - it's quite deliberate. Ok, but there are other tunes by accomplished pipers where it's hard to co...

At 1.5 years of playing I'm still quite a novice, but I really like to listen to CDs of prominent Uillean pipers - masters of the art. However, I have noticed something: on most of these CDs of contemporary Uillean pipers I have occasionally heard what I THINK are dropped notes, i.e. (and e.g.), a h...

Thank you! That's a wonderful site you've linked to, I shall bookmark it for future reference. thanks again!