I accept it as a fact of life that there are people with money who become instrument hoarders. Sometimes these people are poor players and it's a shame that many fine instruments are kept out of the hands of good players.MadmanWithaWhistle wrote: When I attend (in the states) Irish music retreats, festivals, and the like, the hoarding of instruments I see is unbelievable.
But there are hoarders who are fine players! And their instrument collection is likewise out of the hands of others.
I was performing at an Irish festival and a guy came up after our set and started telling me about his whistle collection. From what he said he seemed to be up on every current maker and owned multiple whistles from all of them. And in my hand I had my entire D whistle collection, a 30 year old Feadog. (Which, in all likelyhood, could outplay anything in his collection.) I don't know if that guy played at all, actually.
In the Highland pipe world there's a very fine player, a piper in one of the world's top bands (SLOT), who must have a hundred sets, many of them covered with engraved silver, some bespoke, each set worth thousands. With the Highland pipes it takes some care and effort to keep two or three sets going well. I don't know how he has the time to maintain that many (if indeed they're all in playing condition).