How to leard to blow the bag

[Glenarley]

Pancelticpiper
Thanks for the picture and I acknowledge the gentle backhander for my brusk turn of phrase.
I stand by my view that the tone extenders look like crap, they do. The PM in the picture is made to look a little low rent by his PS and the trailing piper because they managed to tune their drones through reed skills, no gimmicks needed.
The PM is probably a fine piper as he looks relaxed, his blowpipe in in the center of his mouth and his head is nice and straight. His shoulders are back and his drones are well placed on his shoulder and his chanter is well out in front and fairly vertical, he has been instructed in good technique and appearance, no question. I feel he ruins his strengths with those cheap gimmicks on the end of his drones and being a military type band, not a serious competition band, he would be playing Bb pitch more often than not, so why not learn how to set the pipes to be fit for purpose? I think he sends the wrong message by using gimmicks.
While the PM in this picture may be an exceptionally fine piper, it does not automatically follow that he is also a fine technician. The best race car drivers usually have the best mechanics working for them in the same way Eric Clapton would send his guitars to his most trusted repairer when they needed to be altered or repaired, as fine a player as he is, I doubt he would do his own technical modification and repairs.

On your second point about reeds, thank you for supporting my views. You are lucky to have access to a reed maker who can also do your bands reed supply and setting. This is a dying skill and I can only hope for the sake of the craft that this reed maker is open and helpful with his/her skills and knowledge.
There is a TV interview with Richard Park from FMM where he discusses the importance and value of a good reed setter. At the time of the interview, the reed setter he was referencing had since passed away but it is interesting to hear a piper of Park's skill and knowledge speak so highly of his departed reed setter and just how important such a person was to the success of FMM.
I freely acknowledge your experience with multiple instruments and your extensive understanding of music theory, your grey hair and wrinkles give you plenty of high ground on me so I am not wanting to get into a spitting contest with you. I have pipers from beginner to grade 1 visit me to resolve technical issues and the single biggest stumbling block is a lack of technical information about their instruments, reed skills, something that was drummed into us when we were learning but seldom the focus with today tutors.
Are you able to name your reed maker/setter for others that may be in your part of the woods?

Cheers

_G

[Glenarley]

Tone and sheep skin bags, (again)!

I have previously posted my experiences with bag and tone and still, I get many questions sent to me based on allegedly authoritative statements from alleged “experts”.

The following posts are from a bagpipe forum and are examples of what I feel is the total misinformed hogwash some feel compelled to post in an effort, I feel, to allow some in the GHB mob to beat their chests and claim some level of elitism and expertise.

In my previous post I explained the extensive testing we did and the consultant I use for technical concepts and data has a degree in mechanical engineering and a PhD in Acoustics with some 45 years’ experience in his chosen fields. He does not have a dog in this fight so I believe his views are objective and well informed.

To address the posts sent to me I have not listed all those sent as I feel there is no point in making the readers dumber for the experience of reading all of them.

The following are the main focus of the thread and my final comments addressing this issue follow.

Piper1 states:
“I have been hearing lately that the use of sheep skin bag is coming back. It is often associated with the "tone" quality. One piper said " it makes the pipes come alive" compared to synthetic or even cow hide. This seems strange to me as I assumed it was the wood that made the tone. Any experience with a tonal improvement from a sheep skin bag? Any idea why?”

Piper2 adds:
For years, I did not believe that the bag had a relationship to tone and other sound-related qualities. I figured that's a function of the reeds, the drone material/characteristics, etc. BUT...I am now a believer. I finally decided to put on a sheepskin bag (Lee & Sons), based in part on the P/M's talk about his bag (Begg, I think). Anyway, installed, using the very same drone reeds, there was an immediate and obvious difference in sound. Bold, balanced, and just impressive. I played my pipes for band members who have heard my drones before; and all agreed that there was a very obvious difference. Now several are thinking of changing to sheepskin.
The only experience I can add is that I had immediate problems with my drone reeds (Kinnaird Edge) on strike-in and cuts. It was many days of adjusting them to accommodate the difference in bag and strike-in. But the trouble was worth it for the sound. As for the feel of the bags (e.g., feeling alive), I feel a difference; but I need more time to determine that, as the bag will change over time (e.g., stretches). If you're after the best sound you can get, I'm now a fan.

Piper3 chimes in with”
“Having played on every main style of bag - synthetic, hybrid, cowhide, goatskin, and sheepskin, I can definitely say that my pipes have been their best in sheep.”
“Maybe it’s because I’m a better piper now than I was when I used synth/hybrid, but my pipes are easier in sheep and they sound fuller.”

Piper4 then states:
“I'm generally pretty sceptical about "tone" and the claims made for various things in relation to it, but whatever the explanation, a sheepskin bag makes a real and positive difference.”

“I do think part of that is the stability it brings in terms of moisture, but there is without doubt a tonal change.”

Piper5, a real pearl:
“I cannot claim to understand why, but I definitely hear better and richer tone when playing a sheepskin bag. Harmonics? No bag is better for that; I both hear and feel harmonic frequencies from sheepskin that I don't experience from other bag types.”

“Sheepskin can also resonate other secondary sounds. A recent curious event seems to add credence to this. Two nights ago the outside tenor top on an old Henderson pipe - recently rehemped - was slightly loose from usage compression of the new hemp. I could detect a leak, so I corked everything, and at full bag pressure I heard a clear, bell-like ringing inside the bag. I thought I had a bag leak until I tracked down the problem. There was no doubt that the bag was somehow capturing and resonating the tone that was originating at the tuning slide of the outside tenor drone.”

“There are other benefits to using sheepskin bags. The moisture control is superior to anything else I've played, and I've tried about all types of bags. It's not just moisture capture, but more like evenly controlled distribution of moisture through the instrument.”

My response to the points raised above.

Looking at the history of the GHb we find that sheep skin was used because there were a lot of sheep in Scotland so sheep hides were cheap and plentiful. In this same period, cow hide was a premium material for everything from shoes to saddles and out of the cost range for Scottish piper’s bags. Cow hide bags were the premium GHB bag material if you could afford it but being Scottish, deep pockets full of gorse, the cheap sheep skin option was the most common choice, inferior to cow hide but more affordable.

The GHB bag is an air reservoir that allows continuous airflow to the pipe reeds and does not/cannot add to the tone exiting from the drones and chanter. Because the bag is firmly captured between the piper’s arm and ribs, it is “impossible” for the bag to provide any vibrance.

Piper1 is correct in believing the tone is a result of the reeds and drones/chanter design and material and nothing to do with the bag and therefore askes a fair question.

Where Piper2 states “there was an immediate and obvious difference in sound. Bold, balanced, and just impressive.”, I feel he is just proving the children’s story “The Emperor’s New Clothes” by Hans Christian Andersen is not just a tale. This bloke spent $400 on a bag and I feel he does not want the world to know a fool was just separated from his money. And all the other suck-holes in his band do not want to be the kid that said “look, the emperor has no clothes on”.

Further to being duped out of his money, I feel Piper2 has further demonstrated that he has no real understanding of how the drones work and that he has very limited reed skills, if any. How dumb does a piper have to be to believe the bag material is going to have a direct effect on how the reeds strike-in and shut off? This just proves that the GHB mob are the Uilleann pipers’ poor cousins, or worse.

Piper3 thinks a sheep skin bag sounds “fuller”. Such an unsupported subjective comment says plenty about Piper3, I feel clueless and skill less are applicable.
Piper4 is just another one of the sheeple playing follow the leader. “a sheepskin bag makes a real and positive difference” and “there is without doubt a tonal change”. No supporting audio data or evidence-based support, just subjective cods wollop that makes no real sense.

And then we have Piper5. I only included a couple of the sentences as to read as I feel to read the entire post would just make the reader dumber. “I both hear and feel harmonic frequencies from sheepskin that I don't experience from other bag types”. My consultant has equipment that could hear a mouse burp at 10 paces and display the results in a graphic and Piper5’s comments had him shaking his head. And if that statement was not cods wollop, when Piper5 states “Sheepskin can also resonate other secondary sounds. A recent curious event seems to add credence to this”, I am left to wonder if some sort of calming substance was not consumed just before this “curious event” added the credence.

As in my previous post on bag materials, the blind testing and the software proved the bag material does not offer a “tone” enhancement to the GHB.
In our testing, the Gannaway cow hide bag was the most preferred and not because of tone but because of the feel and shape.

Because some legends in their own lunchtime want to see their baseless comments in public forums, I feel there are going to be pipers parting with a significant amount of money only to be sadly disappointed for following such poor advice.

The most complex bagpipe in the world is the Uilleann pipe and, because of the complexity of this instrument and the bag control required to play in tune across 2 octaves, if bag material in a bagpipe was ever going to be critical to getting a good tone, the Uilleann pipers would know about it. Uilleann pipe bags are varied in construction and design yet, in the hands of a competent skilled piper, a more harmonic tone from a bagpipe cannot be produced, in my view.
Now, compare the Uilleann pipe to the crude construction and music scale of the GHB. There is no comparison.

If those that state there is an amazingly obvious tonal quality from a sheep skin bag that no other bag can provide, it should be very easy to prove such and provide objective evidence, and yet, no one has.

Do these sheep skin bag proponents actually realise that historically, sheep skin bags were the poor mans alternative to cow hide, and not for any subjective magical tone benefit. Cow hide is a far more durable hide, able to be split thinner making it more supple while still being fit for purpose. Because sheep skin is split much thicker than cow hide, it can stiffen up a lot sooner than cow hide if not regularly manipulated and conditioned.

Look at two leather coats, one sheep skin and one cow hide. Now choose one to protect you against cold and abrasion while riding your motor cycle. Every way you look at the bag material issue there is no evidence to support these elitest views.

Has every Gold Medal Piping winner only played with a sheep skin bag? Has there ever been a Gold Medal Piping champion that won the gong and did not play with a sheep skin bag?

I place these comments in the same bucket as those that would like you all to believe that a Red Ferrari goes faster than the exact same model in Blue. It’s right up there with unicorn teeth.

My closing advice is, don’t listen to bulldusters in big hats. Don’t waste your money on subjective cods wollop. If you want to play and sound better than you currently do, spend your money on tuition, preferably a tutor that does not share the view that your bag material is the ultimate solution to good tone. Tuition also lasts a lifetime.

Cheers

-G

[Glenarley]

Reeds and Cold Weather

The inquiring piper (IP) asking me about this issue is in Canada somewhere near Niagara Falls where the daytime temperature is often below Zero all day in the winter.

When he plays in below freezing temperatures, he informs me that both his chanter reed and drone reeds shut of after a few minutes of piping.

This is not a mystery as it is just 101 physics, something that is very easily explained and expected in the conditions. What is a mystery is the codswallop being fed to him to stop this situation happening. It’s like someone telling you they can hold back the tide but refusing to explain how they can do it.

IP has been told to use a special blow pipe moisture trap, an in bag moisture control system (silica gel or kitty litter), harder chanter reed, forcefully open the chanter reed and then use a bridle to close it back down, special drone reeds that are moisture proof and so on. The only thing not suggested was a handful of magic beans. None of these offered solutions actually address the problem so they will not work satisfactorily. Magic beans will not out trump physics, such is life.

Almost all the offered solution requires IP to be separated from some of his money.

There was this humidi-cap reed cover that was, for a while, being pushed as the panacea for controlling chanter reed moisture using one of those Boveda saturated salt sachets and a $2.00 digital display. We tested and had an independent engineer test the device and even though the physics did not support the maker’s claims, and the actual test numbers would not support the maker’s claims, the maker used testimonies from pipers as his evidence that the devices worked as claimed. When the maker of the humidi-crib reed cap was asked to provide actual test numbers, he refused and insisted that the testimonies from pipers out trumped physics and facts, similar to what’s happening in this cold piping issue, same tune, different violin.

What IP is encountering is called condensation. Breathe a full breath onto a glass window on a 30 deg Celsius day and see how much condensation is visible on the glass, next to nothing now, do the same on a 5 deg C window and there will be so much condensation on the glass, a drip could form and dribble down the glass. This is what IP is experiencing and it is called physics and no amount of magic beans will be able to change this.

The piper’s warm breath is being blown up a very cold drone pipe so the warm breath condensates on the cold wall of the drone bore. The condensation builds up to the point that it turns into a dribble that runs down the drone to the reed. Once at the reed, the droplets of moisture interfere with the operation of the reed. With the chanter reed the same situation is happening only the moisture gathers around the reed in the reed stock cavity with the same effect as in the drone reed once the condensation build-up reaches the chanter reed.

The blowpipe moisture trap is not going to fix this issue however, taking the chanter out of the stock between tunes to flick out any moisture will help the chanter reed operation but this does not help the drone reeds. A moisture control system may give a couple of minutes relief as in the initial startup, the bag and moisture control system may have a very short heat exchanger effect which may strip out most of the heat in the breath for a minute or two, depending on the temperature. After this initial delay, the warmer breath will contact the cold drone bore and start producing copious amounts of condensation.

A harder reed is the dumbest thing you should do because this would also require the drone reeds to be harder which in turn, will require higher pressure, therefore more, warm air to drive them, more air – more condensation. The person that suggested this has probably never played in cold climates or bunked science class at school either way, a softer setup will use less air and may prolong the playable period providing the piper has the skills to play a soft setup.
While nothing will circumvent physics, there are some things that I am told will help. Here in Australia my opportunities to test cold environments is limited and even in the Uni cool room or the bottle shop cool room, I am not going to get below zero.

Cane drone reeds do not have the same flat surface where the tongue contacts the reed like synthetic drone reeds so the ability for moisture to get between the tongue and the reed body are greatly reduced with the cane reed. The cane reed tongue is cut very close to the end of the reed so the moisture does not have a large head space for moisture to accumulate as is the case with most synthetic reeds. A Kiwi piper I know uses cane drone reeds in the frosty conditions and he treats the cane with a waterproofing chemical used by wood turners. He told me he gets a prolonged trouble-free playing time using this methodology because the moisture runs off the reed more freely.

We make our own drone reeds without headroom below the slot and while we have not rigorously tested them in the very cold weather, the results are encouraging. We came to this conclusion by winding the tuning screws all the way in on Ezee drone reeds till the screw was level with the tongue slot thereby removing the head space and as this seemed to work, we then developed the drone reeds we provide. We used the older model Ezee reeds that used the tuning screw without the hole drilled into it.

Another piper I have heard from in NZ used to put a couple of hotties in his pipe bag to keep his pipes warm when playing in frosty conditions. After he played the coffin in he would put his pipes back into the warm bag and take them out again just before piping the coffin out. He said by doing this he avoided having pipes stop in cold conditions. I am only parroting as I have not tried this at all.

At the end of the day, you are dealing with a bagpipe. A rather simple instrument by design with many variables able to affect the way it operates.

If you are going to play the GHb in freezing conditions you need to improve your odd against physics. Play a soft setup if you have the ability and play with drone reeds that have no head space and will allow moisture to more freely run into the bag space. Remove the chanter between tunes where possible so you can let the accumulated moisture in the stock run out and flick the moisture from the reed at the same time.

Most importantly, avoid buying unproven gimmicks, it will only end in financial loss and tears.

Cheers

-G

[Glenarley]

Tone and Sheep Skin Bags (yet again).

I was done with this subject because all that needed to be stated had been, or so I thought!

I have been sent many emails with testimonials supporting sheep skin bags but not a single piece of tangible, objective data so I only replied to the emails directly, until this gem came along.

“There's a lot in this thread about sheepskin bags giving better tone, but don't forget too that sheepskin bags tend to result in a volume boost as well.”

I found the forum thread to be sure this paragraph was not sent to me out of context, and it wasn’t.

This comment will now be on my “nose tapping – Black arts” list of the dumbest things I have ever read about the GHB. Right up there with sterling silver staples and dry climate chanters.

Do none of these Sheeple know about Jack Lee? A piper and business man that I have great respect for. Jack Lee makes very high-quality pipe bags from different dead animal skins. I wonder what the unicorn farmers in the above mentioned thread will say when they are informed that the “Premium Sheep Skin” bag made by Jack Lee is a natural skin hybrid? Their bums will snap shut so tight they will squeak.

For all the hoopla, I have never read or heard of anyone providing evidence of a superior tone quality from a sheep skin bag over other hide bags. The unicorn farmers may disagree but there is no better or worse when arguing a subjective preference. Just dumb, dumber and dumbest!

This is also why you have never seen the unicorn farmers having pipers submit to objective blind testing. They don’t want to have their britches pulled down, that’s why.

As I have said so many time before, these unicorn farmers with their Black Arts are ruining the GHB craft because the poor uninformed, through ignorance and a will to succeed, go out in the forest looking for unicorns, only to fail and give up the craft as a result.

It is just a crying shame.

Cheers
-G