Varela gaitas

[Nic]

I have a possibility to buy a gaita in C from master maker Antonio Varela and have some questions, the actual owner never played it so hé can't tell me about the fingering and the range. I know there is 2 drones and it is in mint state as it has never been played and was buy directly from the maker 2 years ago, but the seller lives at 2000km from my house, so here's my questions:
- Does all the Valera gaitas have 1,5 octave ?
- Are they half close fingering ?
- Is the chanter chromatic ?

Nic

[pancelticpiper]

I could be wrong, but my understanding is that Anton Varela makes ordinary Galician gaitas, which use the standard modern Galician fingering (open fingering somewhat like that of the recorder) and can go up a few notes into the 2nd octave. Yes it's mostly chromatic like ordinary Galician punteiros.

[Geraint]

I have a boxwood Varela gaita in Do. I'd agree that essentially it's an 'ordinary Galician gaita' as far as fingering goes. As far as getting 1.5 octaves out of it, it partly depends on your reed - I've got an old reed somewhere that will play nearly 2 octaves, but the I wouldn't answer for the tuning of musical quality in the upper octave. I'd be generally happy to use the top D, and then (depending on reed) more or less reluctant to use the E or F.

However, I believe that Varela has made chanters designed to work with half-closed fingering - the fella I bought mine fingered it thus, it, and added a hole for the R Thumb to flatten the third - which I obtain by cross fingering (and cover the thumb hole)

If you need to be absolutely sure, I'd suggest you get in touch with the maker himself to see if he can help out.

[anima]

Should be standard Galician open fingered, 1.5 octave with right reed. 1.2 with stiffer reed.

[O_Gaiteiro_do_Chicago]

Anton makes very good instruments for the price. My C set from him would always easily play to F. He makes either open or closed fingering and also makes some replicas of historical examples. My guess is that the set for sale is open fingering.