Chanters with only High D key ?

[glasba]

Hello,

I am curious why some old chanters had only 5th High D key mounted ?

I attached 2 photos: (the owner of these 2 photos is NPU Dublin)

https://imageshack.com/a/img923/4041/7cULP3.jpg - I can't find the original link on NPU website, but I think it is Brogan set!

http://pipers.ie/source/media/?galleryI ... diaId=7429 - Original link from NPU website
*** The owner of this set is Ronan Browne

Was this idea originaly just for the look of the chanter or it had some practical benefits? Usualy this is the last key anyone would put on the chanter since it is not as usable, but in these 2 examples it's the only key. Why? Any benefits of high D key in real life?

Thanks for comments!

[PJ]

On the first photo, I'm speculating but maybe there were other keys and they broke and were not replaced.

The second photo seems to be Ronan Browne's Kenna set. Don't know why it has only the hi D. Is it possible that there were other keys and that they broke, and somewhere along the line someone decided to file down the unused blocks?

[geoff wooff]

I think this keyed hole is not for a High D but an 'in tune' C# note in the low octave. The obtaining of several notes from the top front hole by cross fingerings often comes with compromises, so the adition of a key to overcome a problem note is a viable solution. It can, of course, also help to get the third octave D but I doubt that was its primary purpose.

I have seen other early chanters with just this one key. Certainly the first of your links shows a chanter that had several keys originally but the second link shows what looks to be an original with just that one key.

[Hans-Joerg]

Is that set on the first foty a Brogan-set? (John Brogan, Dublin, ca. turn of the last century) (over 100 years later than the Kenna)

BTW, I happen to have this (eb) Brogan-chanter that even has an eb-key (plus the hole, of course).

[JR]

Yep not sure it’s Brogan. The regulator ‘bobble’ keys were made in this style by both T. Kenna and later Egan.

[Hans-Joerg]

Hi Jason,
the baritone and the tenor reg seem not by Brogan but I´m pretty sure that the base is. Both Peter Browne and Neilidh Mulligan have Brogans. Compare.

[benoit trémolières]

Don't you think the C# is the most difficult note to get in tune with both opened and close playing?
Daniel Hervé made me noticed years ago that this apparently not very usefull key was present at the earliest stages of UP elaboration, and I always supposed it was added precisely when playing stule was more often switching from one way to another.

[rorybbellows]

I always supposed it was added precisely when playing stule was more often switching from one way to another.

Yes! I would agree 100% , and it just go to show that if you pursue things in the right ways it works out in the end. I have seen that so many time but only with the good ones.

RORY