Vanishing Bass Regulators

[geoff wooff]

Why “too easily”, Geoff? Do I conjure visions of Wooff basses rocketing out of position in a crowded session, skewering bodhrans and cleaving banjo heads? (A flat session of course).

Ah well, these slide off basses can be either too tight or not tight enough but the very idea of a flat session with Bodhrans and Banjos.... my word !!

[FlaminGalah]

Why “too easily”, Geoff? Do I conjure visions of Wooff basses rocketing out of position in a crowded session, skewering bodhrans and cleaving banjo heads? (A flat session of course).

Ah well, these slide off basses can be either too tight or not tight enough but the very idea of a flat session with Bodhrans and Banjos.... my word !!

Just trying to scandalise the laity…

[geoff wooff]

Ah well, these slide off basses can be either too tight or not tight enough but the very idea of a flat session with Bodhrans and Banjos.... my word !!
[/quote]

Just trying to scandalise the laity…
[/quote]

'Laity' ? If I knew what that meant I might be insulted..... but 'tis probably another name for a milky coffee.
Three quarters or Full, I don't mind as long as they are flat or narrow.... them loud feckers ain't for me.

[FlaminGalah]

Ah well, these slide off basses can be either too tight or not tight enough but the very idea of a flat session with Bodhrans and Banjos.... my word !!

Just trying to scandalise the laity…
[/quote]

'Laity' ? If I knew what that meant I might be insulted..... but 'tis probably another name for a milky coffee.
Three quarters or Full, I don't mind as long as they are flat or narrow.... them loud feckers ain't for me.
[/quote]

Sorry, that was a very niche liturgical reference. We say that whenever we use too much incense or too many candles or too much lace, or in any other way over egg the pudding at Mass. Hence my association of it with bodhrans and banjos- which would certainly over egg the pudding of a flat session. Sorry, crossed my extremely niche wires there…

[EDIT: I am not a priest, I just do a lot of ceremonial MC’ing]

I’m with you on the quietude.

[geoff wooff]

Soft , Purring Pipes is what the UP is all about for me.... Those CP's are getting far too loud.... trying to compete wih Accordions and Concertinas... no point.
My wife plays the Cabrette and that is one loud fecker and I found an accordeon that is loud enough to accompany it.... and I have a concertina that can be heard down the street in the next bar.... But gimme a purring flat set any day.

Now where were we... oh yep, three quarter sets.

[rorybbellows]

It's like a lover of apples explaining why he doesn't like oranges, there's not much point.

RORY

[ennischanter]

Soft , Purring Pipes is what the UP is all about for me.... Those CP's are getting far too loud.... trying to compete wih Accordions and Concertinas... no point.
My wife plays the Cabrette and that is one loud fecker and I found an accordeon that is loud enough to accompany it.... and I have a concertina that can be heard down the street in the next bar.... But gimme a purring flat set any day.

Now where were we... oh yep, three quarter sets.

Well said sir, knew I made the right choice gong the flat way.

[rorybbellows]

Horses for courses, it's perfectly natural that some people just don't "get" WB concert pitch , but one things for sure, if WBCP had not been developed Uilleann pipes of all pitches would be dead by now.

RORY

[geoff wooff]

Horses for courses, it's perfectly natural that some people just don't "get" WB concert pitch , but one things for sure, if WBCP had not been developed Uilleann pipes of all pitches would be dead by now.

RORY

I think that's perhaps a little too broad a brush stroke to say " all pitches would be dead by now" if WBCP had not been developed. Certainly the Taylors and Rowsomes took the Pipes in a new direction but some people still played in the old keys both on Pipes and other instruments , Clarkes and other Tin Whistles, one and two row boxes and concertinas. Other bagpipe types have recently been resurected, some just from paintings or sketches found in old books but I get your point. Many of us current devotees were encouraged by those famous bands from the 1970's.

[FlaminGalah]

Horses for courses, it's perfectly natural that some people just don't "get" WB concert pitch , but one things for sure, if WBCP had not been developed Uilleann pipes of all pitches would be dead by now.

RORY

I think that's perhaps a little too broad a brush stroke to say " all pitches would be dead by now" if WBCP had not been developed. Certainly the Taylors and Rowsomes took the Pipes in a new direction but some people still played in the old keys both on Pipes and other instruments , Clarkes and other Tin Whistles, one and two row boxes and concertinas. Other bagpipe types have recently been resurected, some just from paintings or sketches found in old books but I get your point. Many of us current devotees were encouraged by those famous bands from the 1970's.

Suppose there had been no Leo Rowsome, and so there was a great, gaping lacuna in pipe making, even just for a few years. In that case, given the great ‘bridging’ role that Seamus Ennis had in carrying the tradition across a generational and societal gap, playing a flat set, do you suppose the renaissance would have been in C and far quieter? Presumably wistful pipe makers, listening to Ennis and other recordings, fiddling in sheds, trying to nail that sound, would have emulated that best example, in the absence of half a dozen Leo sets in the hands of the world’s great late 20th century players. Did we get concert pitch as standard through Leo’s survivorship bias? Did we get Irish pipes as a band-compatible instrument in the first place because of that survivorship bias?

I’m with Geoff on flat sets, but I’d hate to see all Irish pipes in the ranks of the obscure and complicated French and Italian things like sordellinas: nominally resurrected but in so few hands as to be unobtainable. And yes I know we went through that already!

[rorybbellows]

Liam O Flynn , Paddy Maloney, Paddy Keenan, Davy Spillane, Titanic, Riverdance, Braveheart are the contributors to the international success of piping . The main stem of pipeing is WBCP all the other pitches are now just branches off the stem , without it they would not have grown ,just a dead leaf in the book of Irish culture.

RORY

[ennischanter]

Suppose there had been no Leo Rowsome, and so there was a great, gaping lacuna in pipe making, even just for a few years. In that case, given the great ‘bridging’ role that Seamus Ennis had in carrying the tradition across a generational and societal gap, playing a flat set, do you suppose the renaissance would have been in C and far quieter? Presumably wistful pipe makers, listening to Ennis and other recordings, fiddling in sheds, trying to nail that sound, would have emulated that best example, in the absence of half a dozen Leo sets in the hands of the world’s great late 20th century players. Did we get concert pitch as standard through Leo’s survivorship bias? Did we get Irish pipes as a band-compatible instrument in the first place because of that survivorship bias?

I’m with Geoff on flat sets, but I’d hate to see all Irish pipes in the ranks of the obscure and complicated French and Italian things like sordellinas: nominally resurrected but in so few hands as to be unobtainable. And yes I know we went through that already!

Although not as famous, Tommy Reck also had that magnificent B set.


Nevertheless, it is nice to see some highly respectable contemporary players, and young pipers playing flat setts. I notice a lot of Rogge B sets, Gleeson sets too.

[FlaminGalah]

Suppose there had been no Leo Rowsome, and so there was a great, gaping lacuna in pipe making, even just for a few years. In that case, given the great ‘bridging’ role that Seamus Ennis had in carrying the tradition across a generational and societal gap, playing a flat set, do you suppose the renaissance would have been in C and far quieter? Presumably wistful pipe makers, listening to Ennis and other recordings, fiddling in sheds, trying to nail that sound, would have emulated that best example, in the absence of half a dozen Leo sets in the hands of the world’s great late 20th century players. Did we get concert pitch as standard through Leo’s survivorship bias? Did we get Irish pipes as a band-compatible instrument in the first place because of that survivorship bias?

I’m with Geoff on flat sets, but I’d hate to see all Irish pipes in the ranks of the obscure and complicated French and Italian things like sordellinas: nominally resurrected but in so few hands as to be unobtainable. And yes I know we went through that already!

Although not as famous, Tommy Reck also had that magnificent B set.


Nevertheless, it is nice to see some highly respectable contemporary players, and young pipers playing flat setts. I notice a lot of Rogge B sets, Gleeson sets too.

This is my point- the fact that we had Ennis, Reck, and others make it long enough to have recordings and even video taken means that I don’t think it is quite as black and white as Rory makes this out. It would be more niche, but it wouldn’t be dead. I presume in such a world, alternative-universe-Geoff would still find a Harrington set miraculously un-destroyed and kick off a flat set renaissance. But it’s true that without Leo and the D-set band crowd, it would be smaller.

[rorybbellows]

So niche to be nonexistent. Other factors, would NPU be able to exist for a very limited number of pipers ? Would pipemakers be able to make a living from a very limited number of pipers ? How many pipers start on concert pitch sets and if they weren't there might not start at all ? How many pipers who play flat sets only do so as their second instrument ? How many of the bands of the seventies would not have been so successful if they didn't have a piper ?
Rhetorical questions I know , but you get the point.

RORY

[FlaminGalah]

So niche to be nonexistent. Other factors, would NPU be able to exist for a very limited number of pipers ? Would pipemakers be able to make a living from a very limited number of pipers ? How many pipers start on concert pitch sets and if they weren't there might not start at all ? How many pipers who play flat sets only do so as their second instrument ? How many of the bands of the seventies would not have been so successful if they didn't have a piper ?
Rhetorical questions I know , but you get the point.

RORY

Do you think it would be worse than where Northumbrian pipes are these days? That seems like an imperfect but relevant counterfactual. They too are quite complex to make, and traditionally play in their own key not very amenable to other instruments. They are a bit simpler and a bit cheaper to buy, as it happens, but are still expensive and fiddly compared to GHBs. And they made it through. I think flat pipes would have been in a similar place (which is sort of where they are now, as it happens!) Traditionally oriented, played by a dedicated but small group of people, and with a small list of makers supplying them. The NSPs made it through to the internet age despite the lack of big-hit bands carrying them.

Now, do I think that would be better? NO. Where I agree with Rory is that the widespread dissemination of Irish piping through the bands, through the session compatibility of D sets, through their accessibility and commercial relevance, mean that we have a bigger, wider community to draw from, and that is a good thing.