The streets are alive.. with the sound of pipes

[Cayden]

DJM, this is about a blanket statement, I am wondering why the sound of piping is the way it is. As it I don't actually enjoy listening to the great majority of piping. iregret that because, let's face it, considering the time I have given to them, somewhere deep I must like the pipes.
I heard some piping this week I thoroughly enjoyed, both flat and concert.
But overall, I don't think with the current state of pipe/reedmaking (it's a general set-up issue) i don't think pipes sound their best.

That's one. Forgive me I drew the issue of plain awful pipes into this, maybe I should have left that alone but as it is, the thursday of the Willie Clancy week, the focus slips every now and again. BUT, when I hear a set of pipes that has the soft bottom D as the is proper one (as in the maker seems to intend you use that one)and the hard D as the fecking awful too sharp one, I think the pipemaker in question should have his tastebuds examined or that he really hasn't much of a clue. Yes I know, availability and all that but i don't think anyone should put up with something so essentially wrong as that.
Which pipemaker, I don't think it's relevant here, when you go out to buy a set of pipes you check for that sort of thing, you listen to sets made by a maker and preferably try them, and you'd avoid a maker whose instruments display such faults. Personally I hate having to listen to piping that is unnecessarily ruined by faulty pipes. I must have heard at least fifty odd concert chanters this week and it's sad there was only the one that sounded really well (there were a few more that were going quite well but none really stood out)

I don't think Billy Mccormack was playing a Cillian O Briain chanter, the head looked Taylor style ( couldn't see the rest) and the sound was unlike any O Briain chanter I ever heard.

[Patrick D'Arcy]

My concern is that most pipers I know are still purchasing whatever they can get their hands on, and can only go by input from more experienced pipers of what is good and what is not.

[snip]

Its not like you can wander down to the corner UP store and test-drive models by different makers. Many of us are lucky to get to hear more than two or three sets by any maker in person before buying

Isn't that what tionóil are for though? You can see and hear dozens of sets and in some cases, if your nice, give them a blast. Most tionóil have pipemakers attending also.... The SoCalPipers tionól for example That's www.SoCalPipers.com folks!

Patrick.

[Chadd]

Most tionóil have pipemakers attending also.... The SoCalPipers tionól for example That's www.SoCalPipers.com folks!

How would anyone know about our little gathering if Patrick had shame? Disaster narrowly averted, I tell you.

[djm]

The SOCalPipers tionól That's www.SoCalPipers.com folks!

Oo, what a giveaway!

There's only one tionól near me (and I had to "get in the right circle" to even learn it exists). I purchased my first set from Ireland only on say-so by others via e-mail. I had no opportunity to hear any pipes up close unless I wanted to wait 10 months for the next tionól. I must say that there are more tionóls now than there were when I started, but there's still a lot of us isolated pipers around who depend on others giving us the straight goods, and not unspecified criticisms that don't help direct us in our purchases. I would have been very happy to have been steered away from the maker of my first set, Robbie Hughes.

djm

[Jim McGuire]

I must say that there are more tionóls now than there were when I started, but there's still a lot of us isolated pipers around who depend on others giving us the straight goods, and not unspecified criticisms that don't help direct us in our purchases.
djm

You won't find direct criticism here on a forum like this because there is little point on being negative on almost anything life. One thing about the Irish pipes scene is that nothing is ever handed to anyone. You have an opportunity through tionols, e-mail, phone, in-person visits to find out the information you desire: who to hear playing the pipes, who makes the best reeds, who can reed up your chanter by x, who is the best maker without a decade long waiting list, etc. Who cares about the people not delivering the goods or what the situation really is?; one cares about the success stories.

While Germany is a long ways away, Tom Clarke told me that he was able to visit the Rogge workshop and try out 4 different proto/model chanters that enabled Tom to make his decision for his order. What a great service that Andreas is providing pipers!

[tommykleen]

Here's a picture of Billy circa March 2003. Pictured is his Cillian O'Briain chanter.



t

[Patrick D'Arcy]

There's only one tionól near me

That's more than most pipers can say! You have to travel to them. Hell or high water.. .get to the ones that have the pipers and pipe makers you want to hear. I have travelled all over the country and to Ireland just for this purpose. I would still be learning scales (well I still am) if I waited for a tionól to land on my doorstep!

What about the Toronto Chris Langan Tionól or the East Coast Tionól or the Seattle Tionól or the Al Purcell Tionól in Ann Arbour? And don't go giving me the "Canada is a big country" thing.... that's only an excuse.

Patrick.

[Joseph E. Smith]

You could always come down to Florida for the Tionol in February....uh...after attending the So. Cal affair.

Wouldn't it be an axcellent thing if Willie Week could be a world wide travelling event that would get its start in Milltown Malbay, and for the next 47 weeks travel around the rest of the world?

[The Sporting Pitchfork]

Yeah, but just think of all the dead session players it would leave in its wake.

Steve Scales? Didn't he used to play percussion with Parliament Funkadelic?

I think that there are certainly still quality control issues to be ironed out with a great many makers' pipes (and no, I'm not going to single out any in particular...names have been omitted to protect the guilty). There are very few makers I'm aware of that have a truly solid record of turning out very good- excellent stuff all the time. Everyone churns out a lemon at some point. What's disconcerting is when makers churn out a lemon and then sell it anyway.

Peter, are you sure Billy McCormick wasn't playing his O'Briain? His chanters could look sort of vaguely Taylorish from far away...Whatever it was, I wish I could have heard it.

Anyway, gotta agree with Alan on the whole O'Briain thing. I'm quite partial to them. I also really like the sound of some of the old Taylor and Patsy Browne chanters. The holes and bore seemed a bit smaller than some of the concert pitch chanters you see today. Really nice sound. It's a pity there aren't more makers interested in making chanters like that.

[Paul Reid]

I know that David has had a bad experience with the first set of pipes. An from what he's told me, yeah he may have had some bad luck with them. EVERY maker has had issues with perfection, so knock if off already. I'm going to rebut the Robbie Hughes slag, by going on record as being quite pleased with my chanter. I've had many compliments on the sound and responsiveness from my humble piece of wood. You could possibly leave this as a maker with 35 years of experience having some inconsistencies. Beyond yours, I have never heard of a bad remark. If I'm wrong then let me know. I get furiously annoyed with petty general slags.

[L42B]

Well what's being discussed hear is a bit of a pardicument for me. Being in Australia there are very few Uillean Pipers here. Let alone any in the region where I live. That's why I've found this forum usefull. I found two makers in Australia (via the NPU's site) and asked here about what people thought of the maker.

I settled on the SIMACK set (not anything against Adrian Jefferies http://www.irishpipes.net). Mainly because quiet few people contacted me about Ian's sets and have said good things about them. The other reason is that he offered me a good price for a full set. Verry few had a Jefferies set (that does not neccessarily mean there bad).

It would be good if sites like Uillean Obsession or Piping Club sites might have reviews on different pipes and some sound clips. That way it would make it easier for isolated wona-be-pipers to make a decission on a maker.

L42B

[sturob]

I can completely understand what Peter's talking about, though. I think it's interesting that we'd consider it at all acceptable for people who live in Irish-music vacuums to buy something like a set of pipes and teach themselves. I know, here come the flames, but seriously. Who'd spend $5000 on a mail-order oboe and then teach himself how to play it? Would anyone take that person seriously? Probably not. We're starting with a VERY different standard with piping . . .

And actually, with uilleann piping in particular, perhaps. I don't know of any (though doubtless there are) people out there who've taught themselves GHB (Rufus Harley not withstanding). I guess I'm digressing into the whole teach-yourself vs. take-lessons/be-around-the-tradition thing, and pipemaking is the question at hand . . . so I apologize.

Let me also say that L42B's post appeared while I was posting, and I don't mean this as an attack on self-taught pipers. HONESTLY. I'm just voicing an opinion/observation.

I'll go so far as to say that I think there are at least two huge camps as to how a set of uillean pipes should sound. I'm aghast at how sets by some big-name makers sound up close, let alone on recordings. Some people seem to like the growling, garbage-disposal-esque drones people are churning out these days. I like sweet drones. I realize it's a taste thing, but yeesh.

I frequent the flute board, and there are always folks who want people to post sound clips of flutes to make a decision on what to buy. I kind of dislike the idea for pipes, but I abhor the idea for an instrument with an embouchure. But every time I make a comment about how the sound bytes mean nothing (since flute tone is SO player-dependent), I get shot down.

I guess I just needed to rant! Listen to me! I need some lithium or something.

And I just edited the message AGAIN because I didn't know that L42B had posted about sound clips. WOW! Talk about syzygy. I really don't mean this as a personal attack on L42B. Again, yeesh! But interesting that two of us would post such diametrically opposed messages at the same time.

Perhaps L42B is my nemesis! I always wanted a nemesis! L42B, do you prefer the title of nemesis, arch-rival, or (a personal favorite) arch-enemy?

Stuart

[Patrick D'Arcy]

But every time I make a comment about how the sound bytes mean nothing (since flute tone is SO player-dependent), I get shot down.

I am with you on this Stu. I don't see any practical purpose other than to prove the set or flute can be played in tune. It isn't representative of the instrument it is only representative of the moment and then there is sound quality loss due to it not being live etc. The reed set up has everything to do with how a set will play and the recording won't even represent that properly. It is impossible to get an honest aural reproduction of a set of pipes especially without using professional recording equipment at a high bitrate. The person playing the set will have an even bigger influence on the set's sound and whether it's in tune and playing at the right pressure for the reed set up... am I repeating myself?

Patrick.

[L42B]

Dear Sturob

I guess we all need to have a rant at some stage in live. In no way was I offended by your post, apology accepted . Still friends?

Sincerely, L42B

[The Sporting Pitchfork]

It is pretty interesting how so many people in the UP world are self-taught. Some of the very best players out there have been largely self-taught. Then again, with some of these people, they've had a lot of previous experience with another instrument, such as whistle, flute, GHB, NSP, etc., so the learning curve may not be quite so steep.

Stuart, there's at least one other person on the flute board that agrees with you.

I think someone on the flute board made the rather perceptive comment some time ago that (North) Americans in general tend to be far too concerned about small technicalities in instrument design rather than the bigger picture of practicing, practicing, and...10 minute break...more practicing to get the particular sound they're looking for. For those of you who don't read the flute board, there certainly are queries from time to time on the order of, "Well, A's Rudall and Rose-style flutes have this kind of tone and B's Pratten-style flutes have this kind of tone and Seumas X plays one of B's Pratten flutes and that's the kind of tone that I want, etc., etc,"

Okay, fair enough. I don't really go in for that sort of stuff as much any more. Once I was at a flute workshop with Conal O Grada and someone had brought this lovely old baroque flute. She was passing it around and all these people were making these very quiet, genteel noises on it, cause that's the way baroque flutes are supposed to sound, right? Then Conal picks it up and starts goin' completely balls-to-the-wall crazy with it. It certainly wasn't as loud as the flute he normally plays, but holy s**t! My jaw nearly hit the floor.

Okay...back on topic. What were we talking about again? Oh yeah, we were on a bit of a quality control kick, weren't we? I really don't like the idea of a review system for pipes for a number of reasons.

Pretty much all of this has been thoroughly covered before but, hey, I'm on a roll here.

1.) What sounds like a slice of heaven to one person may not sound good at all to someone else. I like Cillian O Briain's pipes. Padraig Y or Bertrand Z may think O Briain pipes have all the tonal subtlety of an ambulance siren. Who's right? Who cares?

2.) It's all about the reed (and how you play the reed). Sometimes your reed doesn't work right. This might be the reed's fault. It might be your fault. It could be somewhere in between. You could take your seemingly faulty set to say, Liam O'Flynn, he'd play 'em a bit and say "Well, they're working fine for me. What sort of problems do YOU seem to be having with them." (Something along these lines happened with me and my Highland pipes once...how embarrassing). I've had three different reeds in my chanter. Each one has sounded distinctly different. Granted, the chanter still sounds "O Briain-esque" on the whole, but each different reed has had its good points and bad points. The one in there right now sounds (to my ears, anyway) pretty mellow.

3.) If it isn't about the reed, then maybe the bore of your chanter isn't half the bore it used to be. This sort of gets back to what I said in my last post about a lot of otherwise reputable makers every so often churning out a lemon. DJM had a bad experience with a Robbie Hughes chanter. Paul Reid seems very pleased with his. Has Mr. Hughes, in his long history as a pipemaker occasionally produced a sub-par product? Maybe. A lot of makers have. If you have doubts about the pipes that you are playing, then all the more reason to make the effort to get to a tionol or some such gathering, and if nobody there can get your pipes to work right, then send 'em back to the maker pronto. Most makers are eager to avoid bad stuff about their products making the rounds. If the maker won't fix it/replace it/refund your money, then maybe you can consider calling up Uncle Luca and da boys over in Philly.

Of course, if you get a set of pipes and the bore hasn't been reamed out very well, or the keywork is really shoddy or the tenor drone disintegrates in your hands, that's one thing. I don't think an elaborate review system is necessary to cover stuff like that. By and large, most pipes out there work. Some take a lot of additional work to get them to work, but most make noise that is fairly uilleann pipe-ish in character. Most everything else is a matter of personal taste.