How pipes look.

[Paul Reid]

Sorry Peter, you know I think I was rally thinking Kenna but wrote Egan. My mistake!!

[djm]

I'm going from memory (I'll have to find the cassette) but didn't Pat McNulty get a set of Egan pipes in C from a museum in Edinburgh, reed it up and record a few tracks on it for his album Autumn Apples?

Yes, the notes to "Autumn Apples" say he used an Egan C set borrowed from the Scottish Museum of Antiquities, Edinburgh. He recorded:
Track 2 - Air: An Boherin Buide (The Little Yellow Road)
Track 7 - Jig: Ragan's
Track 10 - Reel: The Lightning Flash
Track 13 - Air Slan le Maighe

djm

[PJ]

His is very much the style of the old uns not surprising really as he was a founding member of NPU and has been playing for 51 years it was pure delight last night.

His style of regulator playing sounds to me like that of Leo Rowsome.

[oliver]

His style of regulator playing sounds to me like that of Leo Rowsome.

I agree. Have you read Pat's interview (somewhere on the web, I'll try to post the link if I remember) in which he was very very critical toward the younger generation of pipers ?
Back to topic, I also agree with Peter, seems to me that look and sound go together.

[Uilliam]

Sorry Peter, you know I think I was rally thinking Kenna but wrote Egan. My mistake!!

So don't we count or something thats PJ DJM and mesel for our contributions to your mishtake
Uilliam

[PJ]

Have you read Pat's interview (somewhere on the web, I'll try to post the link if I remember) in which he was very very critical toward the younger generation of pipers ?

http://www.folkmusic.net/htmfiles/inart724.htm

[tommykleen]

Over the years I have tried to sample all the meats of our uilleann pipe design stew. And although I have admiration for much of the work of earlier masters (Wooff's Harrington is spot on), my tastes of late have moved more to the Taylor-inspired camp, although I find that some of the works of the early Taylor-inspired folks seemed to have lost some of the balance that The Brothers featured in their instruments. You might say I dated Rowsome: married Taylor. I also prefer arts-and-crafts bungalows to victorians, and the parthanon to the pantheon so you can see where I'm coming from.

t

[oliver]

Thanks for the link PJ !

[Uilliam]

His style of regulator playing sounds to me like that of Leo Rowsome.

I agree. Have you read Pat's interview (somewhere on the web, I'll try to post the link if I remember) in which he was very very critical toward the younger generation of pipers ?
.

I don't think he was very very critical at all...he was and still is saying what needs to be said and I am 100% wi him.Na why be mean I'm 200% wi him
Uilliam

[Hans-Joerg]

Ultimately, beauty is in the eye of the beholder..but at some level...ugly is just ugly.

Comes to that that 21st century man´s aesthetical conception is destroyed on purpose. There is this unhealthy overproportionality of straight lines, squares and "crying colours" while the human body has none of these. We are not aware of the aesthetical crimes of our surroundings any longer and that going into a supermarket is an aesthetical horror trip.

In terms of pipes: All this did not exist in the days of Kenna, Egan, Harrington or the Taylors and their customers knew very well what they wanted (they had enough other problems). Very few modern makers are able to copy their stile.

Cheers,
Hans

[billh]

Ultimately, beauty is in the eye of the beholder..but at some level...ugly is just ugly.

Comes to that that 21st century man´s aesthetical conception is destroyed on purpose. There is this unhealthy overproportionality of straight lines, squares and "crying colours" while the human body has none of these. We are not aware of the aesthetical crimes of our surroundings any longer and that going into a supermarket is an aesthetical horror trip.

In terms of pipes: All this did not exist in the days of Kenna, Egan, Harrington or the Taylors and their customers knew very well what they wanted (they had enough other problems). Very few modern makers are able to copy their stile.

Cheers,
Hans

This is a very interesting observation and I think right on target.

There aren't that many models for this sort of human-proportioned design in our 21st century environment. There are some examples, but even the "best" modern industrial design is based on an aesthetic that isn't very "naturalistic", it's much more mineral than animal or vegetable in its basis.

Even the (supposedly) nice ergonomic modern examples of "human-centered design" express an aesthetic that is at odds with pipes. How many people really want their pipes to look like iPods and mobile phones? Or even "Danish Design" kitchenware (though I think at least this would make more aesthetic sense than most of our environment nowadays).

Especially if we're playing music rooted in the 18th and 19th centuries on instruments from the same era, a modern visual aesthetic is jarring. Traditional designs in their heydey tend to become human-centric via a sort of 'natural selection' I think, and the Coynes, Kennas, and their contemporaries would have been surrounded by everyday items of long-standing heritage (along with lots of Industrial Age novelties - after all, the 19th century in cities like Dublin and Edinburgh was certainly the 'modern' period).

We sometimes joke about less-refined chanter designs as looking "like furniture" or even plumbing, but the fact is that furniture and plumbing fof the 18th and 19th century gentry (who were likely the majority of customers buying new instruments from Coyne, Kenna, Harrington,etc.) was pretty visually elegant. Even from the "Victorian" period I've seen some exposed pipework that looked like sculpture.

Bill

[Cayden]

Interesting bit of trivia maybe, Geoff once went to Cork so seek out Hannover st where Denis Harrington was based and found a church tower near it the shape of which closely mirrored the frilly design of the Bass reg top of his harry set.

[Joseph E. Smith]

Interesting bit of trivia maybe, Geoff once went to Cork so seek out Hannover st where Denis Harrington was based and found a church tower near it the shape of which closely mirrored the frilly design of the Bass reg top of his harry set.

That's a cool little insight into the mind of Harrington.

This is my bass reg cap (the regs are still under construction), it is based off of a Harrington set. Is it the same Harrington set being discussed here?

[billh]

Interesting - that's very reminiscent of Geoff's Harrington bass reg cap, but it's certainly not a "copy" in the literal sense - a number of elements differ. Could be from another Harrington (though I don't know of anything exactly like it).

Bill

[Joseph E. Smith]

Interesting - that's very reminiscent of Geoff's Harrington bass reg cap, but it's certainly not a "copy" in the literal sense - a number of elements differ. Could be from another Harrington (though I don't know of anything exactly like it).

Bill

David copied it from (I believe ) a photo of a Harrington bass reg cap, though he did not specify who the owner was. Perhaps, David if you're reading this, you could provide us with a little more information.