Comparing Paddy Keenan,s Chanters

[nemethmik]

Don't know if this analogy is on track and at the risk of criticism.

Wow! This is great, I like it very much . Even if it might not be applicable for pipes, I would not care; I love your example, thank You John.
Miki

[Hans-Joerg]

I think there might be another very important problem. It has been mentioned here a few times but not "expressis verbis": The bore surface and it´s influence on the tone (and also performance). I think it quite obvious that different kinds of wood (porous wood, not metal or delrin) will "produce" different bore surfaces. A woodturner/woodworker of esteem will NOT use anything else but very sharp tools to produce good quality surfaces - which will vary from woodtype to woodtype. This especially goes for bore surfaces of woodwinds cause otherwise then by the reamer you can´t reach them anyway. Even a chanter bored with a "freshly" sharpened reamer might sound different to - lets say - No. 10 of the same wood.

[pancelticpiper]

Seems to me that Ted's experiment with all the chanters of various woods by the same maker is about as rigorously scientific as we are going to get, in all probability.

I had a related experience not too long ago: at another convention of the National Flute Association I got to play several wood headjoints made by a certain maker on the same silver Boehm flute body. Of course the exact cut of no two embouchure holes is identical; however, just as in Ted's experiment, the headjoints made of the same wood all had a certain commonality of tone and "feel" not shared by any of the headjoints made of any other wood, so that "blind" I could easily have sorted the headjoints correctly. Once again I suspect that with flutes the differences are more apparent to the player than to an outside listener.
Specifically, the boxwood gave a softer, rounder, more flexible tone (by flexible I mean that the pitch and timbre change easliy in response to changes in the player's embouchure) while ABW gave a brighter, louder, less flexible tone. My favourite was Cocobolo because it seemed to give the "darkest" timbre and had some of the flexiblity of boxwood but some of the projection of blackwood.

[uillmann]

After making many boxwood chanters and many blackwood chanters, I came to the conclusion that it was easier to make a mellower sounding reed for a blackwood chanter than it was to make a brighter sounding reed for a boxwood chanter. I usually enjoyed cutting through the sessiun noise like an ill tempered chainsaw, so I preferred the blackwood. Ultimately, I found that the predictable nature of box's instability, coupled with the time consuming aspect of trying to get a nice surface finish, led me to favor ABW. But opinions are like a holes - every chanter's got one.

[Patrick D'Arcy]

And the winning quote of the day goes to:

But opinions are like a holes - every chanter's got one.

Fecking classic! LOL!

Pat.

[Brazenkane]

I agree with you there but there is more to it than simply a slighlty different design. The whole thing feels different. I'm not about to trust any scientists either.... they only know what they know until they are convinced of something else. ... y'know, flat earth, sea monsters, global warming etc.

PD.

there's certainly some effen "sea monsters" on South Beach, so at least we know THAT is true! (God help us!:-)

[bradhurley]

As someone who's followed this argument umpty-bazillion-and-a-half times with respect to flutes, I would agree with the people who are saying that the finish of the bore (which is influenced by the type of wood) is probably the main factor at play in the differences we hear.

If you take the headjoint off a boxwood flute, point the body of the flute toward a light, and look down the bore, in most cases the bore will appear duller than that of a blackwood flute. The term "a dull bore" is redundant when used to describe people, but in this case it's appropriate. I have two blackwood flutes and a boxwood one and can vouch that the bore of the boxwood reflects less light. A blackwood flute's bore can have a nearly mirror-like finish.

My hunch is that the microscopically rougher finish of the boxwood bore creates more turbulence in the air column, making the sound more complex and perhaps less "pure." I hear it as almost a foggy quality compared with the more laser-beam tone of blackwood, although one can make a blackwood flute sound more complex by deliberately perturbing the bore with chambers, as was done by the makers Rudall and Rose, for example.

I also agree with those who say that the experiment necessary to prove/disprove that "materials don't matter" is probably impossible to perform. There is so much handwork involved in making chanters and flutes that you really can't make two identical instruments to do the test.

There was a famous experiment in which a researcher named Coltman made a wooden flute and then made a cast of it to produce an "identical" flute out of concrete. He played both flutes for an audience, who couldn't hear any difference between the two. It would have been better if the audience had been a sonogram machine; in fact I think he performed subsequent experments using sonagrams and similarly found no difference; he sent me his research papers years ago and I have them here somewhere. But I don't think that sets the matter to rest; it's quite possible that the concrete and wooden flutes had similar finishes in the bore and thus produced the same tone.

[pancelticpiper]

Brad, is your experience like mine, that boxwood flutes have a more responsive, flexible tone than blackwood? That it's easier to produce a bold, ringing, projecting tone on a blackwood flute?

All this makes me think that I should be playing a boxwood uilleann chanter as I love a darker, softer tone on pipes.

[bradhurley]

Brad, is your experience like mine, that boxwood flutes have a more responsive, flexible tone than blackwood? That it's easier to produce a bold, ringing, projecting tone on a blackwood flute?

All this makes me think that I should be playing a boxwood uilleann chanter as I love a darker, softer tone on pipes.

No, I wouldn't say that about boxwood flutes. Responsiveness and "flexibility" in tone are I think qualities that depend more on the embouchure hole and the individual player than the type of wood. And I know a few owners of boxwood flutes who produce a hard, focused, penetrating tone when they play. But I do think the "mellow" quality that many people ascribe to boxwood flutes (and chanters) has to do with an additional layer of complexity in the sound, maybe it boils down to more overtones or "turbulence" or just plain old magic, or maybe it's just our imagination, but I do feel that boxwood sounds different. Whenever I play a friend's blackwood Bb flute and then pick up my boxwood Bb flute, my girlfriend says the blackwood one sounds deeper even though they're tuned to the same note.

[waymer]

There was a famous experiment in which a researcher named Coltman made a wooden flute and then made a cast of it to produce an "identical" flute out of concrete. He played both flutes for an audience, who couldn't hear any difference between the two.

man, I wonder if I can cast a reed out of concrete?
The one I have now is really great but it won't last forever

[stew]

Without any doubt, hard & softwoods produce different resonances because of there fibre scructure, go and clank some different peices of wood together, and the penny will drop, it very simple understand.

[bradhurley]

Without any doubt, hard & softwoods produce different resonances because of there fibre scructure, go and clank some different peices of wood together, and the penny will drop, it very simple understand.

While I understand that this makes intuitive sense, by all accounts it is dead wrong. Flutes and chanters are not resonating instruments. If you were talking about guitar or violin soundboards that would be a different matter.

[billh]

Without any doubt, hard & softwoods produce different resonances because of there fibre scructure, go and clank some different peices of wood together, and the penny will drop, it very simple understand.

While I understand that this makes intuitive sense, by all accounts it is dead wrong. Flutes and chanters are not resonating instruments. If you were talking about guitar or violin soundboards that would be a different matter.

Quite right.

While it cannot be proven that materials do not affect woodwind tone, it is relatively simple to disprove most of the explanations put forward by non-acousticians regarding materials and woodwind tone production. The 'resonance' behaviors of wood do not enter into it - unlike the case of "soundbox" instruments like violins, guitars, pianos, etc., where resonance behaviors are paramount.

Unfortunately these sorts of misunderstandings often lead physicists to - unfairly - dismiss the claims of musicians and instrument makers regarding woodwind materials and tonal effects altogether.

[uillmann]

Luckily, if you want a different tone from your chanter, you can make another reed. Works every time. If, after numerous attempts, you are unable to find the desired timbre, it is likely that the chanter dimensions are to blame and not the species of tonewood.

[Murphdasurf]

Without any doubt, hard & softwoods produce different resonances because of there fibre scructure, go and clank some different peices of wood together, and the penny will drop, it very simple understand.

While I understand that this makes intuitive sense, by all accounts it is dead wrong. Flutes and chanters are not resonating instruments. If you were talking about guitar or violin soundboards that would be a different matter.

Quite right.

While it cannot be proven that materials do not affect woodwind tone, it is relatively simple to disprove most of the explanations put forward by non-acousticians regarding materials and woodwind tone production. The 'resonance' behaviors of wood do not enter into it - unlike the case of "soundbox" instruments like violins, guitars, pianos, etc., where resonance behaviors are paramount.

Unfortunately these sorts of misunderstandings often lead physicists to - unfairly - dismiss the claims of musicians and instrument makers regarding woodwind materials and tonal effects altogether.

I understand (I think) what you guys are saying, and I'll definitely defer
to the more experienced perspectives,but, if chanters and flutes weren't resonating instruments, you wouldn't hear them.

My question is: does the chanter have a dampening effect on the reed itself?
Or on the energy created by the reed?

This same type of question is debated by guitar players in reference to the non-resonating parts of the guitar. The saddle,nut, frets and choice of wood the fingerboard is made of have an effect on the sustain of the string and how the energy in the string is translated to the soundboard of the guitar.

I understand that chanters aren't supposed to resonate the same way a soundboard on a guitar does.

But that doesn't mean they don't....