2 medium length articles I posted on REC.MUSIC.MAKERS.BAGPIPE: ================== ================== Article 4210 of rec.music.makers.bagpipe: Path: magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!ddaye From: ddaye@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (David C Daye) Newsgroups: rec.music.makers.bagpipe Subject: Re: blowing Date: 5 Jul 1995 14:42:02 GMT In article <199506302045.NAA09963@vifa1.freenet.victoria.bc.ca>, Patrick B. Murphy wrote: > >A question for the list. I had ordered a Clanrye reed and shepherd drone >reeds from Jim Scott for an older [70] student who cannot seem to get the >wind to keep the pipes going. GHB should be capable of playing at almost any arbitrarily low pressure and air flow rate, especially for beginners who really don't need much better sound than a goose at this very early stage. I haven't seen a Clanrye reed but I've gotten cane chanter reeds incredibly easy by squeezing and scraping. Sure there's going to be some hole taping required; I don't even worry about overall pitch. This is all temporary. >the player and he is certainly dedicated so do not want to tell him after >two years of this to pack it in, so any ideas would be greatly appreciated. Yikes. People will give up, on their own, at most any time. But if we're talking a formal decision for reasons of skill, I really want this to happen *much* earlier than 2 years. Let's take the optimistic tack and assume the student's fingers and ears are ok (you did teach for plenty of time to find fatal shortcomings) and s/he otherwise promises to have an enjoyable hobby here. Assuming a pair of properly working lips and lungs (yes?), it must be possible to get an extremely easy starting-quality stand of reeds set up. I did this with my asthmatic wife, and incidentally although she's since given up piping, the dramatic improvement in her breathing seems to have held up. I'll go home tonight and take one of my substandard spare reeds, and take a water-tube pressure reading to see how low I can go after some serious reedslaughter. Bulletins as news happens! -- David Daye http://www-bprc.mps.ohio-state.edu/~bdaye/bagpipes.htm scot & uilleann Pipe & reed modification diagrams, sound files of Columbus Ohio USA GHB-A440, UP trad & silly, beginner finger tricks, ddaye@daye1.com and Sounds of Extra Terrier - estrial Intelligence. ================== ================== Article 4233 of rec.music.makers.bagpipe: Path: magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!ddaye From: ddaye@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (David C Daye) Newsgroups: rec.music.makers.bagpipe Subject: Re: blowing Date: 6 Jul 1995 13:09:16 GMT Setting up VERY easy reeds GHB--> In article <3te8bq$ker@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>, I wrote: >In article <199506302045.NAA09963@vifa1.freenet.victoria.bc.ca>, >Patrick B. Murphy wrote: >> >>.... an older [70] student who cannot seem to get the >>wind to keep the pipes going. > >GHB should be capable of playing at almost any arbitrarily low pressure >and air flow rate, especially for beginners > [....] >I'll go home tonight and take one of my substandard spare reeds, and >take a water-tube pressure reading to see how low I can go OK, my practice chanter is pretty easy, about 5-1/2" of water on one side of the u-shaped tube (11" total diff). It took me 10 minutes to set up a pipe chanter reed to the same strength so that I played the 4th part of "Little Cascade" on both practice chanter and pipe chanter at the same time (it's all top-hand notes). This pressure is so low that even my weak, skinny self has to be careful putting it into full pipes because of drone-weight effects on the bag. I can't even blow the wrinkles out of my cowhide with this reed. I don't know how I'd march with it. Tested the reed in Sinclair, Gibson, older Shepherd and '81 War-Mac chanters. The intervals were close enough for modest tape to fine tune and, rather surprisingly, the base pitch was in the 472-474 range these chanters were made for. The reed otherwise behaves and sounds like a normal chanter reed. If I were ill and had cause, I'd be happy to record with it at least for folk type ensemble. Gracenotes, basic tone and loudness balance are all musical if not the specific contest sound. From its behavior during the evening I'd expect a normal lifetime for it with appropriately careful handling. I'm going to keep it around. I got this strength by sanding away about half the existing blade thickness on the upper 2/3, and then squeezing the lower blade / upper staple area very hard to close the blade lips noticeably to restore some of the pitch which had naturally dropped like a stone from sanding. Now when you change a reed this much, it turns into an uilleann pipe reed which, fortunately, I have some experience playing. The top notes went horrendously flat which is readily restored with an adjustable bridle. I used thin (24 guage) copper wire, one turn round the thick lower part of the blades, 1/8" or 2 mm above the binding, pinched against the blade faces to help hold the lips close together. I see no reason why a complete GHB cannot be set up *easier* than a student's practice chanter, with a combination of sanding, pinching and bridling less critical than required for setting up an uilleann pipe reed. Once the reed blows in I would expect no need to adjust the bridle. I know this is rather out-of-orbit for military & contest playing but perhaps the prospect of getting reasonably musical bagpipe sound from featherpipes will be welcome news for pipers in old age or ill health. -- David Daye http://www-bprc.mps.ohio-state.edu/~bdaye/bagpipes.htm scot & uilleann Pipe & reed modification diagrams, sound files of Columbus Ohio USA GHB-A440, UP trad & silly, beginner finger tricks, ddaye@daye1.com and Sounds of Extra Terrier - estrial Intelligence.