“I think that perhaps a poll, much like sports mvp awards are awarded is warranted (sports writers vote and the most #1 votes wins). I will begin a new thread which over a passage of time (until it drifts into obscurity, say a few weeks) will ask this question: name the top 10 living pipe makers and then the top 5 of all time, in order of best pick and downward from there. At the end, I will tally the votes and we can award the virtual crown(s). Now before you critisize this method, recognize that it is a collection of subjective votes which will either become increasinly more objective as the number of submissions increase and as they should include many real experiences as well as here-say (which is often driven by other peoples real experiences), or will just be a popularity contest. So lets just have some fun with it, eh, thats what we are here for. We can debate the results later.”
Name your opinion of top ten living pipe makers (Flat or D) today in order of preference.
Name your opinion of top five pipe makers ever (Flat or D) in order of preference.
I received several inquiried via private email as to whether one can vote this poll blindly or privately, one might say. I guess no one wants to hurts anyones feelings or perhaps doesn’t wish to go out on a limb in public. I was very surprised by this given the loud noises made on other threads over this topic and on numerous occaisions.
I would suggest that if anyone is uncomfortable with a public vote, feel free to email your votes to me via email instead. Also, I think that we should just vote on the top 5 living makers rather than 10 (many people don’t know any more than that maybe!). I will post the results at the end of January if we get at least 25 voters. Otherwise, what is the sense.
I don’t know enough about a lot of makers to make a list, but I think Froment is the best living maker and this is why. Over the years, and he has been making for over 20 years his unwillingness to compromise in his standards and materials.
He only uses Indian ebony as he feels that this is the best timber for tone and stability – he thinks the tone from boxwood is okay but is not stable enough. As we all know he only uses stainless steel which is extremely difficult to work with but he believes that although not to everybody’s liking, it is worth the extra effort. Anyone who has closely examined his work will agree that his standard of turning and metalwork is flawless and is an important point which not all other makers can say is that he does all his own work.
Another point which I think is important although others might not agree is that for a man working on his own he has a reasonable work rate (9/10 full sets a year) as to qualify as the best maker you need to be putting pipes out there and providing budding master pipers with an instrument that will let them fulfil their potential.
I was very dismayed recently to hear the great Robbie Hannon say on Irish National TV that if he had known 15 years ago the way he feels about pipes today he would have taken up the fiddle because of the unreliability of his pipes. If he had had a Froment set maybe he wouldn’t feel this way.
Any pipes of Froment’s making I have heard and I’d like to say I don’t own any myself have a beautiful tone and are in perfect tune. I recently heard a young piper give a recital using a Froment set and when all 7 pipes were playing they blended perfectly in tune and tone. He seems to be the professional players choice. His 5 regulator monster is a site to behold. His list of clients is impressive and to mention just a few:-
Liam O’Flynn
Mike O’Brien
Louise Mulcahy
The Gallision piper who plays with Liam sometimes.
Pipers from Lunasa and De Danad
Paddy Moloney
So for these reasons that I have mentioned Alain Froment gets my vote of Best Living Pipemaker.
Is Alain Froment going to be crowned with only one vote, ah what a world!!
Perhaps a catagory for the Pipe Maker who is Most Improved this year? Best Service? Most ingenious design innovation(s)?? Best reed-maker? Best keywork/tooling? Most consistant work?
Well Neil we tried but it looks as though freedom of speech maybe in the law of the land but it doesn’t appear to be in the minds of men (well pipers anyway). I am sure a lot of pipers do have an opinion about this subject but are probably afraid to air their opinion in case they upset people but I don’t see why. According to some people who contributed to the best maker thread it is supposed to be dangerous to have an opinion (big brother is watching, be a good little piper and don’t rock the boat).
Thank heavens we are not all like that or we would never get anywhere.
“Freedom of speech, just watch what you say.”
-Public Enemy
It sounds good, but in this context it might not be quite right. First off, although I love the pipes I have heard only four maker’s sets (that I knew of, I mean I’ve heard other sets but I didn’t ask for their history, they were busy being played), played only two and am nowhere near wise enough in the ways of the pipes to make any kind of list about the ‘best’ pipemakers.
Yes, a lot of people are reluctant to state their beliefs/inclinations, but maybe it’s as much from lack of knowledge as it is from fear of insulting a maker. Other posts on other threads have made it clear that some aren’t afraid at all to state their derision/praise. So what do you expect? Besides, if you don’t think your set’s the best you can get, why did you buy it?
There’s only a few out there with enough experience to even speak authoratatively about the making of the pipes, regardless of their personal preference.
Let me put it this way, I used to think the be-all and end-all of acoustic steel-string guitars was the Martin HD-38 (bow before its might!) until I heard a Santa Cruz. Then that was ‘the best.’ Then I heard a guitar a luthier here in Winnipeg made. That became ‘the best’. Etc, etc. So, my opinion changes not only according to my tastes, but according to what I’ve heard/played recently.
I can, however that my Joe Kennedy chanter is the best chanter I currently own.
With a good reed any old crap chanter can play a full scale. After that it’s tone, ease of reedability, playability. If you look at pipes as all being potentially good playing you can go on to appreciate some of these other qualities. Or you can settle for pipes made of resin, brass tubes, PVC, with drill bit holes and nasty brass drone reeds. Etc.
Good luck having a civilized debate about this here, though.
I must say I agree With Rory here in that I was surprised that with so much to say in the best pipe makers thread that there have been only a few willing to actually put their mouth where their mouth is, or actually, where their keyboard is. I expected some fear, but presumed that those could be overcome by two things: 1) that this is mearly labelled a public opinion poll, and we all know that they are like arses, everybody’s got one; and 2) I offered to anyone fearful of public reproach, to send me their vote vis private message or email (only a few takers).
Aren’t we all a sorry group of weasley sods then, closing gobs only when we could add it up to something, at least for the fun of it. How many times have you disagreed with the best picture oscar or bets new album, etc. Everyone won’t be happy here either, but if the population of the votes is large enough, though will include the uninformed as well as well informed (no minimum credentials to vote surely pisses off alot of you eh!), it would be an interesting specticle. I also doubt very much that the uninformed-credential-less voters will in mass, differ far apart in their views from those whom are closer to UPing nurvana that they hear from most often, particularly on this great board.
PUIF, poor example. Everyone has seen the movie, so they’re qualified to have an opinion. Few have played sets from more than one or two UP makers, so are not qualified to voice an opinion on who is the best maker.
It would be pretty arrogant to start an opinion poll based on aping the opinions of others from sources such as this board, and that is the basic flaw to your poll in the first place. Even professional players are exposed to the works of only a few makers, so its not likely that they will have an opinion, and I doubt they would even venture to give one.
Because so few people have played UP by more than a couple makers, it would likely end up that the “winner” of such a poll was the maker who had the most sets out there in players hands. As an example of this, each year the local press does a public poll of who makes the best burgers (and other topics). Usually the winner is some chain of restaurants, simply because only a small population of the city has gone to any one of the small but great burger places, but nearly everyone has gone to the big chain places.
DJM, you are quite right about the motion picture comparison. However, the process (oscar) is an interesting one. All members of the acadamy (every union card carrying member), from the biggest and the “best” to the littlest and the “worst” get an equal vote. Now tell me that they don’t pick favorites. It is much more of a popularity contest. For example, The picture Its a Beautiful Mind won for Best Picture and for just about everything else. Except for best actor. For gods sake, Crow was the whole movie! How can the movie be the best, with his mug hogging up the screen for 90% of it, and he not win for the best actor! Well I will tell you. Most of hollywood can’t stand the guy and word of mouth on that point travels fast, so guess what, everyone saw the film, loved it, loved him in it, but hated him everwhere else in the real world and didn’t vote for him.
I think that with the pipes, many of us on this board actually are exposed to many different pipe makers through clubs, seisiuns cheoil, and other get togethers. We get to hear pipers play different sets and we hear their opinions which are based on real experiences. Maybe we even get to play many of them. Word of mouth on these points also travels and impressions are made. I would even bet that many pipers would vote for makers different than the ones that they own and play. I would like to own a K&Q set or a Wooff set (in addition to my Gallagher set, rather than instead of) for example, but there isn’t a store out there with an inventory of them on the shelf, and many people can’t afford them perhaps either. As another example, I am pretty sure that while your average joe may drive a ford tauris or something, that he would not vote for it as the best car on the road. I have no fear that the guy pumping out 100 sets per year in Pakistan, will not make it to the top five!!
I think some people need to get their dictionaries out and look up the meaning of opinion It doesn’t say you have to have a degree in pipemaking evaluation, you don’t have to know the history of every pipemaker or know his work inside out, to argue otherwise would be like being asked what’s your favorite tune? and repling I can’t answer that because I don’t know every tune. All you have to know is what you like. Anyway lets stop flogging a dead horse and ask the serious questions that really matters!
I am going to order a new reed soon and I don’t know whether to have it tied with red thread or black thread. I just can’t decide oh and by the way Hi mum.
In my opinion Geoff Wooff is the best maker at this time, particularly flat sets. That is not to say that there are not other makers producing pipes that work as well or are as reliable. Geoffs pipes are in the older style, perhaps closer to the standards and style that was achieved by the old great makers (Kenna, Coyne, Eagan and Harrington). My understanding from discussions and what I have seen is that he is sensitive to all the aspects that were striven for by these makers, tone, tuning, intonation, balance and quality of finish.
Geoff has put in the time with many great players also (is a very good piper himself) to further understand and perfect the tuning and balance of the instrument. He has researched and measured many old working (un-altered or minimally altered) examples of pipes to re-discover the principals behind the workings of the chanter. I have visited him on a number of occasions and seen antique sets that he has been restoring which he does without altering the instruments (something that not all other makers who have restored old pipes can claim).
Like all makers of his generation there had to be a certain amount of re-inventing of the wheel in the beginning, as a lot of the old knowledge and techniques particular to Uilleann Pipes had been forgotten, lost or kept secret. Having said this, I have seen quite a few of his very early sets and they were made with the same attention to detail as he still employs. A friend of mine has the first Bflat set that he made and I have heard them sounding very nice and in tune, they have been played fairly constantly since the owner got them. I was fortunate to have been able to buy a later Bflat (made in Australia in 82 I think, could be little later though) set that is playing well still. Excellent reliable pipes that sound great.
I think some people need to get their dictionaries out and look up the meaning of opinion It doesn’t say you have to have a degree in pipemaking evaluation, you don’t have to know the history of every pipemaker or know his work inside out, to argue otherwise would be like being asked what’s your favorite tune? and repling I can’t answer that because I don’t know every tune. All you have to know is what you like. Anyway lets stop flogging a dead horse and ask the serious questions that really matters!
I am going to order a new reed soon and I don’t know whether to have it tied with red thread or black thread. I just can’t decide oh and by the way Hi mum.
I guess from reading the “71 page Fingering chart for Howard Chanters” thread, I can be presumptuous and not put anyone down for Brian Howard as top pipe maker.
Anyone in England know how Steve Turner is doing these days with his Froment set pictured here, from page 2 of “Pictures of Your Pipes” thread? Haven’t heard from him for about a year.
