I hate to break into the forum these days with such a newbie question.
Anyway; I have searched for this and only found 5-6 threads, which were not useful to me. I am quite surprised not to find more threads with this in the topic
My problem:
the bottom D. I have a C.Roberts chanter (practice set) and just started fiddling with it. I can play a decent scale up to somewhere in the 2nd register. But; to do so I have to use quite some bag pressure.
A few people have (independantly) told me thatâs probably right (to use that much pressure, that is).
But, this causes the Bottom D to break into 2nd reg most of the time. Even a flick on the âAâ does not help much. I was able to help it slightly a few days ago, by adding a paper tube in the bottom end of the chanter. Then yesterday; the bottom D is suddenly too low; while the rest of the scale is OK. Only solution is to ease the bag pressure quite much; which makes it diffcult to play anything in succession with the Bottom D. At least in tune, that isâŚ
So, any particular tip on how I can easier handle the Bottom D without altering the bagpressure too much?
It sounds like youâre having a couple of problems. First of all, you must expect to vary the bag pressure. It is not constant. The lower octave requires less pressure than the upper octave. For your particular chanter you may find that some notes require more or less pressure to play them in tune. Experiment.
However, the difference in pressure from the lower octave should not be very much. If you have to press the bag very hard it may be that your reed is closing up too much, caused by a drop in humidity. In that case, you may have to move the staple a VERY SMALL amount to open the lips of the reed. Try this in VERY SMALL increments to see if it helps.
If you have to pump a lot of air into your set and apply a lot of pressure in the upper octave, you may have some leaks in your set, or possibly you are not closing all the tone holes completely. For leaks in your set, close all the chanter holes and listen for air escaping. It may be that the wood has shrunk with lower humidity, which will require some additional thread at the joints. Hopefully the bag or bellows are not leaking, as this is major, and you will want to get in contact with the pipemaker.
For finger leaks at the tone holes, try closing all the tone holes and listen/feel for air escaping at your fingertips. It takes a bit of experimentation and practise to make sure you are covering all holes but are not using too much force to hold the chanter (death grip). You should not hold the chanter with any more force than required to hold a drinking straw. At the same time, you must ensure that you are closing the appropriate holes completely when playing in the second octave. It is a mistake to get into the habit of over-pressuring in the upper octave to compensate for tone holes not correctly closed.
Putting stuff in the bottom of the chanter makes the D note go down.., removing the paper again should help..
If the bottom D has a tendency to squeek with a bit of pressure the reed might be too closed.
Opening the reed a tiny bit will cure that BUT.., that will make the 2nd octave a bit harder to get.
If you just started out this is not very strange, you are not yet used to the instrument and getting the 2nd octave is more of a technique thing than blatantly forcing air through it.
[quote=âdjmâ]. First of all, you must expect to vary the bag pressure. It is not constant. The lower octave requires less pressure than the upper octave.[quote=âdjmâ]
??? Are you sure? Iâve always worked on the principle of keeping the bag pressure as steady as possible, especially when learning.
I appreciate your comments, guys.
Of course I am aware that I cant just go ahead and expect to do this right the first time.
Thats what I thought. I have some experience with other bagpipes, and would expect to have to adjust slightly allover. Even though people allover this forum give the advice that bagpressure should be near constant/as steady as possible.
But this kind of drop necessary here seems way off to me.
And Rick, I know the bottom note would go flat if I prolonged the pipe. Which I didnât - I was tipped off to just add something to muffle it slightly, make it narrower at the end or whatever So the paper roll is just inside the bottom opening (was).
Well, back to practice then.
I used to have a piano teacher, as a kid, who would constantly inform me that âpractice makes perfect.â As I grew up I came to realize that âpractice makes my brain hurtâ.
Hmm, would you mind elaborating a little on this, Rick?
Sounds interesting. Is this about closing everything up before opening at the target note? I kinda feel the transition itself will come with practice, what bothers me more is making the reed stay in the 2nd register and not pop back into 1st. That would require pressure that is constantly slightly higher, right? (of course really thight will help, too
I have read (here) that some chanters are more forgiving towards not-entirely-closed fingering than others.
Would it mean anything that this particular one seems to be more forgiving, to the extent that I find it easier to keep it in tune NOT closing entirely? I almost always keep 2 sometimes 3 holes open beneath. Except for Back D, which sounds better (I think) entirely closed.
Gotta go home experiment, bye!
Everything is relative. I was responding to Eivindâs comment that he was having trouble getting into the upper second octave. But this applies to first octave as well. You wonât get a hard bottom D in a dry climate without adding a bit of pressure, and I know I get jumped all over when I donât use a hard bottom D on just about everything. For my A in the lower octave I have to add a bit of pressure to get it up to in-tune. This is just a reed thing particular to my current reed, but others on this forum have noted the need to adjust pressure for various notes on their reeds, as well.
Of course the best thing for Eivind to do is to get in front of an experienced UPiper for an hour. That would probably sort out most of his concerns. But if youâre isolated (I think Eivind is in Finland?) then you have to try a bit of everything to find out where the problem lies. I was trying to give him a spread of options to try. Hope it wasnât too confusing.
It amounts to the same thing. Any time you reduce the size of an exit hole it makes the note flatter. Iâd also suggest you donât have all the holes covered tightly, which makes bottom D tricky. Iâd also suggest that the reed, if stock, may not be scraped or perhaps trimmed enough.
If you, for instance, want to get to the G in the second octave in one go you might have problems reaching/maintaining it.
Probably all the pipers here that play for a few years go âhuh.., why?â and the ones just starting out go âyeah! i got that problem!â
It takes some practise to do this and you canât expect to sound that note just by sitting on the bag with all your weight and open the G hole(s)
That will probably even close the reed completely having it not make any sound at all.
You need time to feel how the chanter/reed behaves and once you got that
it will be a piece of cake to do this.
Leaving notes open to get 2nd octave notes (run up to a note) is allowed but then you also have to close these notes again to have the note you want to play in pitch.
Itâs hard to explain but you will understand what i mean at some point going âoooh.., this is simpleâ (well.., everything is relative ;p)
I just meant to say, do NOT rely on heavy bagpressure to get a 2nd octave note, you donât need too high a pressure to get/maintain them.
Or your reed must be a real bugger or too open.
My suggestion is that all this whining about not getting a strong bottom D is because you donât have all the holes covered tightly. From this I can also suggest that you donât know how to play well enough to make any sort of evaluation concerning the reed. So rather than a thread a mile long about how to fix the reed and second octave technique, maybe we should first see if the player can actually cover all the holes.
These are just suggestions, because without the chanter in my hands I canât really even guess what the problem is.
Allow me to help a bit - I know the chanter and the reed. In fact Iâve played it for years
Eivind it shouldnât be that hard at all. It is a very soft reed, so it must have opened up a lot, the way you describe it. Try to close it up by moving the bridle down. The lips should be closer than you thinkâŚ
Iâve had a rolled up piece of paper in the bell occasionally, and sometimes a guitar string to tune it. Mostly it wasnât nessesary. It probably will need small variations in pressure though.
The norwegian climate must be real rough on the reed I guess
And there is a new reed on its way - expect it in a week or so.
