"Has anyone heard or made a Brazillian Rosewood chanter. I’d be interested to hear an opinion on it’s tone. "
I just got back from Malcolm McLaren’s home where we went through draws and bags of C# chanters that he’d knocked together with Dicky Deegan over the years - some of ebony, abw, Australian native olive and tallow wood (Cheese wood). Malcolm uses mainly Brazilian Rosewood now as that is his main stock of timber for the time being. I asked of its tonal qualities. He said it was a bit brighter than ebony, native olive and tallowwood, but not as bright a African BW.
He then took a handful of C# chanters all of the exact same dimensions and with the one same reed he played each chanter. Sure enough, the Native olive was the mellowest and sweetest, followed by the ebony, followed by the Brazilian rosewood which was brightest but not as bright as the ABW.
Colour is nice when polished and looks very nice with patina-ed brass and off-white mounts.
David,
Did Malcolm put the reed in a tallow wood chanter? - How did it stack up. As you know, I have an invested intrest in this as I ordered a tallow wood chanter on the basis that it will produce a mellow tone.
I swapped a reed between my Simack lancewood chanter and one of Malcolm’s ebony chanters (I assume it was ebony as it was jet black with no visible grain) and found that the lancewood chanter was much mellower.
Goldy, Not a tallowwood C# on this particular occasion but I have played Malcolm’s wide D Ebony and then immediately changed to a Tallowwood wide D with the same reed and the Tallowwood came out on top in terms of sweetness and mellowness.
I don’t know anything about lancewood. I’m about to order some ABW and Native Olive semi seasoned blanks from Sydney to put away for when I finally get to do some pipemaking myself - I figure by the time I’m ready and tooled up the blanks should be seasoned well.
Thanks DavidG, I cannot think of a better way to get an objective test of the influence of the chanter wood on tone. (Keeping chanter design and reed constant).
It ties in with what I’ve heard about the relative degree of resonance within each wood species, although I am not familiar with Native Olive and Tallowwood.
Maybe an issue that has kept a lot of pipes makers away from Brazillian Rosewood is it’s CITES listing. Which could cause problems with importing and exporting.
I wasn’t aware Brazilian RW had a CITES listing although it makes sense. Native Olive is a tree native to Tasmania - very dense and has a nice greyish-tan sort of colour - hard to describe.
“Native Olive - Notolaea ligustrina
Another species that only occurs in the island state, this tree can grow to a large size in favourable conditions. Not a common tree, its wood is a light dark nut-brown with dark streaks which can be very beautiful. The name derives from its similarities as a timber to European olive, which has similar grain patterns and also a very similar fragrance when worked. Native olive is hard and dense and ideal for woodturning and woodwind instruments.” http://www.southcom.com.au/~malcolmf/homepage/tascoll.htm
Thanks also for the weblinks - the websites show just how technical and pedantic it is possible to get about any subject (any of us that have gotten into reed making can attest to that!).
Good on ya for planning ahead to try some chanter making. I guess you’ve got easy access to a good tutor up there in Brisbane which will be a real bonus.
I just spent a few hours at denmarks largest hardwood specialists yesterday. Very interesting. One of the things I learnt was that the original Brazilian Rosewood (Dalbergia nigra) is allmost extinct, any dealing is completely banned, and will probably be so for the next 50-100 years. There is however still some small quantities available around the globe, mostly small sticks and veneer. I was shown the remains of what they had cut themselves in the 60´s - very very beautiful.
Other rosewoods like Honduras (Dalbergia stevensoni) Indian (Dalbergia latifolia) and Cocobolo (Dalbergia retusa) are taking its place - Honduras allmost gone as well…
I went away with a nice plank of Indian rosewood for a new set of drones, a deep dark purple with chokolate brown stripes. I had originally opted for a domestic species like pear, yew or plum, but pear was actually the most expensive wood they had! (I have enough european yew to make a set, but I’m saving it for a full B-set)