I was wondering if it isin’t true that most modern makers of wide bore concert pitch pipes are mostly trying to create instruments that cut through sessions and bands, through the noise of guitars, bodhrans, chitter chatter, etc. Like Gay McKeon’s pipes, really really trebly and bright. Was any of this consciously sought after, in terms of choice of wood-blackwood instead of ebony, perhaps, since blackwood has more of this trebliness, less warm tone to it; or the kind of power-line hum drones many modern sets have. The whole effect is kind of Highland, if you ask me, but since most pipers live in these kind of environs it’s what the market demands, I suppose.
I’ve always liked the tone of certain Taylor pipes better, myself. They usually definitely had more interesting drones than Rowsome’s; none of this sardine can stuff. Like Sean Folsom’s pipes, probably a Taylor copy, actually. A really beautiful warm sound, very harmonic, and plenty loud, too. Why don’t more modern makers go for that kind of sound?
Kevin, I’m not a pipemaker (would that more of them would provide input on this forum), but I understand that African blackwood is used due to its availability and ease of use/workability.
The widebore/concert style set was developed to meet the needs of playing in halls before the days of mics and amplification. Also to make oneself heard over the (then) new fangled accordians and concertinas. So, in a way, you are correct. They were developed to overcome the same problems that pipers can face in sessions today.
That being said, there are many session musicians who get really p***d at pipers who try to drown everyone else out, just as they do with accordians and concertinas, the difference being that accordians and concertinas can control their volume somewhat, whereas pipers with loud sets cannot.
As to the tone, I believe a lot more of the brightness of the tone is determined by how one sets up the reed than the type of wood the set is made from. I happen to like Gay McKeown’s sound, but I think we are getting into a matter of personal taste here.
As I already mentioned in one or two other threads, really loud pipes are not the kind of instrument I would like to play. If it comes to sound pressures like a soprano sax, for example, which “cuts through sessions and bands”, then to my opinion this is not the pipes that I admire.
I prefer chanters which sound immersed in the drones, and not those beasts that you can hear seventy miles from here. They simply disrupt the balance between chanter and drones, and I guess this is why in some cases, drones sound like sick bumblebees.
“Why buy one, if you can get two for just twice the price?”
This is kinda interesting because I once had a chat with Cillian O Briain (who made Gay McKeon’s pipes) and he said his goal was NOT to make really loud, squeaky, session-dominating instruments.
Yes, the wood used certainly does have an effect. Granted, that subject matter seems to have been flogged to death on this forum, but hell, we can always seem to keep droning on about it (ugh…sorry). Also interesting that you say ebony is “warmer” in tone than blackwood as I’ve heard others that think the opposite (I personally can hardly notice any difference between the two at all myself).
Boxwood does seem to have a noticeably milder tone owing in part to the fact that it apparently can’t be bored and polished to as fine a degree as blackwood or ebony, and also its lighter density. However, the biggest factor in my opinion is the way that you set up the reed. If you get a big flashy set of blackwood or ebony pipes and you set up the reeds to play relatively quiet, well then, there you go. Perhaps Gay McKeon sets his reeds to play very loud and at a rather high pressure.
I play a set of O Briain boxwood pipes and while I wouldn’ t say they’re earth-shatteringly loud by a longshot, they do sound louder than some blackwood sets I’ve encountered and I suspect that’s probably owing to the way that I prefer to have my reeds set.
You can put some “rushes” in the bore, wires with junk (string, blobby shtuff, etc.) on them, and then use a reed which is both sharper in overall pitch, and flat in the 2nd octave, without the rush; with the rush it’s in tune. This can also serve as a tuning device, if the blobs can slide up and down; you can then adjust the rushing on whichever note. Leo Rowsome used this in his own chanter, which was something like 13 15/16" long, very short; in his tutor he speaks of adjusting rushes to bring the top hand in, etc. It does mute some of the tone a bit, of course.
Are those soft blobs as in sticky tack or are they hard blobs as in epoxy?
I suppose if you got the tuning right with a soft blob and replaced it with a hard blob you would probably have a brighter/louder sound than keeping the soft blob. Comments anyone?
I use Blue-Tack in a couple of the tone holes on my current chanter, and haven’t (in the past 9 - 12 months) had to replace it with anything more durable (harder) than itself. And, upon any impending reed changes (knock on wood) it’s easy to remove without damaging the shape/size of the tone hole.
Tony…I use soft blobs on the wires in the regs, none on the full length wire in the chanter, but if it needed one I’d use soft (nail putty stick - black). I doubt if it matters whether it’s hard or soft since air displacement is achieved either way. I prefer soft so I can easily change it.
BTW, Kevin R. is another one of those knowledgable pipers who knows way more than he should. It’s good to have him around.
Can I engineer new reeds that will play much much quieter but still play in tune?
Brian, you can also soften the tone and quieten the sound by closing the reed lips a bit with the bridle, and sanding your reed lips thinner. Sharp, bright sounding reeds that blare away are usually very open and very stiff/thick.
As to staying in tune, this is a very touchy business when thinning the reed lips. Its easy to trash a reed. Hopefully you are fully prepared to experiment, and have made many, not just one, reed in advance.
Make all changes in very small increments, e.g. when sanding, one to two scrapes on 600 grit wet/dry paper max on each side, then try it in your chanter. Same for moving the bridle. Never move it more than a hair’s breadth at a time before trying it out in your chanter. Adjusting reeds can take hours and hours until you get used to your chanter’s needs and to your own reeds.
I know the sandpaper/scraper thing on cane has been discussed before, but doesn’t sandpaper leave a “woolly” sounding reed, whereas a scraping/shaving knife leaves the cane sounding more crisp…all due to the fact that sandpaper opens the pores and knives/scrapers seal the wood shut…open pores absorbing moisture, breathing more.
If so, sandpaper would certainly help “soften” the tone.
Lorenzo, you would use both: the knife to scrape the scrape (what else?) and superfine grit paper for sanding the lips - just the lips.
A good source to view is Alan Moler’s video on UP reed making, available from NPU in PAL and NTSC formats. Some of his methods don’t work for me, but if you want to just watch someone do stuff (watch again and again) it is a helpful tool.
Some of the best reed makers, for both uillieann pipes and oboe, use only a super thin shaving knife, curved out, hollow ground on the upper side. They never dig in because the leading edge of the knife naturally wants to come out. I have a couple of these and the shaving ribbons that peel off are not much bigger than fine, fine sawdust.
This one in the pic above is “double ground” or hollow on both sides. Imagine one that is only curved one way. It would never be used for splitting cane because it’s not straight. These are thin and sharp enough to cut a single hair.
Also, some of the best reeds are never sanded on the inside either. Only a gouge is used. This keeps from “roughing up” the cells on the inner surface of the cane which give the reed a soft woolly sound.
I think AlanB says he does sand the inner surface a little but seals the wood afterwards. I’ll have to dig up the old thread and reread it.
Interesting bit about using a straight razor. I tried using one for a while, but found the metal too soft and I kept having to sharpen it too often for my taste. It did work well for taking very tiny bits of the cane off though.
Andreas Rogge used to use sanding sealer on the inside of his slips. I don’t know if he still is though.
I think AlanB says he does sand the inner surface a little but seals the wood afterwards. I’ll have to dig up the old thread and reread it.[/quote]
Eeeee! I didn’t. I mentioned the technique of using wax rubbed in to seal and polish a surface (I’ve even tried using super glue type glue that soaks in and then sand it down). But the only seal on my reeds is the binding. I like things " au natural” I’ll try anything new, but if it doesn’t make a vast difference, it’s just another time consuming process, in a process that is already fraught with the unknown…
For a quieter reed, try a thinner head, but a narrower dimension piece of cane, and gouge a little extra above the tails , but I always think a “quietened” concert reed just sounds muffled. Each bore has it’s dynamics and I like to try and exploit that. My Cillian chanter has poke, but is very smooth too. But I like listening to Nirvana, so…shrug
I prefer “au natural” as well. After gouging, I sand the gouged side to smooth it out, then use a curved scraper, dragging it over the gouge to burnish it and get rid of the fuzz. I follow up with polishing the gouged side on a tube of cane. This slows down moisture absorbtion and gets rid of any loose fibers. I use no oils, waxes etc. as they might adversly affect the tone.
When I finish scraping the reed, for which I don’t use sandpaper, just a reed knife with a plaque between the blades while scraping, I then polish the scrape as well on some polished blackwood. You get a clearer tone if the gouge and the scrape are polished. You should be able to hear the difference in tone of a rough reed after just polishing the scrape. This polishing of the scrape also helps the reed to more slowly take on moisture, hence giving you a more stable reed with a clearer and brighter tone. Sean Folsom showed me this 27 years ago. He had gotten the idea from several old reed makers on a trip to Ireland, Scotland and England before then. Leo Purcell, Al’s father, used to do the same.
After many years of reed making I have come to the conclusion there are only a handful of basic rules you have to follow to make a good reed. Sealing, dunking, special tools and all other ‘gizmos’ are a waste of time. All the tools you need are a gouge, a knife, a beer or wine bottle, and some sandpaper -and this is really hard to come by- some GOOD cane. (A good sharp knife is a reed makers joy and the ones that will hold their edge the longest are made of carbon steel. The cheapest and at the same time the best are the pocketknives made by ‘Opinel’ in France.)
The funny or better yet frustrating thing about reed making is that there is no rule that can’t be contradicted by doing the exact opposite. For example the general ‘rule’ to make a ‘bright’ reed is that you will have to keep the edges thin. But if you do the exact opposite and keep the edges very think –like a GHP reed- and alter your scrape a little you get a reed that is just as bright.
I don’t think the grain of the inner surface of a reed plays an important role, after all this would imply that it is impossible for ‘wet woodwind players’ to get a clear bright tone. But then again I could be wrong:)
I find it very helpful to read your opinions concerning the reed surface smoothness. It is particularly interesting because of the range - from “no influence” to “very important”. I was wondering about the end point of all our experiments and manipulations. In a perfect world, the inside of the sound-producing bore reaches from the tip of the reed through the staple into the chanter bore down to the bell. Ideally this entire path should have the same smooth surface throughout.
So in my opinion, the first point is that the inside of the slip should be as smooth as the inside of the chanter. Thus, polishing the slip with polished blackwood is an option for me, since I (try to) polish the inside of my reamered chanter bores with tapered blackwood “polishing reamers”.
Second point is, that the sound wave produced by a vibrating reed meets a first “barrier” at the top end of the staple. The concept of gouging a sound chamber into the reed tails has, at least partly, been developed to smoothen this effect. For my reeds, I even cut a tiny step into the inside of the reed tails, so that they accommodate the staple better. Furthermore, I use a metalwork lathe to turn one end of the staple tube thinner before I form the taper, to enhance this effect. As a consequence, I can remove a bit more material from the base of the scrape, which results in a more sensitive reed - less pressure needed and not so loud.
I also think that the point where the staple end meets the chanter bore is probably worth of more discussion and experimentation. I look forward to your opinions
“Ooh, what a funny thing! Is it an instrument or a fettering device?”
I think one thing that the penny chanter might have proved is that the step-down tubing sizes throughout the bore didn’t seem to affect the overall performance of the reed, or sound of a chanter. That might mean the bore doesn’t have to be a perfectly tapered wall at all, nor the step from the end of the staple to where it meets the bore. I haven’t played a pc to know for sure, but in studying the diagrams, that’s the way it would seem.
Several good reed makers use the term “not an exact science” which leads me to believe that there are many contributing factors to a good performance. I recall Pat Sky saying that he and Benedict Koehler watched Eugene Lamb make a reed that was contrary to almost everything they believed.
Well, here’s what he wrote:
“I have been making reeds now since 1970. I have made thousands: straight tubing, tapered staple, rolled, long, narrow, you name it; and depending on the chanter most types will work.”
"Ben Koehler and I once stood by and watched Eugene Lamb make a reed. His method was to take a tube, anneal it and make it flair. Then he shaved the reed so that the scrape covered only 1/3 of the tip of the reed, like this:
(missing image)
“I turned to Ben and said “If this reed plays then everything I thought I knew about reeds goes out the window” Ben said “I agree”. Well the reed played great and Ben and I slinked out the door.”
“After all of this time, I consider myself a very good reed maker, however I am humbled and still do not truely know what makes reeds tick; both Koehler and Quinn feel the same way.” -Pat Sky
It’s good to have him around.
