Greetings all,
Im trying to find out more about Felix Doran’s solid silver chanter (as mentioned on Neillidh Mulligans site).
Failing this i’ll settle for any further leads concerning metal bodied uilleann chanters.
Any photos would be great.
cheers,
marcus.
[ This Message was edited by: m coulter on 2003-02-13 06:10 ]
Dave Williams has written an article for An Piobaire about this chanter and the man who made it. I don’t think metal chanters turned out to be very succesful, Felix went back to playing a timber one. Kevin Henry always pulls a few metal chanters out of the bag as a conversation piece, one’s a double one if I remember well, but really I think that’s all they are, a conversation piece.
Peter, not quite conversation pieces.
I have a bit of old tape from John Rooney via Dave Williams on which -allegedly- Felix is playing his metal chanter. Tape quality is crap but the tone of that playing is more ringing than the normal wooden chanter.
Ken
Johny Roony did mention he’d got a set of Felix’s pipes, diddent realise they where the silver ones. Interesting.. ill have to give him a buzz.
As for tone i’d be interested to hear a metal uilleann chanter being played. If you compare the tone and volume between metal and wooden clarinets for instance the differences are relatively slight. I presume the Doran chanter is made along the same lines as a metal clarinet as opposed to having a solid metal body.
I don’t think Rooney has the metal pipes, Felix had a few sets and the set John plays is a Williams copy of one of them.
As far as I remember the story from Dave, somebody sat on the silver chanter at the funeral so if it still exists it is definitely only good as a conversation piece.
Ken
I am not sure, I had a Rooney tape once that was suppose to be on the silver chanter it didn’t strike me as unusual at the time. As far as I remember though I heard stories that Felix had, when the all silver chanter turned out too harsh, a Rowsome chanter fitted with a silver sleeve, i.e. an ebony bore on the inside, silver on the outside so it looked like a silver one while in fact it was not. Imagine the problems with moving wood.
All that distant memories from late night conversations and there are going lots of legends and myths about these things.
[ This Message was edited by: Peter Laban on 2003-02-13 09:42 ]
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The Dublin pipe/flute maker Dessie Serry done a chanter in titanium a few years back. I watched cam corder footage of it being played at the time but the sound quality wasn’t sufficiently clear to judge the tone of the thing.
I remember him telling me that he knackered several reamers during the boring stage.
Regards, H.
Michael Doran has his father’s “German silver” chanter under lock & key. It’s damaged and isn’t played. Frank Gorker, a German gentleman living in Manchester made new regs and stock to go with the L. Rowsome drones and chanter. Felix sold the Rowsome stock and regs to Tom Mulligan, As you know Alphie plays them now
John Rooney plays a magnificent set of pipes made by Dave Williams based on Felix’s Rowsome/Gorker set: Rowsome drones, chanter with Gorker regs & stock. Felix’s widow had the set in her caravan which at the time was parked near Newark, Notts. Dave Williams had his first workshop in Newark after attending a 2 year woodwind making course at Newark Tech. Dave was allowed to measure the set, and take photos in the caravan. Dave and John weren’t allowed to take the pipes out of the caravan, this was in 1981. Felix Doran didn’t pass away in Manchester, 1972 as Sean Reid wrote on the “Last of the Travelling pipers” LP sleeve notes, but in Grimsby, Lincolnshire, 1972, after a night out with Larry Doran, a son, at his bedside. Larry says so. Kevin Henry has a double bore chanter, supposed to be by the Taylor Bros. but I doubt they would have made something so rough and ready as this chanter is. The metalwork on bonafide Taylor pipes is of the utmost craftmanship.
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he has a double and a standard one, I have seen them both several times. They are Taylor style with stop valve for the bottom note. I had them down as Anderson or one of the ‘followers’ of the Taylors.
Ornette Coleman playing pipes! interesting concept 
I heard most of the story from Dave concerning the making of John’s pipes and the subsiquent change in the williams bore dimensions from there on. As for John’s loverly set of pipes, Dave said he’d be avoiding the use of spoons as regulator keys from there on!
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Not sure of the maker, nor is Kevin. He got them off his old partner Hennelly, who was a “follower” of the Taylors. He wasn’t the maker though, I don’t believe.
Actually I understand that Hennelly did make pipes in Chicago for a number years. Kevin plays one of his sets regularly. I also know that Tom McMahon has a full+ set of Hennelly’s but unfortunately is no longer playing them.
I’ve heard that Hennelly was originally a coach maker (horse drawn carriages) who thus had the ability to work in metal and leather.
I’m sure there are other sets in Chicago, but I don’t have the exact information to share.
jeff
On 2003-02-13 18:26, jeff_lindblade wrote:
Not sure of the maker, nor is Kevin. He got them off his old partner Hennelly, who was a “follower” of the Taylors. He wasn’t the maker though, I don’t believe.
Actually I understand that Hennelly did make pipes in Chicago for a number years. Kevin plays one of his sets regularly. I also know that Tom McMahon has a full+ set of Hennelly’s but unfortunately is no longer playing them.
I’ve heard that Hennelly was originally a coach maker (horse drawn carriages) who thus had the ability to work in metal and leather.
I’m sure there are other sets in Chicago, but I don’t have the exact information to share.
jeff
There is, of course, Joe Shannon’s four-reg Hennelly set with quadruple bored tenor and bari regulators. One of the bores in the tenor plays two notes, but I don’t know which one. Looks like a true maintenance nightmare, but they sound pretty good on old field recordings I’ve heard of Joe playing with his pal, fiddler Johnny McGreevy. Joe was playing the conventional chanter, not the double-bore.
http://www.concentric.net/~pdarcy/photos/photo_taylor.jpg
This thing weighs ~60 lbs or 25+ kg.