What would cause lower-hand notes to be flat in the lower octave and upper-hand notes to be flat in the upper octave?
My Kiernan chanter plays bottom D and low E in tune but F# and G are noticably flat but these notes are all in tune in the upper octave.
The upper hand notes are fine in the first octave but in the second octave the A and B are noticably flat.
Any suggestion as to what may cause this?
My first thought would be to consider opening the staple eye slightly, or having the staple taper closer to the eye, rather than extending further toward the butt of the staple.
Yes, that should solve the flat upper hand/octave problem.
Any suggestions for the lower hand/octave problem?
hmm 2 qyestions -
Has it ever played in tune?
is the staple tubing or rolled?
A
It has played in tune (measured with a tuner) but to be honest it is only recently that I’ve been playing it against drones, so it’s only recently that I have found it ‘intolerable’.
Currently it has a tube staple, but I’ll try a rolled staple. Would that help the lower octave?
Not sure to be honest PJ.
But i’ve certainly found that using rolled staples and messing around with the dimensions can give wildly different results tuning-wise in the same chanter, even using the same reed head.
And - generalizing a bit here - if the chanter is old then it was probably made to use a rolled staple originally?
For example, if you’re trying to widen the octave in the top hand, but narrow it in the bottom hand, i wonder what happens if you use a reverse taper with the eye on the wider end? Just wondering!!
Anyway, good luck with it!!
Andy