Here is something which I hope doesn’t start a war, as it is something I’ve tried to sort out for myself about the different sound qualities of pipes, by different makers and might be something to consider when buying a set.
It’s not by any means exhaustive, nor learned, as it is just my hearing of it. So don’t hesitate correcting me, or informing me.
Here goes: What I can hear in sets by Quinn, Froment, Van Daal and Rogge, is a more airy and brighter sound quality in the chanter.
While, on the other hand, I can hear in the pipes of Wooff, Lynch and Williams, (and O’Briain?) a very different, almost deeper, more solid, musical sounding chanter.
There are other makers, naturally, which can be added to either of these two seemingly distinct catagories… and neither one should be assumed as better than the other, just quite different, to my ears.
Depends on the reed. Some reeds are much more bright than others. Lots of factors involved here. Don’t take your cues from any kind of recording, either. Mics can make anything sound like anything else.
I played a narrow D Rogge that was almost painfully bright; just this week I played a wide bore D of his that was very dark sounding. My own D was a lot brighter, even with a rush in the bore. The depth of the chimneys of the toneholes makes things more wooden, it seems. I played a Wooff B that seemed to have that quality in the bottom hand notes. This might be one factor that has a lot to do with the tone a pipe gives, even regulators; or even drones, perhaps.
Absolutely agree with Kevin. Don’t go by commercial recordings. Besides mic placement is the different types of mics and their different characteristics as to how they “hear”. Once the sound is recorded, engineers have a whole host of tricks up their sleeves for “tweaking” the sound, through filters, compressor/limitors, aural exciters, digital reverb, etc. and all professional quality stuff, not the kind you would typically find in your local music store, which is considered consumer grade.
I hear things too in recordings of different chanters. While some of it may be equipment, some might actually be representing different qualities in the chanters themselves…may be, ie. Don’t rule it all out. Just give me one that sound like O’B’riain on any recording. Oh, I’m happy with my chanter, really.
And…some recordings sound a little more trustworthy, let’s say. Dry recordings, no added reverb or any of that shite. Like Jimmy OBM’s. Just the pipes. Live, he sounds very much like his record. Whereas Davy Spillane dumps reverb and who knows what else on his pipes.
Indeed, although I would guess that even on many seemingly “dry” sounding recordings, there’s probably just a teeny bit of reverb added in there to smooth things out.
I’ve only ventured into a recording studio a few times and in rather un-professional circumstances (just helping out some friends), but I prefered just a wee bit of reverb as opposed to a completely dry, raw sound.
If you think Davy Spillane’s studio setup is a bit silly, you should hear the way he’s amplified when playing live. They don’t even make synthesizers that sound that artificial and schmaltzy anymore…
As an aside, once while playing with ProTools, I started messing around with this plug-in called AmpFarm. Simulated running my chanter through a '66 Marshall stack.
