I asked this before - and of course it’s rhetorical, but… says who?
Has anyone actually done a side to side blinded comparison of chanters?
All of this is anecdotal evidence and we in the medical profession know very well that anecdotal evidence means nothing - it is only the double blind randomized placebo controlled study that means anything - we call it Evidence Based Medicine. Perhaps we need Evidence Based Uilleann Piping.
All I have ever heard about anyones pipes is opinion, and opinion only. C’mon Lewis you know what I’m talking about.
Now I am not advocating a Standards of Quality Board, but broad statements of quality stated as fact (without corraborating evidence) serve only to confuse the issue. A better question than “who is the best maker” should be “Whose pipes do you prefer and why?”
There is no accepted standard on what is Best Practice for making pipes or even playing pipes.
We have a very small and fragile world in uilleann pipes and trying to name best pipemaker, or best piper, or best reedmaker, or best CD doesn’t really serve us well.
Yeah, I heard him play that Froment chanter in Drumshanbo Ireland this year. I thought it had some intonation problems and one of the other piping instructors agreed.
I played the K&Q new design last nite. Most excellent! Love the e notes on the instrument.
Hey Peter Laban, glad that I could say something that would permit you to catch up on your sleep.
One of the main principles of influence and persuasion is that of “authority.” So, it’s logical that Seth would want us to know that P. Moloney now owns his personal set. How many of those of you who play Gallagher sets got a warm fuzzy feeling inside when you heard the news of the sale?
Jeff, wouldn’t it be interesting to design a trial that you mention? I cannot imagine that one would ever rid a trial of bias. I think K&Q are the best…but perhaps I’m biased. P. Laban thinks Geoff woof is the best but then again he is biased as well. Those of you who own Howard sets are obviously biased as well. That’s why this is silly…and why I regarded my comment as an opinion…and, you know what they say about opinions!
OK if money or time were no object, who would be your preferred maker ? now if money or time is a concideration ?my choice would be williams for D and GW for aflat set and on the real world sett gallagher
Dr Blevins makes the common mistake, one we all make at times, to think my mind in these things works like his own. Well, I like to think my own preference for pipes is a bit more informed than raving about the latest set I own, Rogge yesterday, Koehler and Quinn today and who knows what tomorrow. I picked the Wooff set because it was the only, certainly at the time, that allowed me to do what I was looking for. Had the tone, the blend of drones and chanter and all that. It wasn’t an attempt to buy into the club, on the contrary, most club members thought I was crazy to order it and told me as much. Several pipers later admitted keeping a close eye on how I was getting on, expecting the set to fail in time. Well, things turned out differently. What I am saying is I am playing the set I play because it was the best suitable I could find, I don’t think it is the best because I have it.
Last summer I played the first C set Caoimhin O Raghallaigh finished. Caoimhin has the ear and the idea of it and his set was brilliant and I would not at all mind playing that all the time, even if it’s the only set he made so far.
As for the K/Q beehive imitation, I played a C set Dave brought over for Emmet Gill the other year. I gave Dave a bit of good humoured slagging about his aiming for a wide bore C in similar vein to Pat Mitchell’s Matt Kiernan chanter. K/Q aim at something very different than Geoff, this is not a matter of bias, Dave’s set played lovely and did what Dave intended it to do, regarding tonal variety and colour it didn’t allow me a number of things that my own chanter would give me readily, the mix of drones and chanter was very different too. I have no bias but I do have a preference.
The problem is, regardless of how much any of us would deny it, preferences lead to and are based on bias. Any investigator or scientist would know this. Once one becomes accustomed to a particular set he or she may find it rather difficult to get out of a different chanter or set what is attempted or desired. That doesn’t mean the nuances aren’t in there…just that the one playing hasn’t had the time with the set in question to figure out how to coax out a desired effect. I played a GW C set just last month. It indeed plays very differently from mine. I liked the chanter a lot…the drones were too quiet for me…and the regs were not as sweet as the ones on my set (I should say somewhat way less than what I expected)…preferences or bias? I can tell you one thing, though, my preference or bias has been developed over a 6-7 year period of lots of listening, attempting to play and playing many different sets, and having owned and sold several nice chanters, not deemed worth possessing, that were crafted by well known not to be mentioned makers. Mr. Laban makes the common mistake of making an assumption that I simply rave about the latest and that I have no basis for a preference.
As “loopy” and subjective as many say this point is, it is what these boards are all about and what makes them great. That is to say great debate, whether praise or criticism. In each, great information for the uninformed and mearly interested.
To add to it, I think that perhaps a poll, much like sports mvp awards are awarded is warranted (sports writers vote and the most #1 votes wins). I will begin a new thread which over a passage of time (until it drifts into obscurity, say a few weeks) will ask this question: name the top 10 living pipe makers and then the top 5 of all time, in order of best pick and downward from there. At the end, I will tally the votes and we can award the virtual crown(s). Now before you critisize this method, recognize that it is a collection of subjective votes which will either become icreasinly more objective as the number of submissions increase and as they should include many real experiences as well as here-say (which is often driven by other peoples real experiences). So lets just have some fun with it, eh, thats what we are here for. We can debate the results later.
Last summer I played the first C set Caoimhin O Raghallaigh finished. Caoimhin has the ear and the idea of it and his set was brilliant and I would not at all mind playing that all the time, even if it’s the only set he made so far.
As for the K/Q beehive imitation, I played a C set Dave brought over for Emmet Gill the other year. I gave Dave a bit of good humoured slagging about his aiming for a wide bore C in similar vein to Pat Mitchell’s Matt Kiernan chanter. K/Q aim at something very different than Geoff, this is not a matter of bias, Dave’s set played lovely and did what Dave intended it to do…
Amidst the noise, there’s some good information getting through here.
I am very wary of the ‘whos best’ stuff; but clearly makers’ instruments differ a lot. It would be great to have a refined consensus vocabulary for these differences. Peter alludes to the “wide bore-ish” characteristics of the K&Q C, which matches my understanding of the K&R C in question as well. But I haven’t had enough hands-on or even listening experience with the K&R C to be firm in my understanding of what that means tonally and in performance. David did say at around that time that the sound of Pat Mitchell’s Kiernan chanter was what had ‘informed his ear’, and thus had influenced his (David’s) idea of what the pipes ought to sound like. Knowing DQ’s craftmanship and breadth of knowledge, I imagine that he has clear ideas about the ‘classic’ narrow-bore styles as well, and the skill to execute them. I’d be interested to know about that level of subtlety, i.e. what he considers their key strengths and weaknesses, characteristics, etc. But he, like everybody, has to make choices about what to specialize in.
There are plenty of makers who name-drop the classic makers of the past, certainly fewer who actually model their instruments’ bores carefully on classic instruments. Going beyond name dropping to discuss the details, especially the reasoning for any deviations from the model instruments, would help a lot in assessing where the makers’ goals and understanding are. From there, specific comments from experienced pipers like Peter can help us understand the different characters of these instruments so that we can discuss them without having to ‘rate’ them against some arbitrary scale. As far as I’m concerned, the insteresting stuff is in the subtle differences between instruments that might all be ‘good’ or ‘excellent’ when measured against the makers’ intent.
The pipemaking process is one of ‘continuous improvement’. From tweaking tone holes to adding ‘pertubations’ to the bore, pipemakers are often changing their product. The changes can be due to their desire or response to demands of the market.
What is appropriate is to celebrate a pipemaker’s latest product delivery, indeed mapping the results against the design and intent. That information can help people make an informed buying decision.
It is inappropriate to try to rank pipemakers or players.
Peter says there is something intangible about the best of these old sets, that is only apparent when you actually hear one up close. Since few enough pipers, never mind pipemakers, will ever own one of these sets this won’t become a practical option for the average maker anytime soon. Unless you live next to a pipemaker with an old set that’s working top-notch? What is a fellow to do, or think?
Would you say Wooff sets keep up with the oldies, Peter? Do they have that nyah? BTW I played a Wooff B that was working great recently. Sounded as good as mine! And the owner of the Wooffs agreed with me on that. Very intangible.
Bill, I believe you have the right thought here…its all good (well maybe not ALL, but you know what I mean). What we need is a way to capture that ‘nyah’…you know it when you hear it…but how to categorize it?
Maybe its like wine tasting..robust, full bodied, et. al.
