In modern Christian “praise music” it has become very popular, nearly mandatory, to modulate up a step for the final verse (or chorus or both).
So the last two nights I’ve been in rehearsals for the band for the opening and closing services of the Religious Education Congress in Anaheim.
It’s a big band with a half-dozen guitarists, a few percussionists, a horn section, a couple woodwind guys (sax/flute/clarinet), a cellist, a grand piano, a synth, and a 100-piece choir.
Anyhow they have me play along some years. I do what I can.
Their main reason for having a piper is You Raise Me Up.
Their arrangements starts with a pipe solo… in the key of F! Then modulates to G. Then modulates to C. Luckily I have a C chanter in addition to my D chanter, so I start off with the C then switch to D when the tune modulates to G. For the final key of C, I’ve worked out the tune in C on my D chanter, which isn’t too bad. I think changing the timbre back to the darker C chanter for the final verse/chorus wouldn’t sound good.
Anyhow for this gig having both a C and D chanter has proved to be VERY useful. Quite a few of the pieces are in F, and three of them modulate to G.
Could you do it all on the C chanter? The part in G should be playable on a C chanter if you have a keyed chanter with Eb and G# or can cross finger these notes.
Oh, wow, I played that a few years back on the concert flute. I think the transcription we used went into something festive like Db major on the modulation, maybe? Anyway, as a somewhat cynical secularist I must admit I was musically moved by that one. It’s such a good kind of over-the-top, you know? Anyway, I bet the pipes are gorgeous. Have fun!
Of course being an Uilleann piper you’d stand up and say " Hey Frank, is that a septimal minor third,a pythagorean minor third, an overtone minor third,an ET minor third or a five limit minor third"?
Ended playing pipes on nearly everything, including a Spanish thing. That worked because of the brass section (two trumpets and two trombones) and the pipes are sort of in that brassy timbre.
The pipes sounded best on a new piece, Christ In Me Arise, by local songwriter Trevor Thompson. In the key of D minor, played on the C chanter.
I’ve been doing this gig for many years and every time there’s one piece that the pipes really sing on. One year it was the Vietnamese song Vao Doi.
There have been years where many songs are in four to six sharps or flats and I’m using whistles a lot but this year nearly everything is in one or two sharps, or one flat, and I can do most everything on the pipes.
Blue eyes leered over at the surly piper and howled out,
“Yoo! Yoo dere wi’ dat…ting…shut jer trap 'n get back ta werck, meister !!”
otoh panceltic, Ive toyed with that rationale for a C chanter also. It always comes down to, regarding the non-ITM stuff, I’m pretty much covered with a 4 keyed concert chanter. Well, yah theres no low C, but no great loss if we dont let on
A few years ago, I was playing uilleann pipes with the city symphonic choir who were performing a rather schlocky, pseudo-Celticky piece. Like many pieces of music of this nature, the composer seemed to have taken his cues for composing something Irish-sounding from the scores to The Lord of the Rings, Titanic, and Braveheart…
Anyway, most of it was fairly straightforward and in the key of G. However, right around the coda, there was an 8-bar section where the theme got restated in in the key of F before getting kicked back up to G for the stirring finale. I balked when I was shown the score and tried to explain to the choir director that, unlike orchestral woodwinds, key changes like this were awkward on an uilleann pipe chanter. But the money was good, and it was only eight bars, so I decided to try and go for it… What was really funny was that the director sent me a CD of the piece’s premiere in Dublin featuring Joe McKenna on pipes, and when he got to that bit, his chanter let out a huge squawk as he tried to finesse his way around some of the awkward intervals. The director didn’t seem to notice that this was out of the ordinary, so I didn’t mind so much when my own chanter tended to make a similarly awkward squawk in the same spot…
I know what you’re saying about trying to “finesse your way around awkward intervals” because I heard Paddy Moloney do the same thing once. He was playing some tune… oh what was it, an O Carolan thing I think… doing it in C (or D minor?) on his D chanter. No squawks, but his playing sounded stiff and mechanical. The only time I’ve heard him not sound fluid and brilliant! But when every other note is being playing with the keys it’s not going to sound like a tune that’s “at home” on the chanter.
For the service this morning, three or four pieces start in F and go to G, and I’ll be doing plenty of chanter switching.
There have been times in the past where a chanter in E would have been brilliant, the pieces starting in G and going to A (with G#'s all over the place in awkward places), starting in D and going to E, or starting in E minor and going to F# minor.
