I have a d concert pitch vignoles chanter. I am a beginner. I was having a terrible time getting the chanter to play in correct pitch with the reeds that came with it (after sitting around for a few years without use). So I got a set of reeds from a local pipe/reed maker Brad Angus. So now after fiddling with the chanter and reed I have the chanter more or less in pitch BUT the lower 4 holes are so shut down with tape that a low E is very muted and f# somewhat muted. Here is what I did. I pushed the reed into the chanter till I got a good low d. High d is not bad either. Then I closed off and flattened each note as necessary with electricians tape. The result is that while the chanter is pretty much in tune the lower three holes are about 50% closed off with the tape. Actually while the low d is spot on, even with the tape the low E is still slightly sharp. But if I cover more than 50% of the hole it goes from a muted E to silence or irratic muted E.
So is there a fix to this? Is this a chanter or reed issue?
The other problem I have is that g is very octave sensitive. I have to be very conscious of lowering the bag pressure to play the g or I pop to the second octave. Ideas.
BTW I have a new chanter coming from Brad Angus for Christmas but in the meantime I would love to have a better playing Vignoles chanter.
instead of taping, try rushing the chanter with a wound guitar string from the bell up to whatever the last note is. At least that way… the holes won’t be obstructed Honestly, other than that experiment… I’d have to have the puzzle in my hands to make any further comments…
Yes it’s difficult to say without trying/seeing the thing.
But i wonder if your reed is too closed up? Can you be bothered to blow a bit harder? If so then open it using the bridle and this should at least improve the over-sensitive G but in some cases i have found a too-closed reed can make the low notes - especially the e - play too sharp.
Worth a go?
Of course you’ll have to faff on with the reed insertion depth and all the pieces of tape again…
Welcome to the crazy world of uilleann chanter tuning!
Yes an experienced reed person could probably sort out your issues in person. The chances of a random reed happening to give a true scale in a given chanter are quite remote.
If you attend a tionol there will be a reed guru who will fix your issue, or send your chanter to somebody to make a proper reed for it. As BrazenKane says, a reed person has to have the thing in their hands to know what the issue is. With a beginner it could be anything, such as improper blowing or what have you. Sounds like your bottom D and back D are flatter than the rest of the scale, and oftentimes beginners overblow their back D and make it “sink” and aren’t hitting the “hard bottom D” but instead playing the “soft bottom D” which on many chanters is very flat.
I will say that once a newbie came over to the house with a new practice set and the chanter was giving a funky scale; several notes were off in various ways.
I experimented with the bridle placement; the reed had fairly parallel sides and the bridle could be slid up and down the reed without changing the opening much. Well I discovered that there was one magic bridle position where everything on the chanter came into tune quite perfectly! Goes to show how a chanter can leave the maker playing well in tune, and by the time the newbie is making sounds on it, its tuning is all over the place. That bridle just slipped, probably.
I want to ask what method of tuning are you using? If D is spot on and A=440 then just research the older threads about Just Intonation. Some notes are meant to be slightly sharper or flatter if you are using a tuner. Good luck
Also, it might be that this particular reed in this particular chanter isn’t “happy” at 440/concert pitch, and perhaps at a sharper or flatter overall pitch the chanter’s scale will be in tune to itself.
Hi Bob,
straight forward:
1rst: Correct bridle carefully up or down to an aceptable loudness level, not too quiet and not too loud - not too easy, not too hard.
2nd: Tune low ‘a’ to 440 Hz by position of reed in chanter - achieve the correct absolute lenght of the sound wave. For now ignore back D and lower D and others.
3rd: Check octave ‘g’-‘g’, ‘a’-‘a’, ‘b’-‘b’, ‘e’-‘e’. Correct lower octave down by putting a rush of thinner (0,6-1 mm) or thicker (1-3 mm) wire into the lower part of chanter or correct upper octave down by putting 0,6-0,8 mm wire into the staple more of less deep into it.
4th: Redo 2nd, redo 3rd one or two times, iteratively, then should be more or less OK.
5th Then check low ‘d’. If too sharp lower by putting some plastic into the bottom end of chanter like a ‘V’ oder ‘U’, but upside down. Too flat happens not very often.
6th: Check Back-D: If too sharp lower with tape.
That solves 98 % of the problems if at anytime the chanter was reasonable good.
Don’t use a tuner too exactly on +/- 0 Hertz/Cent apart from (a and) d of both octaves. All the other notes may not be tuned exactly to 0 Cent. In an ideal world of pipes the tuning of the g should be 2 Cent lower, b by -16 Cent, f# - 14 Cent, a at +2 Cent to correct d or d = -2 Cent to correct a, d-scale: https://skydrive.live.com/embed?cid=E4173A41A3529FD2&resid=E4173A41A3529FD2%21194&authkey=AHSlK3EBySYP8mc". Left scale is a picture of an equally tempered scale. The right scale is for a chanter in pure tuning to the drones.