I was reading an article on Mr Wooff and in it it stated that he was a terrific piper which started me wondering were the taylors great pipers? Good pipers? Crowley, Harrington? And of the living makers anyone ever hear Fromment, Skye, Lynch, etc. Can great pipes be produce by lack luster players?
Some of the deceased pipe makers we have recordings of Leo Rowsome Spings to mind. Some we do not because of the absence of recording technology.
I have had the pleasure of listening to Mr Koehler and Mr Britton and found them both to be outstanding players.
I should add I have never heard a bad piper that was able to produce a working set of pipes.
Unless all pipemakers publish recordings of their playing this is an impossible question to answer. I don’t know anyone prepared to travel the world to interview each pipemaker and score them.
djm
Davey Spillane springs to mind as one of the accomplished players that make pipes.
Davey Spillane brings to mind a lot of echoplexes.
David Quinn is also an outstanding player. But I’m sure he would poo-poo that description.
t
I’m trying, but scoring is not something I’d be comfortable with!
Benedict certainly is a master player and maker. I have yet to go see M. Froment, Mr. Wooff, Rogge, and O’Briain - though rumour has it that all play well. I’d have to assume that former makers were equally capable of playing.
I think most pipe makers are excellet pipers.
An even more interesting question would be to name good and reputable makers who are notoriously cannot play the pipes. 
These guys do deserve respect.
Thx, Paul. My point exactly.
djm
O’Neill’s IMM has a chapter on Famous Bagpipe Makers which another piper and pipemaker (Bill Haneman) has very kindly put on line for the edification of all.
According to the Chief, Billy Taylor was renouned equally as a piper and pipemaker which probably indicates that he was a great piper. Charley, it seems, wasn’t much of a musician.
R.M. O’Mealy was certainly a good piper and pipemaker (some of his recordings are available on Ross Anderson’s website). However, his wardrobe seems to have been his weak point.
Both of the Moloney brothers (Thomas and Andrew) were considered great performers on the union pipes. Conversely, they didn’t make many sets of pipes and the famous Vandaleur set ruined them financially.
Ned White, Michael Carolan and Willie Rowsome seem to have been good pipers.
Do you know where i can see pictures of this set? thanks
RORY
I’ve heard Tim Benson is an excellent player. I don’t think Michael Hubbert plays much, but I could be mistaken about that. I don’t think being a great playing is necessarily that important. What I do find interesting is that so many makers apparently aren’t really strong reed makers. In a way, it seems like they are different disciplines.
I’ve never heard that!!
There was some recent discussion about how a certain maker didn’t want to make replacement reeds for pipes he already made, which is a different thing entirely.
0_o
What IS that? Somebody care to explain?..looks like a really oversized set.
It’s called the Vandaleur set. It was made in Co Clare by the Moloney brothers in the early part of the 19th century. The story goes that it was ordered by the local landlord, Vandaleur, for his son but before it was completed, the son suffered an injury and was unable to play the pipes, so the pipes were not paid for by the Vandaleur family. No one else was prepared to pay the price asked so the Moloney brothers held onto the set for years. Eventually, during the famine, they sold the pipes for a fraction of their value. They ended up in Willie Rowsome’s workshop in the early 1900s. Chief O’Neill saw them and wrote a few paragraphs in his book, Irish Minstrels and Musicians (the Pipemakers Chapter - see Bill Haneman’s website).
The set currently resides in the National Museum of Ireland (Collins’ Barracks?).
There’s been plenty of discussion of this set on the forum. Do a search for “Vandaleur” and you’ll see some of the previous threads about this set.
I can vouch that Cillian Ó Bríain is an absolute black belt when it comes to piping. I know that he was in a band that toured around Europe a bit in the '80s and he’s also on a recording of West Kerry musicians put out by Oifig an Cheoil, but I think that’s the sum total of his music that’s commercially available. A shame, really. He does this little embellishment on E (a bit like a double-tap GHB birl) that sounds really terrific and that I’ve heard few other pipers do…
Brendan Ring also plays pipes and makes them (and also checks out this forum sometimes).
Looks like Tommy Martin is making pipes now, too…
I think that Ronan Browne and Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh have both tried their hand at making pipes, but neither decided to get into it full-time.
O’Meally, Carney, and Rowsome were pipemakers who were also wonderful pipers who recorded. I’ve a handful of cuts of Matt Kiernan that are great - simple piping but very hearty and inspired. Dan O’Dowd was a nice piper as well, knew heaps of lovely slow airs. There are some nifty modern pipers who’ve made a few sets - Leon Rowsome, Pat McNulty, Pat Sky. And Eugene Lambe. Do Ronan Browne, Sean Og Potts, or that guy who lives in Brittany whose name I can’t recall count? Someone help me. Makes all his reeds out of elder.
Patrick Hennelly didn’t play at all they say. Wooff is a terrific piper - very distinctive style too. Brad Angus is excellent as well, albeit he prefers to play his Highland pipes - made his own set out of pearwood, sounds very much like Barnaby Brown.
Anderson is reputed to have been Micheal Coleman’s favourite piper, even after he (Coleman) wore out his welcome by showing up under the haffluence a few times., according to the booklet that comes with the Coleman Viva Voce recording. A beautiful set of his manufacture (in a taylor-ish style) is in very good hands in Galway. It was originally made for Tom Morrison, the “Dunmore Flash”, and I’m sure there are a few more bits and pieces of his about too. Would love to have heard him, particularly considering Coleman would have been familiar with the piping of Touhey, Tom Ennis and Barney Delaney, and was an accomplished spooniste in his own right
Ah, interesting. Thanks!
I recall reading that Eoin Dillon apprenticed with Cillian O’Briain and that Eoin plays a chanter he made himself.