Bagpipes

[Maritimer Gaen Awa]

Well this thread is yielding some great info. Thanks all for sharing. I encourage those who are getting long in the tooth such as I, who wish to learn the pipes to at least give an honest try. there are several folks in the band I joined who are in their later years taking bagpipe lessons. We are having a blast and with weekly lessons the progress is quite quick. never know until you try. might surprise yourself..those looking for gear,

I get my stuff here

http://www.jhiggins.net/

I picked up the JC higgins chanter, tutor book and CD package...cant go wrong for the price

[416 Rigby]

All the major maker's PC'S are good. There are now 5 of us piping here where I live (that I know of) and we're all happy with our Gibson PC'S.

Best of luck to you. Pipe on, brother!

[Pegasys]

just placed order for a Practice Chanter , Book & CD Starter Kit from J. Higgins ... looking forward to this immensely

[Pegasys]

got my practice chanter ... tried it out ... fairly simple to operate ...
doesn't need a rocket scientist to do so ... but here's the thing ...
what is it SUPPOSED to sound like ???

[KD Burke]

I've always thought a practice chanter sounds like a cross between an oboe and a kazoo.

Not a performance instrument by any stretch, but sufficient to learn the fingering and tunes on.

[Pegasys]

dude you made my day ... here I thought I was hearing the screams of a lovestruck tazmanian devil

I shall kazooooo on untill the practice cd teacher says I have walked the length of rice paper without leaving a trace

I've always thought a practice chanter sounds like a cross between an oboe and a kazoo.

Not a performance instrument by any stretch, but sufficient to learn the fingering and tunes on.

[Maritimer Gaen Awa]

Yup....not something to sit around and entertain family and friends with. I found if you blow to weak it rattles and buzzes, blow to hard, nothing...should be a tone not unlike what you hear on the cd. Maybe a touch lower depending which reed you have. mine came with a red one, but I switched it out for what we use in the band's chanters...when I first started my wife accused me of hurting small mammals..

[Pegasys]

hahahahaa ... mine told me I was abusing our cats and that I would have to go outside and play it !!! I feel a WHOLE lot better now , your right about the blow to hard vs not enough thing . I'm quite mechanically inclined and I know how regulated air pressure acts on devices . That being said it still doesn't mean I have a musical bone in my body but now I can practice knowing everyone else using this sounds the same kazoooo noise . I would like to get a reed that is somewhat closer to what my ear tells me is 'the real thing' this is a pic of what I have ... what do I need to get ?

Yup....not something to sit around and entertain family and friends with. I found if you blow to weak it rattles and buzzes, blow to hard, nothing...should be a tone not unlike what you hear on the cd. Maybe a touch lower depending which reed you have. mine came with a red one, but I switched it out for what we use in the band's chanters...when I first started my wife accused me of hurting small mammals..

[Maritimer Gaen Awa]

Well, I am far from expert, but you could try other reeds offered from JHiggins for a different tone. The red reed is good for us beginners and I found playing along with the CD and utube videos is a very close match. Only reason I switched was to be in reasonable tune with my bagpipe classmates. the tone due to the chanter will always be lower. Getting close to a sharp bagpipe sound i dont think is possible. Just gives us a easy way to practice vital fingering. i can imagine trying to learn the bagpipes with real bagpipes...I would be run out the neighborhood...

[OC Richard]

Well, yes, Practice Chanters do sound like kazoos, more or less!

Most PCs are made to the old pattern, with a very narrow bore. They inherently have a high backpressure (resistance) meaning that you put a lot of blowing into it and don't get all that much volume out of it.

I think they've always been that way on purpose: the high backpressure means you have to push against all that resistance. It builds up your lip strength, and perhaps your lungs too.

So pretty much all PCs you get from legit makers, such as Dunbar, McCallum, Naill, etc will be more or less the same.

It makes a tremendous amount of difference what sort of reed you use. I have two McCallum PCs but I don't use the reeds that came with them, which were awful. I use the excellent PC reeds made by John Walsh of Canada.

PC reeds vary from reed to reed. You really have to have a good piper go through a pile of reeds to find one that plays great in your particular PC. What I look for is relatively easy blowing, a clear musical tone, and a good scale (the notes in tune). The same PC can give a horribly out of tune scale, or a well in tune scale, according to which reed you use.

Gibson Long PCs (with their dedicated reeds) are rather different from traditional PCs, it seems to me. They're more freeblowing (less backpressure/resistance) and have a clearer more musical tone.

Here are two ordinary Gibson Long Practice Chanters, with the Gibson reeds, being played together in a common stock, proving that PCs can sound musical

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4lw8-3Jf9w

Roosbeck pipes, by the way, are made in Pakistan and are terrible.