Why does my chanter sound like crap?

[TheOfficialBren]

Okay. Thank you for the valuable information, gents.

This particular chanter really has tried my patience and affected my enjoyment of taking up piping.

Most of my musical instruments are pro-quality. I guess a PC should be approached like any other instrument and accorded the same respect.

Tunes on this chanter are nearly unrecognisable and, even as a healthy guy with good lungs I feel winded easily and my lips fatigue after about 15 minutes of playing.

For some perspective I can run a mile and be only moderately fatigued or play my drumkit for hours upon hours only stopping because my fingers are blistered too much to play any longer.

Might my breathing technique be to blame, too? I'm breathing like a singer (professionally trained at a music college) when I play, if that makes any difference.

Not many pipe teachers around here. The guy I used to take lessons from is a wingnut and didn't correct mistakes. I tested this by intentionally making mistakes on several occasions. He consistanly failed to correct them.

[EagleJCS]

It takes time for the muscles surrounding the mouth to get accustomed to sealing the blowstick, either on the practice chanter or the bagpipe chanter. There's also an optimum pressure for playing the practice chanter - more than a recorder or pennywhistle, but not quite as much as the bagpipe. If you try blowing at the lower pressure, it will sound more like a (dying) duck call. Blowing at the highest pressure will 'shut off' the reed, and you won't get any sound out of it.

Regarding your particular chanter, Bren, you could have the holes cleaned up/rebored and have the internal bore smoothed/polished in order to make it into a decent-sounding chanter.

In regards to the flat/sharp pitch, there's a diagram online that shows what the pitch of each note is supposed to be when using a Korg-30 chromatic tuner. (As I'm sure you're aware, the bagpipe scale in not a chromatic scale). I can send it to you. There is also a tuner specifically designed to be used for the bagpipe (the HBT, or Highland Bagpipe Tuner), which will show the note to be in tune for the bagpipe scale (but it would be out of tune compared to a piano or guitar).

[chasem]

This particular chanter really has tried my patience and affected my enjoyment of taking up piping.

Yeah, that shouldn't be the case. A good friend tried to start on a similar chanter and it was nothing but struggles. She bought a Gibson an a good bit of that struggling was gone her first night with it.

Tunes on this chanter are nearly unrecognisable and, even as a healthy guy with good lungs I feel winded easily and my lips fatigue after about 15 minutes of playing.

If you've played other wind instruments, you shouldn't be winded so easily. Depending on what you've played, your embouchure may need some work and that could play into tired lips, but fighting with the instrument will play a big part of that fatigue as well.