Chiff and Fipple Forums

Rushing a chanter only affects the bottom octave, thus if your top octave is flat, rushing will improve the octave relationship. Some concert pitch chanters are actually designed to take a rush. However, the rush usually takes the form of a metal wire about 1.5mm thick going up to around the A hole....

I'm not a purist in any way and of course I'd consider using a synthetic reed if it was better than anything I could make. If I'd spent as much time playing as I have making reeds I'd be a much better piper. However as Dionys and Alan say there is something wonderful about natural materials and the ...

Tony, Many thanks for your kind words about my piping! I was probably sounding a bit cranky and of course I appreciate that not everyone can make their own reeds. I do agree with you that tweaking is essential, particularly with concert pitch where you have to deal with sessions, stage lights and of...

I have played my reeds in ireland, france, italy, the states, and thailand. I didn't experience any massive problems. I agree with alan, a set of pliers can go a long way. I don't treat my reeds either. At the end of the day I've never heard a synthetic reed that I liked the sound of. I think the se...

There will be a how to element in the article. The principles are similar to cane, if you can make a cane reed you should'nt have trouble with elder, but I wouldn't try it without trying cane first. One of the big things is the material itself, knowing where when and what to get

I'd just like to say I'll answer any questions on the board about elder as it is a passion of mine!

I have been making my reeds, chanter, drone and regulator, from elder for several years. I have made a number of commercial recordings with them and will never go back to cane. There will be an article by me on this topic in the next Pipers Review.

You should check out the work of Jonathon Swayne, he is highly respected in the English pipemaking world. A lot of the pipes like welsh and pipes from the middle ages are made up, there are no surviving examples. This does not mean that they don't work. John Swayne does make a half long style bagpip...

Hi Tony, Elder, Sambuca Nigra is actually a shrub, but can grow quite large and look like a tree. It is absolutely loaded with medicinal and culinary properties and has a huge folklore surounding it, it is not the same as alder, aldus glutinosa which is a tree. Making reeds from elder particularly f...

Try making the chanter reeds from elder. This goes a long way to improving the sound of wide bore concert chanters and sounds amazing in flat sets. Personally I think the poor concert pitch pipes are getting a bit of a rough deal! All the players that I loved like Finbar Furey, Liam O'Flynn, Johnny ...

Hello, I'm new to the pipes forum but I've been reading it for a while. I play pipes low whistle and I also make pipes. That Crowley set does look great, and at 5,500 dollars a really good buy, theres a lot of modern makers charging a lot more than this! I saw a very similar set in the window of Cro...

In reply to Terry and Jack, The CD is available from Colin and Brigitte and also http://www.madfortrad.com. I only used Low F and Low D on the CD. Some of the tracks were actually recorded a number of years ago in analog(this is probably not the correct spelling). For these, which include Maverick A...

Hello, I'm new to the list, but I can think of no better way to start than by wholeheartedly agreeing that Colin and Brigitte are absolutely wonderful. I've been playing the low whistle for 15 years and for me, there's only one place to go, the customer service is oustanding. However, this seems alm...