[NSP] Re: malcom's final solution
Dear Malcolm, Yes of course - I read your post more carefully after sending mine, and see that you were in fact referring to an old chanter rather than something one of our current pipemakers had done. Sorry to have reacted over-hastily! I agree that some research and collating of measurements may be interesting and useful, though of course finger hole positioning is, and always has been with all wind instruments, a compromise between theoretical calculated positions and positions where the player's fingers can move most easily, and then undercut and adjusted for accurate tuning - making compromises and decisions to accomodate the balance between pure and tempered intevals. I do drill my fingerholes in the same very carefully measured places on all my chanters, though these have been refined and slightly changed over the years. However, the undercutting and fine tuning is always subtly different. I'm afraid I don't think chanter tuning can be reduced to an exact science, precisely the same on every instrument! Philip - Original Message - From: Malcolm Sargeant malcolm.sargea...@ntlworld.com To: Philip Gruar phi...@gruar.clara.net Sent: Friday, March 06, 2009 9:00 PM Subject: Re: [NSP] Re: malcom's final solution Dear Philip thank you for your mail. the half inch tone hole sizes came from a Fred Picknell chanter about 100 year old and been in constant use. This chanter belongs to Tommy Breckons and is in use today. I have had it here at Scunthorpe to fettle and believe me it does play. The 1/2 is a guesstimate and of course not to be taken as scientifically as this survey could be. Thank you and please try to be positive, no one is going to come to any harm over this. To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[NSP] Re: malcom's final solution
Excuse my ignorance on this but, many years ago (and I do mean MANY - possibly back in the 70's or 80's), there was a discussion regarding making plastic chanters for NSP as an aid to teaching in schools (thus swapping the pipes for the ever present recorder for music lessons etc). I notice quite a few Scottish smallpipes now have the plastic option but I haven't seen plastic NSPs. Plastic, of course, encompassing a number of man-made materials - as with clarinets etc. Obviously, production of plastic pipes would be quite useless if the chanters have to be tuned on an individual basis (and probably take more time - plastic not being as amiable to work with as wood). Is this one of the reasons why it never happened - that, even in plastic, each chanter would have to be tuned by hand? Just wondering. Colin Hill - Original Message - From: Philip Gruar phi...@gruar.clara.net To: Malcolm Sargeant malcolm.sargea...@ntlworld.com Cc: nsp@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, March 07, 2009 2:09 PM Subject: [NSP] Re: malcom's final solution Dear Malcolm, Yes of course - I read your post more carefully after sending mine, and see that you were in fact referring to an old chanter rather than something one of our current pipemakers had done. Sorry to have reacted over-hastily! I agree that some research and collating of measurements may be interesting and useful, though of course finger hole positioning is, and always has been with all wind instruments, a compromise between theoretical calculated positions and positions where the player's fingers can move most easily, and then undercut and adjusted for accurate tuning - making compromises and decisions to accomodate the balance between pure and tempered intevals. I do drill my fingerholes in the same very carefully measured places on all my chanters, though these have been refined and slightly changed over the years. However, the undercutting and fine tuning is always subtly different. I'm afraid I don't think chanter tuning can be reduced to an exact science, precisely the same on every instrument! Philip - Original Message - From: Malcolm Sargeant malcolm.sargea...@ntlworld.com To: Philip Gruar phi...@gruar.clara.net Sent: Friday, March 06, 2009 9:00 PM Subject: Re: [NSP] Re: malcom's final solution Dear Philip thank you for your mail. the half inch tone hole sizes came from a Fred Picknell chanter about 100 year old and been in constant use. This chanter belongs to Tommy Breckons and is in use today. I have had it here at Scunthorpe to fettle and believe me it does play. The 1/2 is a guesstimate and of course not to be taken as scientifically as this survey could be. Thank you and please try to be positive, no one is going to come to any harm over this. To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
[NSP] Re: malcom's final solution
Colin, Some four to five years ago Mike Nelson devoted a great deal of time and effort to producing a set of pipes suitable for use in schools. The chanter was made from a plastic composite material so were parts of the drones. The idea was that the pipes should be produced as cheaply as could be consistent with sounding as close to normal pipes as possible. The pipes had to be made to stand the knocks and pressures put on them by the children. I remember Mike saying that there were several problems with actually getting the chanters etc. into production but these were overcome and a protoyype set was produced for evaluation. Anthony Robb became involved and I remember him playing a set at the Rothbury weekend course. I have not been involved closely with piping for 2or 3 years now so can someone update us on how the sets progressed and has the scheme been a sucess in schools? Prehps there is a place for beginners sets, or part sets, to be made from composite materials as there must be those who are put off taking up the pipes because of the relativly high initial cost. Dicuss!!! Regards to all, Guy Tindale Original Message From: cwh...@santa-fe.freeserve.co.uk Date: 07/03/2009 18:31 To: nsp@cs.dartmouth.edu Subj: [NSP] Re: malcom#39;s final solution Excuse my ignorance on this but, many years ago (and I do mean MANY - possibly back in the 70's or 80's), there was a discussion regarding making plastic chanters for NSP as an aid to teaching in schools (thus swapping the pipes for the ever present recorder for music lessons etc). I notice quite a few Scottish smallpipes now have the plastic option but I haven't seen plastic NSPs. Plastic, of course, encompassing a number of man-made materials - as with clarinets etc. Obviously, production of plastic pipes would be quite useless if the chanters have to be tuned on an individual basis (and probably take more time - plastic not being as amiable to work with as wood). Is this one of the reasons why it never happened - that, even in plastic, each chanter would have to be tuned by hand? Just wondering. Colin Hill - Original Message - From: Philip Gruar phi...@gruar.clara.net To: Malcolm Sargeant malcolm.sargea...@ntlworld.com Cc: nsp@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, March 07, 2009 2:09 PM Subject: [NSP] Re: malcom's final solution Dear Malcolm, Yes of course - I read your post more carefully after sending mine, and see that you were in fact referring to an old chanter rather than something one of our current pipemakers had done. Sorry to have reacted over-hastily! I agree that some research and collating of measurements may be interesting and useful, though of course finger hole positioning is, and always has been with all wind instruments, a compromise between theoretical calculated positions and positions where the player's fingers can move most easily, and then undercut and adjusted for accurate tuning - making compromises and decisions to accomodate the balance between pure and tempered intevals. I do drill my fingerholes in the same very carefully measured places on all my chanters, though these have been refined and slightly changed over the years. However, the undercutting and fine tuning is always subtly different. I'm afraid I don't think chanter tuning can be reduced to an exact science, precisely the same on every instrument! Philip - Original Message - From: Malcolm Sargeant malcolm.sargea...@ntlworld.com To: Philip Gruar phi...@gruar.clara.net Sent: Friday, March 06, 2009 9:00 PM Subject: Re: [NSP] Re: malcom's final solution Dear Philip thank you for your mail. the half inch tone hole sizes came from a Fred Picknell chanter about 100 year old and been in constant use. This chanter belongs to Tommy Breckons and is in use today. I have had it here at Scunthorpe to fettle and believe me it does play. The 1/2 is a guesstimate and of course not to be taken as scientifically as this survey could be. Thank you and please try to be positive, no one is going to come to any harm over this. To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html Fancy a job? - http://www.tiscali.co.uk/jobs/ __
[NSP] Re: malcom's final solution
Thanks for that. It's nice to know that the idea was followed up. Being out of region (Liverpool) if it's not in the magazine or on the list, I probably won't know about it :-). I'll be watching this list with interest for more news. Colin Hill - Original Message - From: pipe...@tiscali.co.uk To: nsp@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, March 07, 2009 8:23 PM Subject: [NSP] Re: malcom's final solution Colin, Some four to five years ago Mike Nelson devoted a great deal of time and effort to producing a set of pipes suitable for use in schools. The chanter was made from a plastic composite material so were parts of the drones. The idea was that the pipes should be produced as cheaply as could be consistent with sounding as close to normal pipes as possible. The pipes had to be made to stand the knocks and pressures put on them by the children. I remember Mike saying that there were several problems with actually getting the chanters etc. into production but these were overcome and a protoyype set was produced for evaluation. Anthony Robb became involved and I remember him playing a set at the Rothbury weekend course. I have not been involved closely with piping for 2or 3 years now so can someone update us on how the sets progressed and has the scheme been a sucess in schools? Prehps there is a place for beginners sets, or part sets, to be made from composite materials as there must be those who are put off taking up the pipes because of the relativly high initial cost. Dicuss!!! Regards to all, Guy Tindale Original Message From: cwh...@santa-fe.freeserve.co.uk Date: 07/03/2009 18:31 To: nsp@cs.dartmouth.edu Subj: [NSP] Re: malcom#39;s final solution Excuse my ignorance on this but, many years ago (and I do mean MANY - possibly back in the 70's or 80's), there was a discussion regarding making plastic chanters for NSP as an aid to teaching in schools (thus swapping the pipes for the ever present recorder for music lessons etc). I notice quite a few Scottish smallpipes now have the plastic option but I haven't seen plastic NSPs. Plastic, of course, encompassing a number of man-made materials - as with clarinets etc. Obviously, production of plastic pipes would be quite useless if the chanters have to be tuned on an individual basis (and probably take more time - plastic not being as amiable to work with as wood). Is this one of the reasons why it never happened - that, even in plastic, each chanter would have to be tuned by hand? Just wondering. Colin Hill - Original Message - From: Philip Gruar phi...@gruar.clara.net To: Malcolm Sargeant malcolm.sargea...@ntlworld.com Cc: nsp@cs.dartmouth.edu Sent: Saturday, March 07, 2009 2:09 PM Subject: [NSP] Re: malcom's final solution Dear Malcolm, Yes of course - I read your post more carefully after sending mine, and see that you were in fact referring to an old chanter rather than something one of our current pipemakers had done. Sorry to have reacted over-hastily! I agree that some research and collating of measurements may be interesting and useful, though of course finger hole positioning is, and always has been with all wind instruments, a compromise between theoretical calculated positions and positions where the player's fingers can move most easily, and then undercut and adjusted for accurate tuning - making compromises and decisions to accomodate the balance between pure and tempered intevals. I do drill my fingerholes in the same very carefully measured places on all my chanters, though these have been refined and slightly changed over the years. However, the undercutting and fine tuning is always subtly different. I'm afraid I don't think chanter tuning can be reduced to an exact science, precisely the same on every instrument! Philip - Original Message - From: Malcolm Sargeant malcolm.sargea...@ntlworld.com To: Philip Gruar phi...@gruar.clara.net Sent: Friday, March 06, 2009 9:00 PM Subject: Re: [NSP] Re: malcom's final solution Dear Philip thank you for your mail. the half inch tone hole sizes came from a Fred Picknell chanter about 100 year old and been in constant use. This chanter belongs to Tommy Breckons and is in use today. I have had it here at Scunthorpe to fettle and believe me it does play. The 1/2 is a guesstimate and of course not to be taken as scientifically as this survey could be. Thank you and please try to be positive, no one is going to come to any harm over this. To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html Fancy a job? - http://www.tiscali.co.uk/jobs/ __
