Practice Chanter and Book Advice

[EagleJCS]

I'm in the 'first find an instructor' camp. Find your instructor and ask what book and practice chanter they recommend. Some don't really care which book their student chooses because the book simply provides exercises and the instructor skips around using their own sequence of instruction. My piping instructor suggested the Sandy Jones tutorial Beginning the Bagpipe. Which practice chanter they recommend may depend on their personal experience with different brands.

Just about any practice chanter will do, except for the burgundy-colored practice chanter and tutor book combo. I haven't tried one of those myself, but have heard from several others in the band that they started with one and quickly had to move on to a "real" practice chanter. My first practice chanter was a Naill standard-length polypenco practice chanter with counter-sunk finger holes. I still have it, but currently use a John Walsh long blackwood practice chanter that has an integrated moisture trap in the blowstick cap.

Be prepared to spend at least 6 months on the practice chanter learning the finger technique, embellishments and avoiding crossing noises. It may be a year or more before you start working on the 'big instrument' and incorporating blowing, squeezing and finger technique all together.

Best of luck, and welcome to the obsession!

[OC Richard]

I'm in the 'first find an instructor' camp. Find your instructor and ask what book and practice chanter they recommend. Some don't really care which book their student chooses because the book simply provides exercises and the instructor skips around using their own sequence of instruction.

My piping instructor suggested the Sandy Jones tutorial Beginning the Bagpipe.

Which practice chanter they recommend may depend on their personal experience with different brands.

Yes I agree with everything there.

Different instructors favour different books and PCs as you say, so it involves less cost to find these things out from your instructor first.

I couldn't agree more about the Sandy Jones book.

I started with the College Of Piping "green book" because that was the only proper tutor available back then.

For people who are familiar with typical American tutors for, say, band instruments like sax or trumpet the CoP book is exceedingly odd.

Crazy Dave mentioned scales and the CoP book does have a few. However there's little in the way of intervals and there are no arpeggios whatsoever.

Thing is, Highland pipe tunes (and trad Irish tunes too) are often chock-full of arpeggios, and as a direct result of the standard tutors not teaching them I hear, all the time, fairly decent pipers who can't play a clean arpeggio to save their lives.

Here's a common tune, The Atholl Highlanders. There are loads of pipers who sound pretty good, but ask them to play this and you're going to get crossing noises and sloppy arpeggios overall. You can't play Highland pipe music well unless you master arpeggios!



What the CoP tutor struck me as was a book written by somebody who knew how to play the pipes, but didn't know how to teach music.

That's why the Sandy Jones book was such a breath of fresh air! It felt like an actual musical instrument tutor, with helpful logical exercises.

However as with many teachers I developed my own materials, in my case due to teaching at a summer camp for many years. I wanted exercises that hit all the skills needed in the most compact way possible. So people coming to me can use any book they want, but they have to master my exercises first, because once they can play through all my exercises cleanly they won't be caught off guard by any note sequence they encounter in a tune.

I think Job One, before tunes or ornaments, is to be able to negotiate your way around the chanter, and be able to play any interval, any arpeggio, cleanly and fluently. There's plenty of time for ornaments later, once you know how to play the chanter.

[Crazy Dave]

Yes I agree with everything there.

I couldn't agree more about the Sandy Jones book.


I think Job One, before tunes or ornaments, is to be able to negotiate your way around the chanter, and be able to play any interval, any arpeggio, cleanly and fluently. There's plenty of time for ornaments later, once you know how to play the chanter.

Looks like I will be checking out the Sandy Jones book. I am familiar enough with interval and arpeggio from the piano that I should be able to focus on acquiring the skills. I expect that arpeggio will be a bit of a task. Thanks for the advice.

Dave

[Crazy Dave]

I talked to my neighborhood piper to see if he knows a good teacher. It turns out that he teaches. We talked about what chanter to get. I'm on my way! We will start as soon as I get my chanter.

Dave

[OC Richard]

So cool! Good luck with your lessons!

I mentioned "clean arpeggios" and "crossing noises" and someone coming from piano might not know what a piper means when they say those things.

The problem with the Highland pipes is it's "partially closed" or "partially open" fingering system. (Glass half empty/full.)

Whereas orchestral woodwinds generally operate on an "open" fingering system.

To take one example, going from D to E on the Highland chanter as compared with going from G to A on the orchestral flute.

On the flute:

xxx ooox
xxo ooox

You're just lifting one finger! Nowt to go wrong.

On the Highland pipes:

xxx ooox
xxo xxxo

Hold on, what's this? On the flute all the lower-hand fingers remain the same, while on the Highland pipes all four lower-hand fingers reverse positions!

Theo Boehm is spinning in his grave!

So when going from D to E on the Highland chanter FIVE fingers are reversing: the fingers on have to come off and visa versa.

So what's "not playing cleanly" or a "crossing noise"? This:

Let's say when you go from D to E you accidentally put down the lower-hand fingers a split-second before you raise the upper-hand finger, thus:

xxx ooox
xxx xxxx
xxo xxxo

or:

xxx ooox
xxx xxxo
xxo xxxo

THAT'S a crossing noise! Or crossing note, as some call it. In this example it's a Low G or Low A appearing between the D and E. It sounds like a little catch or blip, and is the hallmark of the piper who hasn't had proper instruction.

Thing is, on the actual Highland bagpipe chanter Low A and Low G are the loudest notes, so ONE piper playing a crossing noise in a 12-piper Pipe Band will be heard...by one of the Piping Judges! When you're in competition.

I think the thing that makes me cringe the most, when hearing certain pipers and Pipe Bands, is continuous crossing noises peppering every tune. Well, that and out-of-tune pipes!

[Crazy Dave]

Thank you OC Richard for that detailed explanation. I haven't heard "crossing noises" but it sounds like I wouldn't like it! Long ago, I did play the clarinet, although I was not very good at it, but I think I remember something similar. It is a good reminder that I should get my scales down!

My teacher says I will probably spend a year on the chanter before picking up the pipes. He says there are good plastic pipes. Still not cheap, but less than African black wood. He says he has a set for when he plays in the rain. The pipes that came with the kilt I won in a auction are junk, as I expected. The kilt and the drummer's plaid are very nice, but the kilt is a little small. Motivation to continue the weight loss program I'm on. I've already lost 10 lbs!

Dave

[OC Richard]

Thank you OC Richard for that detailed explanation. I haven't heard "crossing noises" but it sounds like I wouldn't like it! Long ago, I did play the clarinet, although I was not very good at it, but I think I remember something similar.

You're welcome!

I bought a clarinet several years ago, like so many others with dreams of becoming Pete Fountain.

It was unimaginably difficult. All I could get were barnyard animal noises. The hardest thing was "going over the break" where you're playing a note as high up the horn as you can go, all fingers off and several keys depressed to open up tiny holes inches from your face, and the next-highest note is all fingers down, several keys depressed to shut the horn down all the way to the bell, a yard distant! So a change in one note went from being wispy to a honking car horn. How clarinet players ever make going over the break smooth I have no idea.

I did find a discussion online how many professional clarinet players use various alternate fingerings to facilitate going over the break. The Highland pipes have a couple things like that, "false fingerings" all the teachers say not to do, but that most good players do without even noticing.

My teacher says I will probably spend a year on the chanter before picking up the pipes.

It's an interesting aspect of Highland pipe pedagogy: there are things where all good teachers are in agreement, and things where good teachers have a spectrum of opinions.

One thing where good teachers are all over the map is the matter of when the beginner should "graduate" from the Practice Chanter onto the pipes, and how this should be done.

The various approaches can be sorted into three basic categories:

1) Calendar-based. "The student should start on the pipes after playing the Practice Chanter for ______."

The blank can be filled in with almost any number, but it usually ranges between six months and a year.

2) Performance-based. "The student should start on the pipes after mastering _______ tunes."

The blank can be filled in with almost any number of tunes, but usually ranges from six to 20.

3) No delay. It's a bit of an outlier, but some good teachers think the beginner should start on the Practice Chanter and full set of pipes simultaneously.
Some teachers think the beginner should, from the get-go, be able to play anything on the pipes they can play on the PC.
Other teachers think the beginner should work on fingering and playing exercises and tunes on the PC while focusing purely on blowing steadily on the pipes.

Which brings up the differences in opinions about what the beginning should be doing on the full set of pipes, when time to start playing them.

Some teachers remove the chanter and just have the student blow the drones, often starting with a single drone and adding the others one at a time.

Other teachers cork off the drones and have the student play the pipe chanter only.

What are we to make of this wide range of opinion? Personally I think it tells me that it doesn't matter.

So I let each student decide when they start on the pipes. Motivation is huge! And if a beginner is all fired up to get a-blowin' on the bagpipes I say have at it.

Other students, oddly, become enamoured with the Practice Chanter and they have to be cajoled into taking up the actual bagpipes.

He says there are good plastic pipes. Still not cheap, but less than African black wood. He says he has a set for when he plays in the rain.

Yes the superb Canadian pipemaking firm Dunbar Bagpipes has become famous for their great-sounding delrin/polypenco bagpipes. They led the way in this regard, having made poly pipes for decades.

Recently a number of UK pipemakers have followed suit, such as McCallum.

At one point I owned three Dunbar bagpipes, two in African Blackwood and one in polypenco/delrin. They sounded the same.

Personally I don't like poly pipes for three reasons:

1) they're heavier on the shoulder than wood pipes

2) they tend to bounce on the shoulder while you're marching

3) condensation collects inside the drones, causing the drone reeds to malfunction after a while

So I'm sticking to wood!

I will say that wood pipes vary greatly in weight. I have three African Blackwood sets now:

-Starck, London, 1940s

-R G Lawrie, Glasgow, 1940s

-Kintail, Glasgow, 1981

and the Lawrie pipes are much heavier than the other two! What's strange is that another Lawrie set I owned was unusually light on the shoulder. I don't know the reasons, but I suppose that the density/weight of the wood varies.