Frugal Corner Pipes (review)

[Erisianmonkey]

An addendum to my earlier review of these pipes. Mark sent me out a new chanter reed. I installed said reed, and immediately got sound out of the chanter. Once I got the right pressure, I was able to play a few notes of the scale. (Not too many, I really don't know how to play yet. I went by a fingering chart I found online. But I do mean musical notes. Not squeals like frightened canaries being hit with a tennis racket- although I got some of those too.)

I've heard tell about how inexpensive pipes turn people off the idea of learning the pipes- I may be an exception to the rule. I had no intention of really ever learning to play the pipes before I got these. They were going to be wall hangers. Mark gave them to me because he wanted someone to review the pipes, and I pretty much won the coin toss. After finding out that I could indeed make a beautiful sound with these (as well as, I will admit, sounds that sound like a sick cow or a distressed duck- but that is due to my inexperience, not the pipes.) I want to learn to play. Will I want to get a set of good pipes? Sure, I'd love to. As soon as I can pony up $700 plus for some plastic pipes, yeah, I might go that route. But then again, I might wait longer to get some African blackwood pipes. But for the foreseeable future, my interest will be to get a practice chanter, and learn how to play. Then I've got a set of pipes that will tide me over until I can get an expensive set.

I'm going to respond to a few of the comments thrown my way as well.

1. I may not be an expert on playing the pipes, but that doesn't mean that I don't know what they sound like. I have listened to and enjoyed pipes all of my life.

2. The idea of this going in kilt accessories was an in-joke to those of us who do not play the pipes who often get asked where our pipes are. If it bothers you that much, I have no objection to the mods moving it to wherever they see fit.

3. As far as having an experienced piper evaluate them- I don't know any around here. Yet. I'll probably see about getting whatever instructor I find to check them out. I'd love to hear what an experienced piper would make these sound like, since in between the squeals and moos of my inexperienced piping I have got some wonderful sound out of these.

[LadyGriffin]

My man is a Shriner and a piper, and knows many of the best pipers in the MPLS area. If you want to trust me with a set, I will send them with him to a practice and let them do a critique. I'll even cover return postage.

I took a good look at them at the fair and I thought that they looked pretty good! I have a set of the cheepo ones from "THE PLACE WE WILL NOT NAME" and sure know what crap looks like. Poor wood turning, splits, ROUGH bores, etc.

Anyhow, I thought I would toss in my hat to help.

Julie

[ScottInNewHampshire]

Since this seems to be spinning to an end, I thought I'd mention that I bought a Fagerstrom Electropipe recently. I know, I know it's not a bagpipe and it doesn't involve any breathing into a chanter and the feel may be totally different BUT I'm having a blast with it.

Mastered the scales (up and down) and just learning to skip notes. Don't have a tutor (not sure how serious I'm going to get) but I see the value of having one. Am holding the "instrument" in the proper position as if it was a GHB.

Sorry if I hijacked this thread but the electronic chanter was mentioned two or three times during the discussion.