Replies

  • I've come up with a provisional new design, using single reeds for the chanters. Any comments will be welcome. (Keep in mind, I haven't learned the technique, and haven't had any practice whatsoever, so don't judge by the playing quality....) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmEDhkA9MJA

  • Dominique, makers don't actually consciously think of temperaments. What happens is that you have the chanter, with the fingerholes producing (hopefully) not too-far off notes from what sounds right. (preferably slightly flat.) By enlarging the holes ever so patiently you bring up the pitch of each to be in perfect tune with the drone. The result is, indeed, a kind of Just temperament, but not exactly. If, for example you have cross-fingering, you can make a minor third perfect, as well as the major third. That is not something that is a feature of ANY temperament, including Pythagorean. In fact, it's a form of UNTEMPERED scale. Unfortunately only works when a strong drone is present.

  • Je pense aussi que pour faire de vrais cornemuses médiévales (cela vaut pour les autres instruments) il faut leurs donner un tempérament pythagoricien !

    Cela serait beaucoup logique...

  • My version of the double chantere pipes in the clips uses smallpipe reeds. They tend to be very mellow, which means there are relatively few and weak overtones. They are the crucial things for the problem of temperament. The more pronounced the overtones, the more difficult it is to have a good tuning. I am working at the moment on single-reed chanters, which are much more shrill, and believe me, I'm running into some serious difficulties with the sound. (They also are a fifth above those in the clips, which doesn't make it easier.)

    As to the problem of thirds - I am of the opinion that today we, the Western people living in Western cultures, are so inured to equal temperament that we no longer notice the unpure thirds at all. In equal temperament fifths are nearly pure (2 cents deviation), but the thirds, both minor and major, are totally off. Well, we became used to it, and accept them as we hear them. In any case, thirds do not form an important part of early Medieval music, so in this case it's only the problem of two drones interfering with the thirds in between. As an interesting point, I have a bag that I use for more than one kind of chanters. While leaving the drones the same. With a relatively mild chanter I can use both drones (fifth apart) quite successfully. With another chanter, a Spanish Gaita type, which is very strident and piercing, I cannot,. I have to switch off the fifth drone, as it really interferes.

  • Pour la cornemuse de l'église de Rinkebyj, vu la taille des trois bourdons, je me demande bien quel accord ça peut-être...

    Des suggestions ?

  • Je ne dit pas le contraire, ma pensé est que sa cornemuse est un bel essai de cornemuse à deux chanteurs.

    l'image au début de la discussion est simplement l'image de présentation du sujet...


    troubadour31 a dit :

    Cf plus haut: "La reconstruction de Yuri Terenyi est très convaincante !"

    Je ne suis pas tout à fait d'accord avec vous, car la reconstruction de Yuri possède deux bourdons et deux chanteurs de tonalités différentes là où la sculture nous montre un seul bourdon et deux chanteurs de même tonalité.
    Sa reconstruction est à mon avis plus proche de la cornemuse de l'église de Rinkeby - ce qu'il a lui même revendiqué lors d'une conversation sur FB et même si cette dernière dispose de trois bourdons.

    The Double Chanter Bagpipe
      The Double Chanter Bagpipe from English Church Architecture By H.L. Aleyn Wykington Apprentice to Master Stephen of Hunmanby OL Télécharger le pd…
  • As far as the likeliness of coexistence of the two type of bores, it is all the more probable as:
    1 -  the name says it, a bagpipe is but a (set of) pipe(s) grafted onto a bag that acts as an auxiliary lung, relieving the piper of the effort of circular breathing.

    2 - The Middles Ages knew the "muse"

    3 - They also knew shawms, ancestors of the oboe, which are by definition conical bore, double reed instruments;

    Here is a very interesting video on the possible evolution of directly mouth blown pipes to bladder and bag blown ones.

    Barnaby Brown a dit :

    for the 1500s and clearly earlier!

    I'd be surprised if cylindrical and conical chanters didn't co-exist - cylindrical for quieter contexts, such as solo vocal accompaniment, and conical for outdoor contexts where loudness mattered.

    With two chanters, you don't really need more than one drone - each chanter becomes a drone when you play staccato. And you can change the pitch of this "virtual" drone by lifting a lower finger, or switch it off by playing legato. Great fun! Many possibilities - if composing for a double chanter bagpipe, you need to think in 5 voices, not 3. Each chanter can switch from 1 to 2 voices at the drop of a hat.

    muses
  • Cf plus haut: "La reconstruction de Yuri Terenyi est très convaincante !"

    Je ne suis pas tout à fait d'accord avec vous, car la reconstruction de Yuri possède deux bourdons et deux chanteurs de tonalités différentes là où la sculture nous montre un seul bourdon et deux chanteurs de même tonalité.
    Sa reconstruction est à mon avis plus proche de la cornemuse de l'église de Rinkeby - ce qu'il a lui même revendiqué lors d'une conversation sur FB et même si cette dernière dispose de trois bourdons.

  • Barnaby, the two drones a fifth apart present exactly the same problem as what became THE problem after thirds reared up their ugly head in music. (OK, don't take it too seriously, but you all know what I mean). You have two drones tuned in pure fifth. Now you need to place a third in between. That means that there will be a major third up, with a minor third down, or the other way around. In any case you have both a minor third and a major third present at the same time. there simply is no way (in this universe, with the laws of physics, more specifically acoustics, being what they are (I always thought that this particular universe has been made using very shoddy craftsmanship, think about the pi (3.14.....) just what kind of a number that is?...  ... but I digress...))so anyway, there is no earthly way to have either of the thirds pure. (Or rather, you can have one of them pure, but the other will be out by some 70 cents or so.)

  • for the 1500s and clearly earlier!

    I'd be surprised if cylindrical and conical chanters didn't co-exist - cylindrical for quieter contexts, such as solo vocal accompaniment, and conical for outdoor contexts where loudness mattered.

    With two chanters, you don't really need more than one drone - each chanter becomes a drone when you play staccato. And you can change the pitch of this "virtual" drone by lifting a lower finger, or switch it off by playing legato. Great fun! Many possibilities - if composing for a double chanter bagpipe, you need to think in 5 voices, not 3. Each chanter can switch from 1 to 2 voices at the drop of a hat.

This reply was deleted.