This is perhaps the most remarkable pipe chanter I have ever come across. As I have been told, it is one of the pipe chanters played by Shotts that were also the subject matter surrounding Shott's controversial fallout with the McAllisters brothers. I have been told (and I am quoting here) that back then Shotts P/M R.Mathieson was not satisfied with the chanters and that offended the McAllisters brothers, so they recalled all the chanters that were loaned to Shotts. Hence, R.Mathieson wrote the tune "Farewell to Camraw" ("Warmac" backwards!), which is a bit disrespectful to the McAllister brothers.
The chanter in my possession, along with the rest of the batch used by Shotts, carries a double hallmark on the silver sole - one on top of the sole and one below - which is very unusual. Every chanter in the same batch also carries a unique number on the bottom of the sole. It is not known what the number represents. The very chanter which I acquired has a number 2 inscribed onto the bottom side of the sole - as I was told this normally stands for the Pipe sergent's chanter.
I was very taken with the chanter the first time I heard it played to me. It is very compatible with most makes of reeds. The notes are very true and balanced regardless of the pitch of the chanter (the chanter pitches at 468Hz to 480Hz depending on reeds and external conditions) and the chanter sounds very bright and full. It is very forgiving with many reeds - very good with Ezee, G1, MG and Warnock reeds. It plays and sounds like very piper's dream. The chanter is particularly good with Brian Lamond's reeds, but then his reeds are good with many chanters!
The external profile and shape of the chanter is excellent too - a straight body in the top hand which I prefer. The holes spacing is almost identical to a Naill blackwood chanter which I have, so it feels great in the fingers too.
WAR-MAC. The 3 combs on the bowl stand for the three McAllister brothers.
I was viewing a set of 1/2 size D.Glens in full ivory that belonged to a gentleman piper in Perth and he kindly showed me the most outrageous and stunning set of pipes I will probably ever see in my life - I was told it is a set of golden age Hendersons in ebony, ivory projection mounts, chased and repoussed silver in ivy leaf pattern. Not a bad day that was!
This set of Atherton bagpipes, purchased from Dave in 2013, is the best set of pipes I have ever owned. It is a set of the Premier model and originally came with imitation ivory mounts. The plain silver ferrules and slides are original. Atherton bagpipes without a doubt are the best pipes the world has ever seen; I have to turn it into a full silver set. Unfortunately, when I contacted Dave silver projection mounts are not offered anymore, so I have to find my own solution.
Remounting silver projection mounts has not been an easy project. Pipe makers source their mounts from silversmiths who supply them in standard sizes and pipe makers turn their pipes to suit the mounts, not the other way round. It was very difficult to get silver projection mounts of a customised size from suppliers on a one-off basis and most refurbishers are not willing to work on existing pipe makers' pipe for very obvious reasons. Most refurbishers advised me to consult the maker for such a project. (However Dave does not make or supply silver mounts anymore...) It was back to square one.
I was very fortunate to have the help from art clay silver maestro, Ms Morana Lee (http://www.silver-craft.hk/index.php?lang=en), to make the silver mounts and the 8 mounts were made, over the course of 6 months, to the precise dimension of my pipes and the shape of the original Atherton plastic mounts was also perfectly replicated.
The mounts are solid, hand-formed, art clay silver which is 99.9% pure silver - much higher purity than 925 sterling silver. The silver mounts on average weigh at a hefty 112grams each and the full set weighs like a tank!
This post is about the state of affairs before modification of the holes on a Donaldson Master chanter. I must flag up a disclaimer here that this article (and all other articles to be followed henceforth) should not be construed as a guide but is merely a memoir of the experiments or endeavours attempted by an inquisitive piper.
The Donaldson Master chanter is a nice chanter in many ways - in my opinion it has the best finger position I have ever come across and a slim and straight main body (down to the D hole if you watch the video below) - so it feels fantastic in the fingers. It has a distinctly clear and balanced voice. The finish and craftsmanship as shown by the chanter is second to none.
It goes without saying that the chanter sounds good too. See P/M Donaldson playing his chanter.
- the making of the chanter by the great man himself :
A bit of background to the chanter:
See the stamp
What is interesting of the chanter is the zoomorphic hand-engraved silver sole. As you can see from the photo, the sole is stamped P.H with a Glasgow halmark, a prancing lion facing the left, a thistle and a small letter "b". That dates the sole back to 1924 according to the useful guide by Island bagpipes (http://islandbagpipe.com/csi/?page_id=736). I am sure the sole is a retrofit on a new chanter which was purchased first-hand from the College of Piping in 2011/2012. The chanter has a bright sound and pitches at a good modern solo pitch within the region of 478Hz to 482Hz.
Unfortunately, the F and High G are consistently sharp and there is a lot of tape covering the F and high G, rendering the top hand very thin which is a shame. Similar problems have been cited by other users of the chanter (http://www.patrickmclaurin.com/wordpress/?p=1000).
Therefore I would need to do the followings:
1.) "move" the two holes down the chanter by carving the bottom of the F and high G holes and cover the top with tape to make the notes flatter.
2.) enlarge the holes a wee bit - I hope this will help give it a thicker and clearer voice, and clearer gracenotes as well.
It has to be mentioned that much of what makes a good chanter sound also depend on many other intricate factors such as the bore profile and throat of the chanter, chanter reed, set-up of the pipes (e.g. bag, drone reeds) and drone harmonics etc. A usual chanter in my pipes would sound a lot better in Roddy's pipes because a good drone harmonics will lift and reinforce the chanter. But this is beyond the scope of this post. Moreover, lest we forget that the most important thing to a good sound is not in the set-up but is in the playing. A good, steady playing is key. Of course how you set up the pipes and chanter is a pre-requisite to good playing. If you use the wrong bag, a blowpipe of the wrong length, wrong reed then it won't be too much good if you have good playing. This is a fictitious cycle. Good playing has to come hand in hand with (the skill of) good set-up etc. But I digress here.
Many top players before us have to tweak his own chanter to get the
sound desired. In fact I do not know a top solo player who does not have
to manipulate his chanter. I strongly believe that every serious piper should, amongst many other things, learn to perfect his own sound and to be able to work towards that goal.
