Small Pipe Workshop in Hexham

The Small pipe workshop went really well last Saturday in Hexham (Northumbria). The students engaged with the exercises very well and I think got a lot out of it…well I know they did. I got good feedback from them and the boss of Core Music, who ran the event. I would like to do more events there, and do a follow up workshop for the Small pipes, as I feel the students wanted to go further with their playing. They managed to get a regular bellow technique; they got 2 drones in harmony and the beginnings of a steady chanter note, not bad for 3 hours. Northumbrian/closed fingering was popular; I guess Scottish Small pipe fingering is more popular over the border. If lessons could be held regular then I feel they could advance quickly.

Newcastleton Folk Festival 2015 (review)

I had a different, and in many ways a better festival this year. I did not attend the sessions like I normally do. I found last year a bit frustrating with all the noise (drunks not music) and a lack of places to play (for quieter instruments) all added to me walking aimlessly around. This year was different the organizers had added new venues to the places to play, one was a “quiet room” not in the main square (away from the pubs) but where you could have a tune. Also there were fewer drunks there this year and possibly less musicians (?) so I could find places to play.

I found the marquee empty on a Saturday morning so I played my Northumbrian small pipes, I played and played and slowly people began to sit down, after 2 hours of playing the tent was getting full, a few more musicians arrived and added more… then I left, found another piper and played on the grass (Border pipes and Scottish small pipes) and spoke to some people about the festival, piping and things in general. I met with a Northumbrian piper and had a few tunes together.

The after-hours sessions were great, songs and music, which went on until the early hours (got to bed 3am both nights) and on the Sunday night the “survivors session” we finally got out at 5.30am... and excellent sessions (I even sang while playing the pipes… a rare occasion).

The workshop went well, 10am to 12.30pm was useful to the students and myself (I even got a hug off one of them) what was apparent was the lack of contact the individual pipers had (isolation) and no advice or after care help; something they found the workshop was useful for. After the workshop we chatted and played until about 4pm!

I learn a lot too about my pipes and the adjustments I need to make, but the comments about the pipes were good and positive. I will make some mouth blown pipes too incase they will be needed. I will look for more festivals in the future and other venues to attract the students.

Completed Small Pipes for Newcastleton Folk Festival 2015

There are 7 completed Small pipes for the Newcastleton Folk Festival. I have covered most of the bellows with a fabric except for 2 of them.

Bubinga chanter, cherry and cedar drones. The bellows were donated by a friend this is the only item that I did not make.

Indian Red Wood chanter and drones, the deeper colour on the chanter is due to oiling. The bellows I made in 1994 in Lithuania

Bubinga chanter and drones, cedar wood decoration on drones

Cherry chanter and drones, walnut wood decorations on drones

Bubinga chanter, cherry drones with Indian red wood decorations

Indian red wood chanter and drones, cherry wood decorations on drones, cedar wood decoration on chanter

Cedar chanter and drones, this was the first bagpipe I made in Spain in 2014

Making Bagpipes: Workshop Leaflet

A leaflet will be given out at the workshop giving contact details and letting people know about other workshop ideas...

"The intension of the workshop is promote the Small pipe tradition to people who have an interest in learning the Northumbrian Small pipes, Scottish Small pipes, Leicestershire Small pipes and other types of bellow-blown pipes. The aim is to provide sets of pipes to develop the student’s playing techniques and offering 3 levels of classes:

The 1st level is the total beginner’s workshop to show the techniques for starting to play.
The 2nd level is a workshop to introduce tunes from the Scottish Borders.
The 3rd level is to teach more demanding tunes and build a varied repertoire.
Within the 3rd level there is the opportunity for the student to buy their small pipes and to continue the classes privately.

(The small pipes in the workshop are made by myself and are of different quality depending on the level of workshop).

To learn more about the musical activities, concerts, lessons and workshops visit my web page http://ethnopiper.blogspot.co.uk or email me at ethnopiper@gmail.com"

Bagpipe Society Blowout, 2015

It was my first time at the ‘blowout’ (Polesworth, Tamworth, England) in a beautiful surrounding of the Abbey. Each piping culture has its traditions and this was a new tradition for me. Here there was a different style and feeling about the music, pipes, people and events, perhaps a more European style or perhaps an ‘English” style. I say English as it is a reinvention of a tradition that died out. And the reintroduction of the tradition has established a very firm and loyal group of people to their type of music.

I was expecting a heavy influence of French music, but I was surprised to see a good mix of styles in the form of workshops and concerts: Northumbrian/Borders; Occitan from the French Pyrenees; Hungarian; Irish; Welsh... these music’s were played on a type of bagpipe that I have a problem in naming.

They call it a “Border pipe” but I cannot see where their border is exactly? The majority played a type of pipe similar to the French/Belgium bagpipe: mouth blown or bellows blown, conical bored chanter, 2 drones, over-blown into a 2nd octave. Not so loud, plastic reeds, no African Blackwood in sight (made a nice change too) therefore the sound was mellow, perhaps they could call it a “French-Anglo Pipe” as the makers are English and the pipe is modeled on the French/Belgium style.

The makers present (selling their pipes) were in the main hall alongside a Society stall, a flute maker, an Occitan maker. Zampogna maker. There was a 2nd hand section of music books, CDs, cassettes...

One of the workshops I attended was a ‘beginner’s workshop’ to sort out teething problems players were having. This was very informative as it gave me a chance to see how the workshop was structured (with relation to my own workshop); I was also looking for some advice about my Spanish gaita as it was sharp in the bottom notes.  It came apparent that the information was only for a select type of pipes from a select few pipe makers. A general knowledge was not there of conical bored pipes.  The Society was open to all pipes but in reality (at this blowout in particular) only certain types of pipes were represented. Sometimes it felt like if you did not have a bagpipe from a certain type of maker then you were excluded from activities and advice, there was no advice about the Gaita. Also it presumed that because I had “asked the question” that I did not know anything about pipes or conical bored pipes, and I was told to go and "ask (someone) and you will find that the pipes are fine" (meaning “it is you who is wrong” well it seems I know as much as the person who is giving the advice, as he did not know either, a little condescending I thought).

The only sessions available were in D or G, G being the more popular of the 2. G pipes are common in French music, a large bass G. Which is fine, they sounded beautiful. But there are other pipes and I would have liked to have seen a session where any type of pipe could have been played... a few people had brought their sackpipa (key on A minor), , Spanish gaita (C),  , I had with me bagpipes in A minor, C, A major, D, F, and C minor... but no G. I did attend the Irish workshop which was in D, but others I could not. This did not lesson my interest. Other pipes present were a Welsh Pibgorn (D), Leistershire Small pipe (D), Italian Zampogna and there was a Dudy from the Czech/Slovak regions.

The D session on the Saturday was titled “English Session” this apparently is a new occurrence as only English melodies are played (I did not know this at the time and I played a Catalan melody which was met with a silence). After I realized my “mistake” I tried to play along with the English melodies, which there was a lot of. This was the biggest surprise of the weekend, a firm selection of English tunes were being played by all. The Northumbrian tunes came at the end of the night when they had played out all the English tunes. This is great as it establishes a firm melody base of for an English tradition, and leaves the Northumbrian tradition a little apart (which I feel is more accurate as it is more akin to the Scottish/English Border tradition).


Another surprise for me was the Occitan music and bagpipes. 2 makers from the French side of the Pyrenees were offering their instruments for sale, CDs, workshops and concerts. It was a music I only knew a little about (and only recently). They seemed to have a cross-over from the Catalan and Aragon side of the Pyrenees with the Sac de Gemecs (made from a fruit wood, a type of apple) and the Gaita de Boto (complete with snakeskin and girls dress). But also they had their own type of pipes a very large bagpipe in F with a large drone with a knitted “flecco” (decoration). A shepherd’s bagpipe without a drone, deep sound, sad sound, lovely (I had heard this on the Spanish side of the Pyrenees). And the Boha bagpipe with the drone apart of the chanter which can play 2 notes... (Therefore is it really a drone?). Also there was a variant of this having 2 melody pipes and 1 ‘drone’ built into the chanter, single reeds, polyphonic sound.

In the sessions I heard the Welsh Pibgorn, a dingle reeded instrument, 1 octave mouth blown with a distinctive sound, a beautiful decorated horn cut away at the bottom of the chanter, with cylindrical bored chanter.  Their melodies were not dissimilar to a Breton tune, in a minor mode.

The Hungarian duo (pipes and hurdy gurdy) were fantastic players, (I had seen them at the Piping Live Festival in Glasgow a few years previous) tight in their music and ‘tuning’ (an important lesson for us all). Played beautifully with traditional and composed pieces, improvisations and structured parts. The pipes were not so dissimilar to the Occitan Boha. With the Hungarian ’suggesting’ that the Boha was taken from their pipes. They look similar... but who’s came first is a question too far...

My final observation of the weekend was that there is a danger of the “small pipes” becoming obsolete in time due to their quiet nature. Those who had them were drowned out by the conical chanters. This is a reflection of what is happening in sessions too all over the country. If you are “not heard”, why play them? The highland pipe makers are increasing the volume of the “session small pipes” but not so with pipe makers (although there are exceptions). Perhaps the small-pipes need to become more assertive, and insist the venues, meetings, and festivals are predominantly ‘small-pipe sessions’ the same way the ‘English Session’ has become?

Bagpipe Making: Small Drone Parts

I have been making ‘small drone parts’ over the past few days. The original plan was only to have bass drones for the workshop, but the small drone adds to the techniques and is an important part in learning how to play. It can be a little difficult tuning a 2nd drone easily and successfully, an out of tune drone is annoying as an out of tune chanter, so tuning ones ear to a harmony can be useful to know.

I am experimenting with woods, mixing them together, joining them together and playing with outer designs. I do like making the wooden parts.

I made another bellow, still trying different techniques out, experimenting with different glues and ways of assembling in a less messy manner.

If I get the time I will use it with the workshop, but at the moment I am finalizing 7 sets and if I can squeeze in an 8th all well and good.

Bagpipe Making: Tuning Chanters

The chanters are being tested to see if they are in the right key. My original idea was to have them all playing in the key of D (a common key for sessions) but after assembling them and testing them out I am finding they are quiet for sessions (due to wood type and reed limitations). So I am forgetting about unifying the chanters in the same key, I will make each of them in tune with the drones so each player can practice by alone (and not as a group).

Thinking more about it this makes more sense as anyone coming with their own small-pipe will be in a different tuning (possibly F, C, Bb, G, A) to my D set,  it only takes 1 key difference to make the group sound discordant. I cannot cater for this. It will be easier to ask the student to play alone, and I can see to them individually, and occasionally to get them together as a group for general discussion.

The workshop will not only be “hands on” practice, but informative with maintenance tips, buying guide, types of pipes etc.  a general introduction. It is catering for the “person who is intending to own a set of Small pipes in the future”. This workshop cannot give them hours of practice (which is what is needed) it can give them ideas on what to look out for and to suggest the steps to practice when they have their own sets.

Bagpipe Making: Help in Making, near Completion

What a difference a few days make when someone comes and helps with the making. Leila flew over from Spain to help with the sewing of the outer bags; she also helped with other aspects of making. By the end of the 3 days we completed all of the assembly, the finer tasks of clack valves, blow pipes, belts for bellows, decoration on the bellows, a new design for the bellows, and securing the wooden drone parts to the metal sliding section.

What is left to do is to drill and fine tune the chanters against the drones, and complete making the reeds. Last week I was wondering if I could complete everything in time but having someone help and encourage and just to bounce ideas helped get through the mountain of jobs that often overwhelmed me. Sometimes, I just froze due to the amount of jobs still to do.

1 bag had to be discarded due to leaking. It was an old bag, an experiment from Spain. It will be easier to make a new bag with the current method than to try and find the leaks.

The next jobs will be tuning of the chanters and making reeds for the drones. It is the last and trickiest task to do.

Bagpipe Making: Bellows (1)

I finished gluing the leather to the cheeks of the 1st bellow, and then I left it to dry over night. It was beginning to look like the finished bellow. Instead of screwing the leather to the cheeks, I inserted safety pins into the cheeks to hold the leather while the glue dried. This worked very well and took a lot quicker to do. I can simply pull the pins out and insert the screws later then the glue is dry.

I then started on the 2nd bellow (my own design). I connected the two ends of the leather by stitching and smearing silicone between the folds and over the stitching, and left it to dry over night.

The glued cheek covering (a green velvet) that was done the previous day had glued smooth and came out nice.

I took the stocks out of the bags, ready for dying them to give them some uniformity in design.

Bagpipe Making: Bellows

I had some success yesterday, I began by redrawing the plans for the new bellow cheeks, and I also standardized the plans for the leather, ignoring the Northumbrian style as well as the Irish bellow style. I thought why not experiment with my own style.

After drawing the plans, I cut the leather to the new plans.

I started on the Irish bellows, I glued the leather to the cheeks first instead of adding the screws to the cheeks, and then I loosely place the screws to keep the leather in place, and left it to dry for 24 hours.

I drilled the new holes in the new bellow cheeks and put a covering over the wood for decoration.

I then went to the lathe and finished off the bass drone, my best yet, a nice combination of woods (bubinga and cedar).

Bellow Trouble

Sometimes the work can go smoothly, other times like today it can be really slow and frustrating. The final bass drone is still yet to be completed due to the gluing of the ornamentation.

The fixing of the leather to the bellow cheeks had to be postponed due to the cheeks splitting/cracking. I had to cover the cheek with glue; hopefully this will seal and strengthen the sides making the wood stronger for the screws to go in without splitting the wood. I do not want to revert to the traditional Northumbrian method as I know this works; I want to try new things out. But it is a very slow process having to measure the leather around the cheeks, then sealing and sewing the two ends of the leather together (which I did today), then fixing the leather to the edges of the cheeks.

I do not want to abandon the process just yet, I want to see if I can do it, but it is a method I will not try in the future. Irish pipers have this method for making their bellows, it works fine for them, but for me I need a different system for making bellows.


My own system I will try, straight after I have completed the ‘Irish method’. I have started it already but it is taking time due it is my first try and I am working ‘blind’, after this one it should be smoother.

I dyed and varnished the stocks to make them seem uniform in the bags. This is not essential but from afar it will look presentable; they look like a dark oak colour now.

Cheeks for New Bellows

Today I glued the bass drone pieces together using bubinga and cedar woods, it looks attractive. I will shape it tomorrow then I will have the 7 bass drones made.

I made 7 bellows cheeks today, cut them and sanded them down ready to apply the material. I did away with the curved ends; I want my own design, something to make them a little different. The construction is my own idea, so I might as well make the design a little different too.

The glued fabric on the 2 bellows cheeks I did yesterday was a success, it is ready to apply the “leather” part now…. the tricky bit. 

Workshop Venue

Yesterday I completed shaping another bass drone this time with bubinga and cherry. After taking advice from the “Bagpipe Makers Exchange” forum, I began different tasks to rest the eyes and mind so not to make too many mistakes in the future.

I worked on the bellows by drilling the outlet holes and gluing fabric over the cheeks and letting them dry for 24 hours. Then I went back to the bass drone making, cutting the wood, long boring and shaping it down to 19mm. This will be my 7th and final bass drone for the workshop.

At Newcastleton, I looked around the venue space where the workshop will be held. There was a leather couch type seating around the wall which is good for spacing out the students so their pipes will not overlap each other too much.

The room also took me back to the 1980s Festivals where they used to hold the Northumbrian small pipe competitions, times change, next year it will no longer be a venue but flats.

Bass Drone and Bent Reamer

I finished off the bass drone from yesterday, it was gluing over night and today I turned it down and added decoration. There is a mixture of woods: European cedar and cherry, a white wood mixed with a light pink wood, it looks nice. That makes 5 bass drones in total completed.

An accident occurred yesterday as I was re-boring the drones to clean out some chaff. The reamer came out of the lathe and hit the tool rest; the reamer was bent and came out of the chuck. It happened so fast I could do nothing, luckily I have another. Was it tiredness which made me not fix it securely or just one of those things?

Today, I used the Visio programme and redesigned the measuring and cutting of the bubinga wood for another bass drone. I will mix the woods again, this time using the cherry as a contrast wood to the bubinga.

I long bored the bubinga and choose a piece of cherry to complete the length of the drone. I will try and join them now and glue them before I leave for a folk session at Monkhill tonight.

Drone Design with Computers

I spent too much time over a drone yesterday. The boring and rough turning was done the day before, so all was left to do was shape it, but this is where the time went, designing and turning all has to be done in my head then acted upon; and since it has been months since I had made a drone I was again remembering how to do it. I had altered the design since last time too by using new measurements and new forms; using my chisels instead of the tool post and cutters. It was a success, it looked ok, until the last piece was to be turned and here (again) tiredness took over and I glued the finishing piece and left it for the night. I should have left the gluing until today, as it was not long enough. Not to worry the beauty about wood is that you can redo it.

Later I decided to revisit the design of the drone, not in my head, but on the computer by using a “vsd” format. This allows quite detailed drawings to be experimented with, and a working blueprint to be achieved ‘on paper’. So I am hoping today I will have gained some time and drones will not take so much time.

I started working on my new idea for the bellows, I submerged the wood into a barrel of water to make it more supple, then I laid heavy weights on it to iron out any lumps and bumps, and then let it to dry.

Drone Configuration and Melody Types

An interesting talk with a young piper yesterday in Carlisle prompted me to write a little about drone tuning. Our conversation centered on the types of drones one should use and for which melodies. He was interested in using the drone configuration of A, d’, a’’ (Bass A, tenor D, alto A) with his ‘A’ Scottish small pipes. This drone configuration is not unusual in the European style but it is with Scottish small pipes. When I first heard about it I was skeptical, there would be a clash of sounds, but it was not as bad as what I thought as I listened to him play.

The problem is the amount of melodies he could play, not many would fit the harmonic arrangement. The Highland tunes would be more willing to blend in with the drones especially the one which were routed in the D note, but the Northumbrian and Border melodies that used the C# (3rd note of the A scale) a lot clashed with the D drone. He thought it sounded ok, but I begged to differ.

When I started to play the Northumbrian small pipes in G I looked for melodies that played with the A drones (a’, a’’) there was not many melodies either, the root note of the melody being the A note on the chanter. With the drone playing the root note it harmonized with the rest of the scale. Not a problem.

My young friend was interested in a small pipe that “fitted all situations”, I was too, many years ago and in some respects the addition of owning chanters reflect this still. But perhaps this has been tried before, in the past, and the best that was achieved by the tradition was a drone configuration of A, a’, a’; giving a strong root note for different types of modes/scales to be explored. For me it was interesting to see a “work in progress” but I wonder if it will be followed up in a few years time… I hope so.

Drones, Bellows and Reeds

I have not turned any drones for a couple of months so yesterday morning I had to spend most of my time trying to remember how to do it, or in what order I should do it. Also, within those months I have changed my making process and now I do things differently. What is the point (besides documentation) in writing anything down, to remember the process, when it is changing all the time?

With the new drill I bought the boring and drilling went very well, I did 2 sections of wood which will become a tenor drone.

Later that day I got given some wood which will become bellow cheeks. A change of design has been growing in my mind for several weeks now, to make the design of the bellows more airtight. My present system is an adaptation of the traditional method, but I have this idea and it will not go away! What I need to do is try it out, and this wood will be ideal for that. The process is not quicker but I believe it will be a cleaner and more secure/airtight that the traditional method.

I bought screws for the bellows cheeks, not the ones I was looking for, but they will do for the traditional bellows. This is the problem of making pipes in 2 countries (Spain and the UK), there is not the same product in both countries, not the same measurements and not the same price, and availability is not the same either. These screws will do for now until I can source better ones.

Later on that afternoon, I met a piper and we went to the park in Carlisle, the meeting was an interesting one but for the point of this blog I noticed that the reed I had made was not so bad. It was louder than what I had thought and the tone was sweeter. There were some problems with it (too sharp in the chanter) but from the point of view of making I was pleased.

Removable Chanter Stocks

Yesterday I made 5 removable chanter stocks; these stocks are made for each chanter so they protect the reed if removed from the bag.

In hindsight I could have made only the bag/chanter stock, but this is not only about the workshops, it is also about learning and creating a finish product I am pleased with. The bag/chanter stock would have been quicker but the chanter would have to fit each chanter stock exactly and I would not be able to interchange the chanters in different bags if there were any deviation in size. This might have been limiting if a student wants to try Northumbrian fingering and then they want to try Scottish small pipe fingering… they would have to change bags, bellows etc. which is all time consuming. With the removable option I can simple take one chanter out of the bag and add it to another without damaging the reed (most damage done to the reed is when it is removed from the bag).

As I was completing the 4th stock it suddenly jumped out of the chuck in the lathe and crushed itself against the tool post. Tiredness and lack of concentration can be dangerous. It is the first ruined piece of work so far… well there has been many failed experiments but this was my first broken experiment. It was a valuable lesson “take a break and rest”. Bad things happen very fast indeed!

Stocks and Newcastleton Folk Festival... it's on !

At the end of the day I had 5 stocks completed, the drilling on the wood lathe went ok but the shaping and finalizing the stocks on the metal work lathe took the time. Also I had problems with the motor, it kept on speeding up then slowing down, I had to reduce the rpms to keep it stable, and so I was cutting slower. Anyways, it is progress and still on schedule.

Today I finalized the dates of the workshop at Newcastleton Folk Festival, so it is official, I will be giving a beginners workshop on the “Bellows blown Small-pipes”. The aim of the workshop is to introduce the student to the techniques of bellows blown piping, with ideas on bellows technique, bag pressure, holding a note, keeping the drones steady, and if there is time playing a scale… basically everything except learning melodies….that is for another workshop. With these techniques one can adapt to any of the bellows blown bagpipes (Irish, Border, Northumbrian, Scottish Small pipes, Pastoral, Dudy, Cornemuse, Mussette, etc.), as the basics are the same. If you are buying a set of bellows blown pipes with these techniques you can see if the pipes are in tune, working, playable… without the basic techniques this is impossible.

Stocks, Stocks and more Stocks

I realize I am starting late in documenting my attempts at making “small pipes” it is better to start now while I am still in the process of making, than to leave it and forget what I have done. The idea is to make at least 6 sets of small pipes to use in workshops at folk festivals. I think between 6 and 10 sets are a realistic number, 6 being the minimum to start with then increase it if I have the time. I get the chance to give my first workshop at the Newcastleton Folk Festival in July 2015.

There has been a lot of experimentation over the past year, but a few months ago when I was told I could do the workshop I had to get together the experiments (that worked) and start assembling them. I should also add that most of these experiments were done in Madrid, Spain. There I had tools and wood easily to hand, on returning to the UK I had to source all the materials again and things were harder to find here, and some things were not possible to get, so I had to begin again and experiment. Time was running out but today I thought to allocate time to each stage, for example last week and this week I dedicate my time to making stocks and by the end of the week I move onto the next stage eg. Drones. By this method I should complete at least some if not all of the small pipes in time, leaving enough time for tuning! So I began today by making stocks for each bag that did not have them, and I will work my way through the missing stocks systematically until all have them.

I have made 6 bags so far (I have made more, if I need them), I have inserted some of the chanter stocks, blow pipe stocks and drone stocks, but as I go along I notice I have to do little changes to them. For example, originally I had made the internal diameter of the blowpipe sock 16mm but I later noticed that it would have been better to make it 18mm so I have to enlarge it. Not big jobs but multiply it by 6 it can take a few hours. This is what I mean by “experiments”.

Today I made 4 bag stocks: 3 chanter stocks and 1 drone stock. The drone stock took most of the day due to slowly boring the stock then shaping the outside. I had an old bag which was precut, so I had to match the diameter of the hole in the bag, I did not have a large diameter piece of wood and when I found one it took some time to prepare it for drilling.

The 3 chanter stocks were not a problem; these can be tired into the bags when I get some better twine. This will complete what is required for the 6 sets.

This morning I placed the 6 bags on the floor and placed beside them the things I have made so far. I had made about 3 sets but something was wrong with all of them, so I will have to take the stocks out of the bags and redo them at a later date. It was a useful exercise as I could write down what is still needed to do, and what things I need to prioritize. The 3 bellows I have already are nearly complete I need to make one more here (as I have the cheeks cut already) and do the rest in Spain.