Learning Uilleann Pipes as a Highland Bagpipe Player
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- Опубліковано 30 чер 2024
- I've had some questions from people about how learning the Irish Uilleann Pipes (UP) was different from the Scottish Great Highland Bagpipes (GHP). I tried to address most of those questions in this video, as well as provide some answers to questions and information that will be helpful to someone just beginning or looking to get into Uilleann piping.
I have also provided 2 great beginner tunes to play along with at the end.
If you have any questions, please feel free to leave a comment with your questions. I'll answer them to the best of my ability.
I am not great at speaking... Please pardon the "Ums" and "Ahs". Public speaking is not a strength of mine. Most of my future videos will focus on just playing, however I really wanted to address some questions and get people information they needed to get started.
Please excuse the voice audio quality. I had recorded with a proper mic, but the audio would go out of sync as the video proceeded so you are stuck with the camera mic. The music parts are better quality. I am learning and will keep improving my content.
Please like and subscribe. I have plans for an epic video when I reach 100 subscribers
Chapters:
0:00 - Introduction
01:18 - My History with Highland Pipes
02:57 - Uilleann Pipes Information
06:11 - Differences between GHB and Uilleann Pipes
07:37 - Challenges Learning the Uilleann Pipes
15:10 - Amazing Grace
16:15 - Jim Ward's Jig
17:42 - Bloopers
Great video, I’m so glad to see more educational content for the uilleann pipes like this! Keep up the good work!
Thank you! I'll try to keep putting content out! Thanks for your support and checking out my videos!
What a wonderful introduction! Very informative! Keep up the great work and good luck in your journey!! You sounded great and it was inspirational!
Thanks for the kind and encouraging words. Much appreciated!
Thank you for this! I'm an uilleann piper, but teach a lot of people with Highland pipe backgrounds, so your insights are helpful to those of us from "the dark side," too. Great job!
Thanks kindly! I am glad it can provide some insight! Definitely great to see "both sides" of the puzzle. It's amazing how different the styles of playing are. I still feel like a fish out of water sometimes.
Excellent video. Thank you. You are making a difference…keep going
Thank you very much for your kind words! To a beginner in UA-cam this means a lot to me. Much appreciated.
❤
I got a used set of Seth Gallagers for about $7000 USD. Several relatively local pipe makers never responded to me. Its a good set, but I have no clue how to tune the drones or regulators on it. I learned a couple easy tunes on the chanter, but this is a very challenging instrument, even for a highland piper. Its very frustrating and its going to be a long time before anything that sounds good is going to come out of my instrument. I did manage to get one lesson from a great uilleann piper who was visiting my area, but the online lessons from OAIM have been very useful to me.
Hey! Thanks for your comment! Congrats on the Seth Gallagher set. I have heard good things about his work, and they sound really good. Unfortunately, I believe he's stopped making pipes at this time, so you've got something really special! I agree with you 100%, even with highland experience, it's a handful. It will get better with time, keep at it!
I don't have much experience with regulators yet to offer any advice. However, I did make a video on drone tuning, i've just unlisted it as I wasn't too happy with it. It may over explain some things, but in case it offers any help/info for you I will share the link: ua-cam.com/video/HFraz1kThZA/v-deo.html
I have seen the OAIM, looks very interesting. Love to hear more about why you like them.
Cheers,
Dan
@@DanielCaza Well the videos are great because you can watch them over and over again. And rewind the same part 100 times if you need to. And you can work on something for as long as you want before moving onto the next thing. With private lessons, your teacher shows you something and then he is gone for a week. With the videos, your teacher is always there with you to show you again.... The private lessons are better for getting actual feedback. Someone to make sure you are doing things right, help with things you are struggling with, and to show you how to set up the instrument.
I just got a David Daye practice set and I’m loving it. Played on a whistle and a practice Scottish small pipe while I waited the year to get my pipes, big help
Awesome! Congrats on the new pipes!
@@DanielCaza thanks! Thanks for the vids on piping. I love seeing your progress
Very cool! Great video! I’m a curious highland piper 😅
Awesome, thanks for watching and the comment! Curiosity is good! If your interested, I highly suggest trying to find some Uilleann Pipers close to you and give them a shot! Your experience on the GHB should help a lot!
Yes it's a different type of Bagpipe. This specific Bagpipe is meant to be played Seated as it's heavier than the Great Highland Bagpipe.
Well said. Thank you
Thanks for watching!
I'm a highland and gaida player, but recently got a used Fred Morrison practice set. Lots of fun to play with the extended note range, goes well with other instruments and you don't really need earplugs. One issue from Highland to Uilleann however is remembering to keep your pinky down on the low hand
Hello! Super excited to hear you have obtained a set of Uilleann Pipes, congratulation! Sounds like you have a great head start with your other piping background. The fingering will come easier with time. When I switch back and forth between pipes, it takes me a few seconds to revert fingering, but I can remember things feeling very awkward at first. I was doing the pinky thing too, and also messing up the fingering for the back D (high A on highland pipes).
I am not sure how similar/different gaida pipe fingering is, but keeping 3 finger patterns in your head should prove to be great brain exercises. haha
This is just what I was looking for. Thanks for sharing your journey. Could you tell us the name of the tune at the beginning?
Thanks for the kind words. I hope to revisit this video soon as I have learned so much since I originally made it. However, I am glad it it still useful to people. The tune at the beginning is the Braveheart movie theme. Here is a more complete clip: ua-cam.com/video/x_DQNINhIzo/v-deo.html
Cheers.
@@DanielCaza Thanks, Daniel.
I have a set of these pipes, as well as the Highland pipes, but I also have a pair of Northumbrian ones as well. Have you ever tried a set of those? I have moved away from the island pipes now, I hardly ever bother with them.I prefer the bellows ones now
Hello! Very nice, sounds like you have a nice collection of pipes! I have never had a chance to play the Northumbrian pipes, but I think they sound amazing and hope to have a chance one day. 🙂 I am definitely becoming more biased to bellow blown pipes too, but I think they all have their place and character.
I wonder if anybody has ever done a video about the differences between the Scottish pipes and the Northumbrian pipes? And what it is like to transition from one to the Northumbrian?
@@chrismills2012 Sound like a great video idea! I would love to see that if you ever make one!
The Gaels in Ireland and Scotland and the Scottish/English Border folk have a great and varied Piping tradition. It must all be preserved. This gentleman is making a big contribution in this regard. Go nÉirigh leis!
I agree…but we need to accept bagpipes appeared in England before than in Scotland or Ireland
I come from Border Scot-Irish ancestry and I agree with your sentiment.
@@DougSmileyVirgo ….and historically the truth
@@pemacal57 who cares?
@@kr1886 I care, if you do not mind
Are these louder than Northumbrian pipes? I want to find some that would be used indoors. I love bagpipes but play flute, oboe, piano, and organ. I have world bamboo flutes but want to some small pipes to play. I don’t even know how to find them and probably have none to hear first hand.
Hello! Thanks for your comment! I honestly have never heard Northumbrian pipes in person. I have seen some videos of Northumbrian and Uilleann pipes being played together. I believe Uilleann pipes are about the same volume, maybe slightly louder.
Uilleann Pipes are about equal in volume to fiddle/violin.
It sounds like you have a great musical background, if you ever decided to give them a try, your experience would give you a good head start!
If you are on facebook, try searching for the group "uilleann piping". You can likely find someone close to you there, and find good suggestions for pipe makers in your area.
@@DanielCaza thank you. I appreciate your help and the information.
sou Brasileiro e meu sonho é um dia poder possuir esse belo instrumento. é meu sonho de infância..
infelizmente aqui no Brasil não é fácil de encontrar.
You forgot one very important advantage of the Uilleann pipes, or really any bellows-blown bagpipes in general: because you inflate the bag with bellows instead of your mouth, it means that... well... you can actually play the pipes and sing at the same time! :))) In fact, I wouldn't at all be surprised if it's actually a whole tradition for people to do this, either on the uilleann pipes or any other bellows-blown pipes. There's actually a pretty decent video I found of a guy doing this, I can post the link in a comment if you're interested. I've also heard of a guy called Alan MacDonald who successfully does this; I think he does it with the uilleann pipes specifically.
You make a very good point! I don't have much of a singing voice, but it would absolutely be possible! I have seen a piper by the name of Jarlath Henderson do similar. Definitely feel free to post a link! I'd love to see.
Here is one of Jarlath: ua-cam.com/video/Gq07eVGYdbE/v-deo.html
@@DanielCaza OK, this is weird. Either I didn't see your reply, or I forgot that you replied to my initial comment. So I'm replying 4 months later! :))) It's OK though, because there's no expiration date for UA-cam comments hahahaha..
Anyways, I listened to that video of Jarlath Henderson you linked and it was really cool! That guy is a great vocalist. Some people have said solo bagpipes and vocals don't go together well... I completely disagree with that nonsense. The only time I'd say they don't go together well is if the player's singing voice isn't that good to listen to.
Regarding the link to the video I said I'd post: the guy in this video is not playing the Uilleann Pipes specifically, but rather some kind of "smallpipes". They do sound a tiny bit similar to the uilleann pipes though, so one might hear it and mistakenly think it's the uilleann pipes if they maybe weren't listening closely or whatever.
Anyways, here's the link to that video:
ua-cam.com/video/r8nV2FyPXRk/v-deo.html
Thought it might also be worth noting that I'm visually impaired to the point of complete blindness, so I can't actually see what's going on. Still, it's cool even just to listen to. Heck, I actually have never even touched a bagpipe before! I've spent most of my life around musical instruments in one form or another and so I've had the opportunity to touch them and try playing them, but bagpipes, of any kind, have not been one of them (not yet, anyway). That being said, I do understand how bagpipes "work", and really it's this working principle behind them that makes them rather fascinating to me. It's like, OK, you literally inflate a bag with air, similarly to how you'd blow up a balloon or something... and then you essentially 'squeeze' the bag to release the air out of it and then the air goes into the actual pipes that make music which are attached into the bag! I learned about that and I was like "huh? That's weird! A musical instrument that's played by squeezing air out of a bag like how you'd squeeze the air out of a sandwich bag or whatever!" :)))))
Oh, and then add to that the fact that you would then "re-inflate" the bag in order to keep the sound going (the challenge, though, is to do this without significantly releasing the 'squeezing force' on the bag or else the pipes will cough and sputter out).
Like seriously, how many other wind instruments work on this principle? None. Even the accordion, with its use of bellows as the air supply, doesn't work quite like this. With the accordion (or a pipe organ, for that matter), the air from the bellows basically goes 'immediately' to the sound-making part of the instrument; the air only has one path to take, basically. The same applies to any mouth-blown wind instrument. But then, if you want the sound to sustain for a long time without any obvious breaks or cuts, you can't really do that, because eventually your lungs or the bellows will run out of capacity. When your lungs or the bellows run out of capacity, something else has to take over for the air supply, for a little while, while you 'recharge' your lungs or the bellows with more air. That's the job of the "bag" part in a bagpipe. Rather than the air from your lungs or bellows going directly to the sound-making part, that air instead goes into an inflatable bag, and it's this bag that's really acting as the air supply for the sound-making part! The bag can still act as the air supply when your lungs or the bellows are empty (this is why you squeeze the bag with your elbow). No other wind instrument I can think of really works like this. It's very unique.
And now I'm just gonna keep rambling on and on for hours if I don't hurry it up and post this comment soon :)))))))))) hahaha!
'Uilleann' is a misnomer. They were originally called the Union Pipes, because they were a union between the chanter for melody, and the regulators for simple accompaniment, and their original purpose was indeed for leading and accompanying singing hymns in church!
@@Ubu987 First of all, "Uilleann" is the Irish word for "elbow", and this specific set of bagpipes is from Ireland. The term "uilleann pipes" is indeed correct, because it translates to "elbow pipes" or "pipes of the elbow"; it describes how they're operated. So... I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that 'uilleann' is a misnomer. May I suggest you do research before making claims like this? Yes, maybe they were originally called the "union pipes", but I'm not sure it's for the reason you mentioned... I've not seen that mentioned anywhere.
Secondly, this hardly even relates to my comments. I was never even hoping to argue about the validity of the name "Uilleann", and I was simply expressing my interest and/or fascination with this category of instruments. So... I really have no idea why you felt it was necessary to claim that "Uilleann is a misnomer", especially because that's not really true. I sincerely hope you're not intentionally trying to spread bogus information and start an argument or something.
I just found out about them by accident.
Uileann bagpipes are UNIQUE
Haha, they are for sure!
I have tiny hands so I guess I won’t be able to ever play small pipes?
Northumbrian pipes should be ok. Not quite the same but very similar.
@@michaelvout7813 thanks.
Thanks but I will stick with the GHB and small pipes at 66 I won't live long enough to master Uilleann Pipes
I think you can master anything you put your mind too, never too late to start. That being said, the GHB are a great place to be too! As long as you enjoy it, keep going!
well as a former Highland piper .I am coming along quite well on the Uilleann pipes,at the young age of 73 !
@@gordonrust9325 Bravo!!! Glad to hear!
So it’s pronounced “illan” pipes. Did not know that
Makes sense
I tried to see what uillean pipeslooked and sounded like, but this is just a talking head.
Hello, thank you for your feedback. I am sorry if this video did not meet your expectations. I am still fairly new to making videos. There is a clear view of the Uilleann pipes at 0:05 and some sound demonstrations at 15:10 and 16:15. I also feel this video (ua-cam.com/video/4MxFsk4sYM4/v-deo.html) may be more what you are looking for as a higher quality, educational production. Cheers.
Very interesting and well explained. Was cute that Sam was in video.
Haha. Thanks Dad. He was curious while I was filming and wanted attention.