Since most pipers play with a slightly flat high 'A' you may want to seat the reed in further to get it spot on as this could clash with other instruments also playing this note. For the best result, test in your pipes with the drones corked so you get the most accurate reading from your chanter. You'll want to either have a tuner on hand or a tone in B flat (pitch pipe, piano, sine wave) to help you adjust the low A to the correct pitch. Having a B flat reed to suit a higher pitched chanter works well or, having a dedicated B flat chanter will also make the challenge easier. McCallum, Shepherd, and G1 chanter options are available on our website in B Flat models. The best thing to have is a B flat pipe chanter or a B flat reed. Depending on your specific need and capabilities, an electronic bagpipe may be the best fit for you. Many different models are out on the market today and all have different options for what they can do. While the sound of these are sampled or digitally reproduced, they won't sound exactly like a live set, but are able to do more as an instrument. With most of these, we're able to feed them into a speaker for amplification or even to record them via a sound cable to an audio interface. Depending on the brand and model, you can change the instrument in terms of pitch, volume, drone to chanter balance, drone tuning, alternate fingering, additional scales, and even different kinds of bagpipe sounds. This electronic version of our instrument is surprisingly more versatile and adaptable than the acoustic pipes. Since these aren't as in demand as the 'A' pipes, they are more obscure and are only made by specific craftsmen. Some smallpipes are also capable of playing in B flat, D and sometimes C. The folk pipes have no harmony drones so you won't need to worry about corking any off. For this, simply plug the E drone with a small cork. The bellows blown smallpipes will sometimes have an 'E' harmony drone which creates a lovely blend to the drones, however it can get in the way of tunes in the key of D like 'Amazing Grace'. These are much easier to settle into a defined key as they're made to play in A 440. The first thing we have to do to tame the high pitch of our instrument is acquire a B flat chanter and reed. So our instrument is almost a whole step above 'A' and is in fact somewhere between B and B flat on a normal scale. The Highland Pipes' 'A' is anywhere from 470 to 487 hz while a concert instrument like a piano tunes 'A' at 440 hz. The sheet music for Highland Pipes is always written in A mixolydian (meaning that our G note is lowered and not a G sharp as it would be in A major), however we don't actually play in A as our sheet music suggests. Before we can get to setting up the pipes, lets look at the key and options of our instrument: In addition to the Highland Pipes, the Smallpipes and Folk Pipes are also great for playing in a group as they are quieter instruments that are tuned to concert A 440. While the Great Highland Bagpipes are usually played by themselves or with percussion, it is also a refreshing change to hear them played with other instruments.

Fattorini and sons pin bagpipe player