Na Píobairí Uilleann

Chairman, NPU

An Píobaire

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9 4 24 20130930 24 To improve the drone for the a modes, I ex- tended the baritone with a middle piece and achieved a quiet but stable drone sounding A or B, an octave below the new drone described above. And now I found that if a B + b drone is going under the e mode tunes, the result is much more convincing. However, it is not a tonic drone but a drone a fourth below tonic, as is the familiar Ddd’ drone in g tunes. Picture 5 (page 23) shows the new drone and the prolonged baritone drone on the Robbie Hughes set. The last step, built last year, was to have a ring mounted onto the bass drone at the base of the slide part, to give G, after the pattern of Northumbrian pipes drones. This, along with the tenor d’, offers a just tonic drone group for the tunes in g. It was mere luck that the posi- tion of this tone hole allows both the D and G to be in tune when the ring is turned during playing. It took some reed adjusting however. Picture 6 shows the tone hole ring on the Rob- bie Hughes bass drone. Picture 7 shows it on the Kiernan bass drone, mounted onto a replacement piece which makes it possible to tune the d drone down to c sharp. To sum up: Today I have two sets of pipes at hand having been rebuilt as described, offering the following drone accompaniments: Both groups, the new drone being stopped up, the middle piece of the baritone removed: Tra- ditional Ddd’ Group one: the classical bass and tenor: Dd’ or Gd’ (with bass ring hole open) Group two: the prolonged baritone and the newly attached drone: Aa or B,b If the middle piece of the baritone is removed: da (for d tunes) or eb (for e minor). Following tonic drone changes in sets of tunes may be done : D (Dd’) to a (Aa) D (da) to g (Gd’) D (Ddd’) to g (Gdd’) (Turning tone ring) D (Dd’) to e (eb or B,b) G (Gd’) to e (eb or B,b) G to b (B,b) D to b G to a (A,a) If well-practiced and prepared, one even may add a third new drone setting, by moving the bass drone ring while changing to a new tune, or while a tune is played with the right hand off the chanter (airs). Additionally to this, there is at hand the regulator e’ and the re- sulting enlarged chord variety. The only invasive changes on the sets were: Five screw holes, a tone hole for the e’ on the baritone regu- lator and the ring on the bass drone with its hole. So these Picture 6

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