The World of Bagpipes : British Isles

Pastoral Pipes

Pastoral Pipes 

   The Pastoral or New Bagpipe appeared during the early part of the eighteenth century and research has indicated them to be the forerunner of the Union Pipes. It is often incorrectly termed the "Scottish Hybrid Bagpipe" a name that was given to them by W A Cocks. They were certainly not indigenous to Scotland, being also manufactured in both London and Dublin as well as other locations.

When Geohegan published his tutor book for these pipes in 1746 they consisted of a chanter with a chromatic compass of two octaves plus a flattened leading note and two drones these being a bass - folded three times to save space (I have seen one set where it is straight in the Duncan Fraser Collection - spectacular but inconvenient) and tenor - mention being made in a subsequent edition that a key had been added to the chanter to increase the compass up to an "e" in the second register.

A third drone sounding in unison with the six finger note was added about this time along with a regulator (stopped pipe with four or five closed keys giving the notes g, a, b & c and sometimes f #) to provide a simple harmony, the chanter also became fully keyed to give a more accurate intonation than that obtainable by cross fingering. The pitch of the six finger note is either e flat or d. A fourth drone sounding an octave below the three finger note and occasionally a fifth an octave below this, as well as a second regulator (giving either the notes d, e, f# & g or d, f #, g & a) are present on a number of sets but this seems to have been the limit in the instruments development. 

On a couple of examples a slide is provided on the foot joint vent holes to change the lower leading note from flat to sharp as required and on a further set an on/off mechanism is fitted to control the drones with the two regulators fitted neatly to the top of the common stock. (This latter set can be seen in the Gallery Section)
Pastoral Pipes 

Below : The Reeds

Below : Details of regulator

Regulator key layouts :

These are the various arrangements that have been found on existing instruments. There is one set (Cocks collection : Morpeth Chantry Museum) that has an 8 keyed regulator but the chanter with this instrument is a Union (Uilleann) one. So it may be a conversion from a Pastoral pipe or an early set of Union pipes. It is fully described under Uilleann Pipes.

Single Regulator 4 Keys F#,G, A & B

Two Regulator both with 4 Keys

 F#,G, A & B
D, E, F# & G

Single Regulator 5 Keys F#,G, A, B & C

Two Regulator 5 &4 Keys 

F#,G, A, B & C
D, F#,G & A 

above : keyed chanter / 2 regulator set with stop key for drones
 
Materials :
Exotic hardwoods with brass / nickel silver ferrules and mounts of bone, horn or imitation figured ivory.

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Last Revised: 09/09/00
Copyright © July 2000 Christopher Bayley. All rights reserved.
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