King Brian Boru With Crown, Scepter, & Shield
King Brian Boru with Crown, Scepter, Battle Armour & Shield. Note that the three lions are one colour, on his original Shield. Because it pre dated the English invasion when Henry VIII insisted that they be changed to half Gold & half Silver due to Henry VIII 's own Coat of Arms having three Red lions.
Brian Boru's Sword
This is a replicate of The Sword Used by King Brian Boru, in the many Battles he fought, including the Battle of "Clontarf " when he was killed by a retreating Viking trying to make his way back to the water edge. King Brian Boru was praying in his tent giving thanks for defeating the Vikings in a very difficult battle. when a lost Viking entered his tent not knowing who he was, and plunged his sword into King Brian Boru's Back. A struggle took place and King Brain Boru managed to end the life of the lost Viking, before dying himself
Irish Wolfhound (Brian Boru)
Mascot to the
Irish Guards
Irish Guards
The Irish Kilt
Mike O'Brien (USA)
So where did the idea of an Irish kilt come from? Most scholars of Irish dress agree that the kilt is not part of traditional Irish dress, nor does it have a pedigree in the mists of Irish ancient history. The Irish kilt has a modern origin adopted by some Irish nationalists (but certainly not all) at the end of the 19th century in an attempt to counteract the Anglicization of Ireland, which had been going on for hundreds of years.
An excellent article of depth on the subject of the Irish kilt was written and copyrighted in 2010 by Matthew Newsom and Todd Wilinson titled “Hibernean" Dress, & Caledonian Custom: Brief History of Irish Kilts & Tartan.” Some of the data in this article is from this excellent source.
The idea of the Irish kilt is believed to have started with Eugene O’Curry, a professor of Irish History at Catholic University of Ireland, according to scholar Henry McClintock. O’Curry first proposed the idea of the ancient Irish kilt in 1860, in his Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish. McClintock also mentions “a well-known antiquarian”, Patrick Weston Joyce, strongly advocated O’Curry’s claims in his Social History of Ancient Ireland, which was published in 1903.
McClintock is cited by Kass Mc Gann, that Joyce mistranslated the word “Leine,” in reference to an ancient Irish shirt, as “kilt,” in Mc Gann’s article “Proof against the Existence of an Irish Kilt.”
Old Irish and Highland Dress, by McClintock states his belief that it was Joyce’s book that put the idea of an Irish kilt firmly in the minds of many, as his book, “Handbook on the Traditional Old Irish Dress” was “widely read and carried much weight at the time.” (p. 123) Indeed, McClintock believes that it was Joyce that inspired Irish pipe bands to adopt the saffron kilt (which was also mentioned in James Joyce’s Ulysses). McClintock is quick to suggest that those who took Joyce and O’Curry at their word were not to be blamed, as they had “what seemed to be ample authority” for adopting the kilt as a form of Irish dress.
Throughout the nineteenth century there was a revival of Gaelic nationalism. Women wore Celtic/Gaelic inspired jewelry to show their political leanings. According to Karl S. Bottigheimer in Ireland and the Irish: a short history (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982.) Pp. 212-214, by the end of the century there formed two major nationalist organizations: the Gaelic League and the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA). Both were concerned with Irish identity, and one of them being a ‘costume’ or national form of dress.
Patrick Pearse (son of an Englishman) was perhaps the most famous Irish nationalist associated with the Irish kilt says Elaine Sisson in Pearse’s Patriots: St. Edna’s and the Cult of Boyhood (Crosses Green: Cork University Press, 2004). Like many members of the Gaelic League and the larger Celtic Revival, Pearse sought to distance himself from all things English. Pearse joined the Gaelic League in 1905 and soon took an interest in the Irish educational system being concerned that Irish children, especially boys, were losing their “Irish” identity in an English-dominated school system. Using his life-savings and borrowed funds, Pearse formed ‘St. Enda’s School for Boys’ in 1908, which offered a bilingual education in English and Gaelic, as well a curriculum in “traditional” Irish culture.
An excellent article of depth on the subject of the Irish kilt was written and copyrighted in 2010 by Matthew Newsom and Todd Wilinson titled “Hibernean" Dress, & Caledonian Custom: Brief History of Irish Kilts & Tartan.” Some of the data in this article is from this excellent source.
The idea of the Irish kilt is believed to have started with Eugene O’Curry, a professor of Irish History at Catholic University of Ireland, according to scholar Henry McClintock. O’Curry first proposed the idea of the ancient Irish kilt in 1860, in his Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish. McClintock also mentions “a well-known antiquarian”, Patrick Weston Joyce, strongly advocated O’Curry’s claims in his Social History of Ancient Ireland, which was published in 1903.
McClintock is cited by Kass Mc Gann, that Joyce mistranslated the word “Leine,” in reference to an ancient Irish shirt, as “kilt,” in Mc Gann’s article “Proof against the Existence of an Irish Kilt.”
Old Irish and Highland Dress, by McClintock states his belief that it was Joyce’s book that put the idea of an Irish kilt firmly in the minds of many, as his book, “Handbook on the Traditional Old Irish Dress” was “widely read and carried much weight at the time.” (p. 123) Indeed, McClintock believes that it was Joyce that inspired Irish pipe bands to adopt the saffron kilt (which was also mentioned in James Joyce’s Ulysses). McClintock is quick to suggest that those who took Joyce and O’Curry at their word were not to be blamed, as they had “what seemed to be ample authority” for adopting the kilt as a form of Irish dress.
Throughout the nineteenth century there was a revival of Gaelic nationalism. Women wore Celtic/Gaelic inspired jewelry to show their political leanings. According to Karl S. Bottigheimer in Ireland and the Irish: a short history (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982.) Pp. 212-214, by the end of the century there formed two major nationalist organizations: the Gaelic League and the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA). Both were concerned with Irish identity, and one of them being a ‘costume’ or national form of dress.
Patrick Pearse (son of an Englishman) was perhaps the most famous Irish nationalist associated with the Irish kilt says Elaine Sisson in Pearse’s Patriots: St. Edna’s and the Cult of Boyhood (Crosses Green: Cork University Press, 2004). Like many members of the Gaelic League and the larger Celtic Revival, Pearse sought to distance himself from all things English. Pearse joined the Gaelic League in 1905 and soon took an interest in the Irish educational system being concerned that Irish children, especially boys, were losing their “Irish” identity in an English-dominated school system. Using his life-savings and borrowed funds, Pearse formed ‘St. Enda’s School for Boys’ in 1908, which offered a bilingual education in English and Gaelic, as well a curriculum in “traditional” Irish culture.
The Irish Kilt
While the traditional tartan kilt is seen generally as an icon of Scottish culture, many people, especially Americans of Irish heritage, also associate the garment with Ireland as that nation’s “traditional dress”. The Internet has only heightened this misconception with all sorts of claims for an ancient pedigree for the kilt & tartan cloth. It is our hope that this brief article will help set the record straight in terms of the origins of the kilt as an Irish garment, as well as the association of tartan with the Emerald Isle.
THE IRISH KILT
In his book Life & Tradition of Rural Ireland, Timothy O’Neill discusses the idea of the kilt as a form of Irish national dress. Like other noted scholars such as Henry McClintock and Kass McGann, O’Neill establishes the origin of the Irish kilt at the end of the 19th century in the so-called “Gaelic Revival” movements attempted to create a distinct Irish culture to separate themselves from their English overlords.
Suffice it to say that most scholars of Irish dress agree that the kilt is not part of traditional Irish dress, nor does it have a pedigree in the mists of Irish antiquity. The kilt was adopted by some (but certainly not all) Irish nationalists at the end of the 19th century in an attempt to counteract the Anglicization of Ireland, which had been going on for hundreds of years before.
At the end of the 19th century, a “Gaelic Revival” of sorts began to take place in Ireland as a reaction to British rule. Besides the effort to restore the Irish language, the revival also sought to restore “traditional” Irish culture in many forms, including sports, literature, song and dress. In 1893, for example, the Gaelic League was organized, with Douglas Hyde as its first president. The League’s goal was to preserve Irish as the national language, and to study Gaelic literature, both ancient and modern.
About 10 years before the formation of the Gaelic League, the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) was founded by Michael Cusack to provide an Irish alternative to traditional English sports such as cricket, rugby and polo. While both the League and the GAA were nominally apolitical, both groups began to attract Irish Nationalists of all stripes. And in both organizations, we find individuals looking for the adoption of an Irish “national dress”. (Bottigheimer, pp. 212-214)
But who is responsible for the myth of the Irish kilt? Noted scholar Henry McClintock believes that the idea may have originated with one Eugene O’Curry, Professor of Irish History in the Catholic University of Ireland, who first proposed the idea of the Irish kilt in ancient times in his 1860 Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish. McClintock also mentions “a well-known antiquarian”, Patrick Weston Joyce, who strongly advocated O’Curry’s claims in his Social History of Ancient Ireland, which was published in 1903. Kass McGann cites McClintock’s claim that Joyce mistranslated the word “Leine”, in reference to an ancient Irish shirt, as “kilt”, in her article “Proof against the Existence of an Irish Kilt”.
In his Old Irish and Highland Dress, McClintock states his belief that it was Joyce’s book that put the idea of an Irish kilt firmly in the minds of many, as the book was “widely read and carried much weight at the time.” (McClintock, 123) Indeed, McClintock believes that it was Joyce that inspired Irish pipe bands to adopt the saffron kilt (which was also mentioned in James Joyce’s Ulysses). McClintock is quick to suggest that those who took Joyce and O’Curry at their word were not to be blamed, as they had “what seemed to be ample authority” for adopting the kilt as a form of Irish dress.
Who were these individuals that adopted the kilt? One was Sir Shane Leslie of County Monaghan. Born in 1885, John Randolph Leslie came from a prominent Anglo-Irish family, and attended Eton and King’s College, Cambridge, where he converted to Roman Catholicism, taking the Gaelic name Shane. Leslie became a devoted Irish nationalist as well as Roman Catholic, and adopted the “traditional” Irish saffron kilt, and began a personal campaign to urge the adoption of it in 1906, according to Janet and Gareth Dunleavy’s biography of the Gaelic League’s founder, Douglas Hyde. (p. 317)
A description of Leslie in an article in Time Magazine in February, 1957 describes him as cutting a “glorious Irish swat through London on his visits, tricked out in mutton-chop whiskers, cockaded tam-o-shanter, green kilt and dagger in the stocking.”
Another kilt-wearing Irish nationalist aristocrat was William Gibson, 2nd Baron Ashborne. Like Leslie, Ashborne had been educated at Oxford and Trinity College in Dublin (known for its strong Unionist sympathies). When
Ashborne was first admitted to the House of Lords in May, 1913, the New York Times reported that there was great curiosity if he would wear his saffron kilt to Westminster. Such an act might have caused an incident, as some months before, the House of Commons refused to admit an Irishman to the stranger’s gallery because he
was wearing a kilt. (May 1913)
When his father, Edward Gibson, 1st Baron Ashborne, died that same year, the New York Times reported that he received only $4,000 from his father’s estate because “he is an enthusiastic Nationalist, wears the ancient Irish
dress, and is a convert to Catholicism.” (July 22, 1913).
Another nationalist, who was later killed in the Easter Uprising of 1916, Eamonn Ceannt, wore a kilt when playing the uileann pipes during an audience with the Pope in 1908. (O’Neill, p. 44) Indeed, kilts were quickly adopted by a number of pipers and pipe bands in Ireland in the days before the First World War. Several of these bands are still in existence, including the Black Raven Pipe Band, the St. Laurence O’Toole Pipe Band and the Youghal Pipe Band.
Many of these pipe bands were formed during the renewal of the national game of hurling, as part of the larger “Gaelic Revival” of the late 19th and early 20th century. In the case of the Black Raven Pipe band, it was in connection with the Naomh Mac Cullen Hurling Club of Fingal.
According to the band’s web site, a pipe band that accompanied a rival club from County Armagh made quite the impression on a club member and school teacher named Thomas Ashe, who soon acquired a set of pipes and began to teach himself how to play. In 1910 Ashe began to organize a band and recruit new members. He contacted the noted Belfast antiquarian Mr. F J Bigger to assist with the design of the band’s uniform, which included the kilt.
In 1911, the band paraded for the first time with its new uniform, which included two versions. The first one was a black tunic, green kilt and white plaid shawl. The second uniform was white tunic, saffron kilt and black plaid shawl. The band marched under a reproduction of the Black Raven flag, said to have been captured by the forces of King Brian Boru from the Danes at the Battle of Clontarf in 1014.
The band competed against a number of rival bands in national competitions until 1916, when several of the members joined the Easter Rebellion against British rule. The founder, Thomas Ashe, would die as a result of a hunger strike in prison in 1917.
The history of the Youghal Pipe Band, founded in 1914 by one Danny McCarthy, may have something to tell us about regarding the adoption of the kilt by Irish pipers and nationalists. Youghal, in County Cork, had long been a garrison town for units of the British Army stationed in Ireland; the band’s history reports that McCarthy “would watch the Pipe Bands of the British Army parade their Regiments down Cork Hill and out to the train station every couple of months,” and would also go to the barracks to listen to the bands. Eventually he organized the formation of the Cork Hill Pipe Band, which later renamed itself after the town of Youghal.
McCarthy and several members of the band were members of the Irish Volunteers, a Nationalist paramilitary force which later became the Irish Republican Army during the Anglo-Irish War of 1919-1922. Pipe bands became an important recruiting tool for Nationalist forces; in a biography of IRA leader Terence MacSwiney, Moirin Chavasse discusses how a pipe band was used in October, 1915 as part of a recruiting drive for the Volunteers. (Terence MacSwiney, p.35)
IRA pipe bands even had yearly competitions; The Cork Volunteer Pipe Band was named as the “Prize Pipe Band” in competitions held in Killarney (1918), Cork (1918-1919) Dublin (1920) and Wexford (1922), according to information on the personal genealogical web site of Bryan Wickham. Wickham’s father, Michael, later immigrated to the United States, where he joined the New York Corkmen's Society Pipe Band. (http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~bwickham/index.htm)
At least one suggestion was made in 1914 for all members of the Irish Volunteers to wear the kilt; in the organizations’ newspaper of February 14 of that year, one William Royce called for the adoption of the kilt by the volunteers, saying that the only objections to such a move would “come from the skinny-legged, knick-kneed type for whose faulty or undeveloped ‘understandings’ the pants as a covering are a veritable Godsend.” (Kelly, p. 219)
The most famous Irish nationalist associated with the kilt, however, is Patrick Pearse. Like many members of the Gaelic League and the larger Celtic Revival, Pearse (himself the son of an Englishman) sought to distance himself from all things English. Pearse joined the Gaelic League in 1905 and soon took an interest in the Irish educational system. Concerned that Irish children, especially boys, were losing their “Irish” identity in an English-dominated school system, Pearse used his life-savings and borrowed funds to form St. Enda’s School for Boys in 1908. The school offered a bilingual education in English and Gaelic, as well a curriculum in “traditional” Irish culture.
As part of his attempt to restore “Irishness” to the educational system, Pearse wished to adopt “traditional” Irish dress. After viewing a pair of trews, coat and cloak found at Killery in County Sligo, which dates to the early seventeenth century, Pearse wrote to John O’Kelly in October 1900 about his ideas on a potential Irish national dress to be worn at a Gaelic League Feis, or Irish cultural festival:
Frankly I would much rather see you arrayed in a kilt, although it may be less authentic (author’s emphasis) than in a pair of these trews. You would, if you appeared in the latter, run the risk of leading the spectators to imagine that you had forgotten to don your trousers and sallied forth in your draws. This would be fatal to the dignity of a Feis. If you adopt a costume, let it, at all events, have some elements of picturesqueness.( Dunlevy, p. 176)
Pearse eventually did adopt a saffron kilt as a uniform for the boys of St. Enda’s, suggesting to parents that the kilt was “economical, hygienic, and [a] becoming costume for boys” as well as a “distinctly national form of dress.” (http://www.somebody.to/pp.htm) Pearse also recommended that the garments be Irish made, and directed parents to purchase them at Messrs. M. Meers and Co. of 10 Lower Pembroke Street, Dublin
THE IRISH KILT
In his book Life & Tradition of Rural Ireland, Timothy O’Neill discusses the idea of the kilt as a form of Irish national dress. Like other noted scholars such as Henry McClintock and Kass McGann, O’Neill establishes the origin of the Irish kilt at the end of the 19th century in the so-called “Gaelic Revival” movements attempted to create a distinct Irish culture to separate themselves from their English overlords.
Suffice it to say that most scholars of Irish dress agree that the kilt is not part of traditional Irish dress, nor does it have a pedigree in the mists of Irish antiquity. The kilt was adopted by some (but certainly not all) Irish nationalists at the end of the 19th century in an attempt to counteract the Anglicization of Ireland, which had been going on for hundreds of years before.
At the end of the 19th century, a “Gaelic Revival” of sorts began to take place in Ireland as a reaction to British rule. Besides the effort to restore the Irish language, the revival also sought to restore “traditional” Irish culture in many forms, including sports, literature, song and dress. In 1893, for example, the Gaelic League was organized, with Douglas Hyde as its first president. The League’s goal was to preserve Irish as the national language, and to study Gaelic literature, both ancient and modern.
About 10 years before the formation of the Gaelic League, the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) was founded by Michael Cusack to provide an Irish alternative to traditional English sports such as cricket, rugby and polo. While both the League and the GAA were nominally apolitical, both groups began to attract Irish Nationalists of all stripes. And in both organizations, we find individuals looking for the adoption of an Irish “national dress”. (Bottigheimer, pp. 212-214)
But who is responsible for the myth of the Irish kilt? Noted scholar Henry McClintock believes that the idea may have originated with one Eugene O’Curry, Professor of Irish History in the Catholic University of Ireland, who first proposed the idea of the Irish kilt in ancient times in his 1860 Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish. McClintock also mentions “a well-known antiquarian”, Patrick Weston Joyce, who strongly advocated O’Curry’s claims in his Social History of Ancient Ireland, which was published in 1903. Kass McGann cites McClintock’s claim that Joyce mistranslated the word “Leine”, in reference to an ancient Irish shirt, as “kilt”, in her article “Proof against the Existence of an Irish Kilt”.
In his Old Irish and Highland Dress, McClintock states his belief that it was Joyce’s book that put the idea of an Irish kilt firmly in the minds of many, as the book was “widely read and carried much weight at the time.” (McClintock, 123) Indeed, McClintock believes that it was Joyce that inspired Irish pipe bands to adopt the saffron kilt (which was also mentioned in James Joyce’s Ulysses). McClintock is quick to suggest that those who took Joyce and O’Curry at their word were not to be blamed, as they had “what seemed to be ample authority” for adopting the kilt as a form of Irish dress.
Who were these individuals that adopted the kilt? One was Sir Shane Leslie of County Monaghan. Born in 1885, John Randolph Leslie came from a prominent Anglo-Irish family, and attended Eton and King’s College, Cambridge, where he converted to Roman Catholicism, taking the Gaelic name Shane. Leslie became a devoted Irish nationalist as well as Roman Catholic, and adopted the “traditional” Irish saffron kilt, and began a personal campaign to urge the adoption of it in 1906, according to Janet and Gareth Dunleavy’s biography of the Gaelic League’s founder, Douglas Hyde. (p. 317)
A description of Leslie in an article in Time Magazine in February, 1957 describes him as cutting a “glorious Irish swat through London on his visits, tricked out in mutton-chop whiskers, cockaded tam-o-shanter, green kilt and dagger in the stocking.”
Another kilt-wearing Irish nationalist aristocrat was William Gibson, 2nd Baron Ashborne. Like Leslie, Ashborne had been educated at Oxford and Trinity College in Dublin (known for its strong Unionist sympathies). When
Ashborne was first admitted to the House of Lords in May, 1913, the New York Times reported that there was great curiosity if he would wear his saffron kilt to Westminster. Such an act might have caused an incident, as some months before, the House of Commons refused to admit an Irishman to the stranger’s gallery because he
was wearing a kilt. (May 1913)
When his father, Edward Gibson, 1st Baron Ashborne, died that same year, the New York Times reported that he received only $4,000 from his father’s estate because “he is an enthusiastic Nationalist, wears the ancient Irish
dress, and is a convert to Catholicism.” (July 22, 1913).
Another nationalist, who was later killed in the Easter Uprising of 1916, Eamonn Ceannt, wore a kilt when playing the uileann pipes during an audience with the Pope in 1908. (O’Neill, p. 44) Indeed, kilts were quickly adopted by a number of pipers and pipe bands in Ireland in the days before the First World War. Several of these bands are still in existence, including the Black Raven Pipe Band, the St. Laurence O’Toole Pipe Band and the Youghal Pipe Band.
Many of these pipe bands were formed during the renewal of the national game of hurling, as part of the larger “Gaelic Revival” of the late 19th and early 20th century. In the case of the Black Raven Pipe band, it was in connection with the Naomh Mac Cullen Hurling Club of Fingal.
According to the band’s web site, a pipe band that accompanied a rival club from County Armagh made quite the impression on a club member and school teacher named Thomas Ashe, who soon acquired a set of pipes and began to teach himself how to play. In 1910 Ashe began to organize a band and recruit new members. He contacted the noted Belfast antiquarian Mr. F J Bigger to assist with the design of the band’s uniform, which included the kilt.
In 1911, the band paraded for the first time with its new uniform, which included two versions. The first one was a black tunic, green kilt and white plaid shawl. The second uniform was white tunic, saffron kilt and black plaid shawl. The band marched under a reproduction of the Black Raven flag, said to have been captured by the forces of King Brian Boru from the Danes at the Battle of Clontarf in 1014.
The band competed against a number of rival bands in national competitions until 1916, when several of the members joined the Easter Rebellion against British rule. The founder, Thomas Ashe, would die as a result of a hunger strike in prison in 1917.
The history of the Youghal Pipe Band, founded in 1914 by one Danny McCarthy, may have something to tell us about regarding the adoption of the kilt by Irish pipers and nationalists. Youghal, in County Cork, had long been a garrison town for units of the British Army stationed in Ireland; the band’s history reports that McCarthy “would watch the Pipe Bands of the British Army parade their Regiments down Cork Hill and out to the train station every couple of months,” and would also go to the barracks to listen to the bands. Eventually he organized the formation of the Cork Hill Pipe Band, which later renamed itself after the town of Youghal.
McCarthy and several members of the band were members of the Irish Volunteers, a Nationalist paramilitary force which later became the Irish Republican Army during the Anglo-Irish War of 1919-1922. Pipe bands became an important recruiting tool for Nationalist forces; in a biography of IRA leader Terence MacSwiney, Moirin Chavasse discusses how a pipe band was used in October, 1915 as part of a recruiting drive for the Volunteers. (Terence MacSwiney, p.35)
IRA pipe bands even had yearly competitions; The Cork Volunteer Pipe Band was named as the “Prize Pipe Band” in competitions held in Killarney (1918), Cork (1918-1919) Dublin (1920) and Wexford (1922), according to information on the personal genealogical web site of Bryan Wickham. Wickham’s father, Michael, later immigrated to the United States, where he joined the New York Corkmen's Society Pipe Band. (http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~bwickham/index.htm)
At least one suggestion was made in 1914 for all members of the Irish Volunteers to wear the kilt; in the organizations’ newspaper of February 14 of that year, one William Royce called for the adoption of the kilt by the volunteers, saying that the only objections to such a move would “come from the skinny-legged, knick-kneed type for whose faulty or undeveloped ‘understandings’ the pants as a covering are a veritable Godsend.” (Kelly, p. 219)
The most famous Irish nationalist associated with the kilt, however, is Patrick Pearse. Like many members of the Gaelic League and the larger Celtic Revival, Pearse (himself the son of an Englishman) sought to distance himself from all things English. Pearse joined the Gaelic League in 1905 and soon took an interest in the Irish educational system. Concerned that Irish children, especially boys, were losing their “Irish” identity in an English-dominated school system, Pearse used his life-savings and borrowed funds to form St. Enda’s School for Boys in 1908. The school offered a bilingual education in English and Gaelic, as well a curriculum in “traditional” Irish culture.
As part of his attempt to restore “Irishness” to the educational system, Pearse wished to adopt “traditional” Irish dress. After viewing a pair of trews, coat and cloak found at Killery in County Sligo, which dates to the early seventeenth century, Pearse wrote to John O’Kelly in October 1900 about his ideas on a potential Irish national dress to be worn at a Gaelic League Feis, or Irish cultural festival:
Frankly I would much rather see you arrayed in a kilt, although it may be less authentic (author’s emphasis) than in a pair of these trews. You would, if you appeared in the latter, run the risk of leading the spectators to imagine that you had forgotten to don your trousers and sallied forth in your draws. This would be fatal to the dignity of a Feis. If you adopt a costume, let it, at all events, have some elements of picturesqueness.( Dunlevy, p. 176)
Pearse eventually did adopt a saffron kilt as a uniform for the boys of St. Enda’s, suggesting to parents that the kilt was “economical, hygienic, and [a] becoming costume for boys” as well as a “distinctly national form of dress.” (http://www.somebody.to/pp.htm) Pearse also recommended that the garments be Irish made, and directed parents to purchase them at Messrs. M. Meers and Co. of 10 Lower Pembroke Street, Dublin
In his attempt to restore “Irishness” to the educational system, Pearse wished to adopt “traditional” Irish dress. After viewing a pair of trews, coat and cloak found at Killery in County Sligo, which dates to the early seventeenth century, Pearse wrote to John O’Kelly in October 1900 about his ideas on a potential Irish national dress to be worn at a Gaelic League Feis, or Irish cultural festival: “Frankly I would much rather see you arrayed in a kilt, although it may be less authentic(emphasis added) than in a pair of these trews. You would, if you appeared in the latter, run the risk of leading the spectators to imagine that you had forgotten to don your trousers and sallied forth in your draws. This would be fatal to the dignity of a Feis. If you adopt a costume, let it, at all events, have some elements of picturesqueness.”
The Gaelic League decided on the kilt and it would be adopted since it was a noble garment, and worn by the Scots for whom everyone knew was Celtic. According to Mairead Dunlevy, Dress in Ireland (Doughcloyne, Wilton, Cork : Collins Press, 1999) P. 176, a difference was noted that instead of tartan being used in the kilt, a plain colored kilt would be worn. Thus, the development of the saffron kilt, worn by many of the military regiments beginning in World War I. Shared by a Ennenclaw representive at genealogy fair, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, in 2009, saffron is often depicted as being burnt orange in color, like the kilts worn by the Royal Irish Rangers of the English army, but the color is truly more of a mustard color and the dye used to favorably in clothing because the saffron dye repels lice.
The wishes of the Gaelic League and Gaelic Athletic Association of the Irish kilt being adopted as the national garment of Ireland never caught on with the Irish populace except a few of the gentry-class (early 20th century), dancers, and the military pipe bands throughout the twentieth century continue to wear it. The Irish pipes have been heard throughout Africa, Lebanon, and on United Nations Peacekeeping missions, usually played by kilted pipers.
So if Irish kilts are to be solid in color, what’s all this about tartans for the Irish? In the 1980s or so, several Irish weaving mills would take Scottish tartans and change the colors and rename it, for instance the Scottish clan tartan of Maclean of Duart was re-colored and renamed Tara.
Then in the 1990s there arose a clamoring by the Irish Diaspora mostly of North America and Australia for their family tartan so that a kilt could be made for them to wear to show their ethnicity. Of course, the native Irish are still wondering what all the hoopla is about concerning Irish kilts. To answer this niche demand was met by the House of Edgar mill in Scotland, who designed 32 Irish county tartans. A short time later, Marston Mills of England designed 32 county tartans inspired by the Irish county coat-of-arms colors.
These tartans are more vibrant then the first. Probably the best design was the Irish National tartan by Edgar mill which has a base green with white, black and gold/orangish stripes. Of course Marston came out with designs to counter Edgar’s. In addition to the mill county tartans there’s also Irish family tartans, including O’Brien, which was designed by an Australian in the 1990s. It must be remembered that none of the Irish counties or Irish families have authorized the tartans. The only Irish tartan that is recognized is that of Clan Cian/O’Carroll of Ely, who in 1983 registered their tartan with the Chief Herald of Ireland’s office.
In very early 1990s, a Cornishman traveled across America talking to newspapers and TV stations doing interviews about the Cornish people adopting the kilt. Why he asked. Because the Scots kilt is recognized around the world as being Celtic/Gaelic, and the Cornish want the world to know that we are Celts not English. He went on to state that six tartans had been designed for Cornwall with colors that have meaning to the Cornish, and even though they have no history of wearing anything close to a kilt, but the tradition has begun, and is now over twenty-five years old.
There are those in Scotland who feel that this isn’t fair that the world should be adopting the kilt for the kilt belongs to the Scots and the Scots only. As for other countries, go find something else. Personally I can understand this with the Norwegians, the Dutch, Germans, French, etc., do not these countries have their own native dress? Yes, and they have tartans designed, says Gordon Teal of Teallach & Philip D. Smith, Jr., in District Tartans (1992), but not the kilt.
In review – the Irish kilt has its origins about 1900, but the idea never caught on among the native Irish, but the Irish Diaspora wanted to indicate their ethnic heritage and pride in the mid to late 1990s by wearing the kilt as the Scots do. Mills designed Irish tartans to meet this demand and the wearing of the Irish kilt was born, whether in solid color or tartan. The Diaspora has created a new tradition completely novel to the native Irish.
The best reason to don the kilt is that you like it. Nevertheless evolution of the Gael continues.
The Irish and O’Brien Tartans In the modern era many of the Irish clans have developed a tartan for use in the wearing of kilts at festivals, etc. The use of tartan as a heraldic or clan symbol is not of Irish origin. Only a few Irish of the Gaelic League and Gaelic Athletic Association wore kilts at the turn of the twentieth century didn’t catch on with the native Irish population, but the Irish Diaspora has embraced the idea in the late 1990s.
Type of material that works best for kilts is a 13 – 16 oz twisted Strome wool. But a new fabric has entered the shelf called poly-viscose (PV). This is acrylic and not wool and can be washed in the washing machine, hang dry, and has few problems with creases. The best part is the cost is usually only a quarter the cost of that of a traditional kilt, and can be made at various costs depending on what additions one wants. One kilt makers PV material has added anti pilling (small lumps of fabric caused by wear).
There are several generic Irish tartans available in PV, but no O’Brien.
The O’Brien Clan does have a tartan designed by an O’Brien who lives in Australia. Concerning Irish tartans, it is one of the earliest (abt. 1995), but it is not officially recognized by the O’Brien Clan Chief. None of the Irish clans have authorized a tartan except Clan Cian/O’Carroll.
If you want to wear a kilt decide on either solid color (it doesn’t have to be saffron, but be sure the color is mustard and not burnt orange) or tartan (personally I like tartan, and although I’d wear the O’Brien tartan, a special run of the material [especially the ancient style] costs to much, so my family voted on the Irish National by House of Edgar). The PV material does have several Irish tartan designs.
Kilts have no pockets, so either you wear a coat with pockets or use the sporran (Gaelic for purse). There are three types of sporrans: day-wear, semi-formal (I recommend this for it can serve for day & formal events), and formal, but a sporran isn’t absolutely necessary. There are tweed day coats styled ‘the Kilkenny,’ and evening or formal tux style called the Unless you’re a re-enactor, I’d suggest staying away from period clothing, and don’t mix tartans. As for a hat or bonnet, there is the Irish caubeen.
Again remember that the Irish kilt is only a hundred year old tradition that the native Irish didn’t approve of, but the Irish Diaspora a hundred years later are considering the kilt as a way to express their ethnicity, and thus have invented a new tradition.
The Gaelic League decided on the kilt and it would be adopted since it was a noble garment, and worn by the Scots for whom everyone knew was Celtic. According to Mairead Dunlevy, Dress in Ireland (Doughcloyne, Wilton, Cork : Collins Press, 1999) P. 176, a difference was noted that instead of tartan being used in the kilt, a plain colored kilt would be worn. Thus, the development of the saffron kilt, worn by many of the military regiments beginning in World War I. Shared by a Ennenclaw representive at genealogy fair, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, in 2009, saffron is often depicted as being burnt orange in color, like the kilts worn by the Royal Irish Rangers of the English army, but the color is truly more of a mustard color and the dye used to favorably in clothing because the saffron dye repels lice.
The wishes of the Gaelic League and Gaelic Athletic Association of the Irish kilt being adopted as the national garment of Ireland never caught on with the Irish populace except a few of the gentry-class (early 20th century), dancers, and the military pipe bands throughout the twentieth century continue to wear it. The Irish pipes have been heard throughout Africa, Lebanon, and on United Nations Peacekeeping missions, usually played by kilted pipers.
So if Irish kilts are to be solid in color, what’s all this about tartans for the Irish? In the 1980s or so, several Irish weaving mills would take Scottish tartans and change the colors and rename it, for instance the Scottish clan tartan of Maclean of Duart was re-colored and renamed Tara.
Then in the 1990s there arose a clamoring by the Irish Diaspora mostly of North America and Australia for their family tartan so that a kilt could be made for them to wear to show their ethnicity. Of course, the native Irish are still wondering what all the hoopla is about concerning Irish kilts. To answer this niche demand was met by the House of Edgar mill in Scotland, who designed 32 Irish county tartans. A short time later, Marston Mills of England designed 32 county tartans inspired by the Irish county coat-of-arms colors.
These tartans are more vibrant then the first. Probably the best design was the Irish National tartan by Edgar mill which has a base green with white, black and gold/orangish stripes. Of course Marston came out with designs to counter Edgar’s. In addition to the mill county tartans there’s also Irish family tartans, including O’Brien, which was designed by an Australian in the 1990s. It must be remembered that none of the Irish counties or Irish families have authorized the tartans. The only Irish tartan that is recognized is that of Clan Cian/O’Carroll of Ely, who in 1983 registered their tartan with the Chief Herald of Ireland’s office.
In very early 1990s, a Cornishman traveled across America talking to newspapers and TV stations doing interviews about the Cornish people adopting the kilt. Why he asked. Because the Scots kilt is recognized around the world as being Celtic/Gaelic, and the Cornish want the world to know that we are Celts not English. He went on to state that six tartans had been designed for Cornwall with colors that have meaning to the Cornish, and even though they have no history of wearing anything close to a kilt, but the tradition has begun, and is now over twenty-five years old.
There are those in Scotland who feel that this isn’t fair that the world should be adopting the kilt for the kilt belongs to the Scots and the Scots only. As for other countries, go find something else. Personally I can understand this with the Norwegians, the Dutch, Germans, French, etc., do not these countries have their own native dress? Yes, and they have tartans designed, says Gordon Teal of Teallach & Philip D. Smith, Jr., in District Tartans (1992), but not the kilt.
In review – the Irish kilt has its origins about 1900, but the idea never caught on among the native Irish, but the Irish Diaspora wanted to indicate their ethnic heritage and pride in the mid to late 1990s by wearing the kilt as the Scots do. Mills designed Irish tartans to meet this demand and the wearing of the Irish kilt was born, whether in solid color or tartan. The Diaspora has created a new tradition completely novel to the native Irish.
The best reason to don the kilt is that you like it. Nevertheless evolution of the Gael continues.
The Irish and O’Brien Tartans In the modern era many of the Irish clans have developed a tartan for use in the wearing of kilts at festivals, etc. The use of tartan as a heraldic or clan symbol is not of Irish origin. Only a few Irish of the Gaelic League and Gaelic Athletic Association wore kilts at the turn of the twentieth century didn’t catch on with the native Irish population, but the Irish Diaspora has embraced the idea in the late 1990s.
Type of material that works best for kilts is a 13 – 16 oz twisted Strome wool. But a new fabric has entered the shelf called poly-viscose (PV). This is acrylic and not wool and can be washed in the washing machine, hang dry, and has few problems with creases. The best part is the cost is usually only a quarter the cost of that of a traditional kilt, and can be made at various costs depending on what additions one wants. One kilt makers PV material has added anti pilling (small lumps of fabric caused by wear).
There are several generic Irish tartans available in PV, but no O’Brien.
The O’Brien Clan does have a tartan designed by an O’Brien who lives in Australia. Concerning Irish tartans, it is one of the earliest (abt. 1995), but it is not officially recognized by the O’Brien Clan Chief. None of the Irish clans have authorized a tartan except Clan Cian/O’Carroll.
If you want to wear a kilt decide on either solid color (it doesn’t have to be saffron, but be sure the color is mustard and not burnt orange) or tartan (personally I like tartan, and although I’d wear the O’Brien tartan, a special run of the material [especially the ancient style] costs to much, so my family voted on the Irish National by House of Edgar). The PV material does have several Irish tartan designs.
Kilts have no pockets, so either you wear a coat with pockets or use the sporran (Gaelic for purse). There are three types of sporrans: day-wear, semi-formal (I recommend this for it can serve for day & formal events), and formal, but a sporran isn’t absolutely necessary. There are tweed day coats styled ‘the Kilkenny,’ and evening or formal tux style called the Unless you’re a re-enactor, I’d suggest staying away from period clothing, and don’t mix tartans. As for a hat or bonnet, there is the Irish caubeen.
Again remember that the Irish kilt is only a hundred year old tradition that the native Irish didn’t approve of, but the Irish Diaspora a hundred years later are considering the kilt as a way to express their ethnicity, and thus have invented a new tradition.
The Original Irish Pipes
The uilleann pipes or ɪljən Irish: are the characteristic national bagpipe of Ireland. Their current name, earlier known in English as "union pipes", is a part translation of the Irish-language term píobaí uilleann (literally, "pipes of the elbow"), from their method of inflation.
The bag of the uilleann pipes is inflated by means of a small set of bellows strapped around the waist and the right arm. The bellows not only relieve the player from the effort needed to blow into a bag to maintain pressure, they also allow relatively dry air to power the reeds, reducing the adverse effects of moisture on tuning and longevity. Some pipers can converse or sing at the same time as playing.
The uilleann pipes are distinguished from many other forms of bagpipes by their tone and wide range of notes — the chanter has a range of two full octaves, including sharps and flats — together with the unique blend of chanter, drones, and "regulators". The regulators are equipped with closed keys which can be opened by the piper's wrist action enabling the piper to play simple chords, giving a rhythmic and harmonic accompaniment as needed.
There are also many ornaments based on multiple or single grace notes. The chanter can also be played staccato by resting the bottom of the chanter on the piper's thigh to close off the bottom hole and then open and close only the tone holes required. If one tone hole is closed before the next one is opened, a staccato effect can be created because the sound stops completely when no air can escape at all.
The uilleann pipes have a different harmonic structure, sounding sweeter and quieter than many other bagpipes, such as the Great Irish Warpipes, Great Highland Bagpipes or the Italian Zampognas. The uilleann pipes are often played indoors, and are almost always played sitting down.
Contents Etymology Uilleann is the genitive of the Irish word uille, meaning elbow, emphasizing the use of the elbow when playing the uilleann pipes. However, the first attested written form is "Union pipes", at the end of the 18th century, perhaps to denote the union of the chanter, drones, and regulators. Another theory is that it was played throughout a prototypical full union of England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland.
This was only realized, however, in 1800, with the Act of Union; the name for the bagpipe slightly precedes this. Alternatively Union pipes were certainly a favourite of the upper classes in Scotland, Ireland and the North-East of England and were fashionable for a time in formal social settings, where the term Union pipes may also originate.
The term "uilleann pipes" is first attested at the beginning of the 20th century. William Henry Grattan Flood, an Irish music scholar, proposed the theory that the name "uilleann" came from the Irish word for "elbow". He cited to this effect William Shakespeare's play The Merchant of Venice published in 1600 (Act IV, sc. I, l. 55) where the expression "woollen pipes" appears.
This theory originated in correspondence between two earlier antiquarians, and was adopted as gospel by the Gaelic League. The use of "uilleann" was perhaps also a rebellion against the term "union" with its connotations of English rule. It was however shown by Breandán Breathnach that it would be difficult to explain the Anglicization of the word uillin into 'woollen' before the 16th century (when the instrument did not exist as such) and then its adaptation as 'union' two centuries later.
History The first bagpipes to be well-attested to for Ireland were similar, if not identical, to the Highland pipes that are now played in Scotland. These are known as the "Great Irish Warpipe". In Irish and Scottish Gaelic, this instrument was called the píob mhór ("great pipe").
While the warpipe was alive and well upon the battlefields of France, the warpipe had almost disappeared in Ireland. The union or uilleann pipe required the joining of a bellows under the right arm, which pumped air via a tube to the bagpipe under the left arm. The uilleann or union pipes developed around the beginning of the 18th century, the history of which is here depicted in prints of carvings and pictures from contemporary sources. Geoghegan's tutor of the 1740s calls this early form of the uilleann pipes the "Pastoral or New bagpipe".
The Pastoral pipes were bellows blown and played in either a seated or standing position. The conical bored chanter was played "open", that is, legato, unlike the uilleann pipes, which can also be played "closed", that is, staccato. The early Pastoral pipes had two drones, and later examples had one (or rarely, two) regulator(s). The Pastoral and later flat set Union pipes developed with ideas on the instrument being traded back-and-forth between Ireland, Scotland and England, around the 18th and early 19th century.
The earliest surviving sets of uilleann pipes date from the second half of the 18th century but it must be said that datings are not definitive. Only recently has scientific attention begun to be paid to the instrument and problems relating to various stages of its development have yet to be resolved. It is gradually becoming accepted that the union pipes originated from the Pastoral pipes and gained popularity in Ireland within the Protestant Anglo-Irish community and its gentlemen pipers. Certainly many of the early players in Ireland were Protestant, possibly the best known being the mid-18th century piper Jackson from Co Limerick and the 18th century Tandragee pipemaker William Kennedy.
The pipes were certainly frequently used by the Protestant clergy who employed them as an alternative to the church organ. As late as the 19th century the instrument was still commonly associated with the Anglo-Irish e.g. the Anglican clergyman Canon James Goodman (1828–1896) from Kerry, who interestingly had his uilleann pipes buried with him at Creagh (Church of Ireland) cemetery near Baltimore, County Cork. His friend, and Trinity College colleague, John Hingston from Skibbereen also played the uilleann pipes.
Tuning The instrument most typically is tuned in the key of D, although "flat" sets do exist in other keys, such as C♯, C, B and B♭, and a few sets in E♭ have been tried. These terms only began to be used in the 1970s, when pipemakers began to receive requests for pipes that would be in tune with Generation tin whistles, which are stamped with the key they play in: C, B♭, etc.
The chanter length determines the overall tuning; accompanying pieces of the instrument, such as drones and regulators, are tuned to the same key as the chanter. Chanters of around 362mm (14¼") length produce a bottom note on or near D above middle C on the piano (where A=440 Hz, i.e. modern "concert pitch"). The modern concert pitch pipes are a relatively recent invention, pioneered by the Taylor brothers, originally of Drogheda, Ireland and later of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the late nineteenth century.
Concert pitch pipes typically have wider bores and larger tone holes than the earlier "flat" pitch sets, and as a consequence are a good deal louder, though by no means as loud as the Highland pipes of Scotland. They were developed by the Taylors to meet the requirements of playing in larger venues in the United States; today they are the most common type of uilleann pipes encountered, though many players still prefer the mellower sound of the earlier style narrow-bore pipes, which exist in pitches ranging from D, through C♯, C, and B down to B♭.
Pipemakers before the Taylors had, however, built concert pitch pipes using the narrower bores and smaller fingerholes of the flat pipes. Some of these instruments seem to have been designed with lower pitch standards in mind, such as A=415. The Taylors also built many instruments with higher pitch standards in mind, such as the Old Philharmonic pitch of A=453 that was commonplace in late 19th century America.
The D pipes are most commonly used in ensembles, while the flat-pitched pipes are more often used for solo playing — often a fiddler will "tune down" his or her instrument to play with a piper's flat set, but the inflexibility of other instruments used in Irish music (accordions, flutes, etc.) does not usually permit this. It is noteworthy that Irish music was predominately solo music until the late 19th century, when these fixed-pitch instruments began to play more of a role.
Like pipe organs, uilleann pipes are not normally tuned to even temperament, but rather to just intonation, so that the chanter and regulators can blend sweetly with the three drones. Equal temperament is almost universal with the fixed pitch instruments used in Irish music, which can clash with the tuning of the pipes.
Instrument variations Starting out — The "practice set" Because of the instrument's complexity, beginning uilleann pipers often start out with partial sets known as practice sets.
Starter or Practice Set A practice set consists of only the basic elements of pipe bag, bellows and chanter, with no drones or regulators. The chanter is available in keys ranging from the "concert pitch" D chanter in half-note steps downward to a B♭ chanter, the latter of which regularly is referred to as a "flat set" (as are any sets below the key of D).
In order to play the uilleann pipes effectively, students must learn to pump the bellows steadily while controlling the pressure on the bag and playing the chanter simultaneously. Therefore, beginning students often play on practice sets until they become comfortable with those basic mechanics. Despite their name, however, practice sets are used not only by beginning players but also by some advanced players when they wish to play just the chanter with other musicians, either live or in recording sessions. In these instances, the practice sets can be tuned to equal temperament if needed.
Half set" A half set is the next stage up from a practice set. As with other forms of bagpipes, uilleann pipes use "drones", which are most commonly three pipes accompanying the melody of the chanter with a constant background tonic note. The pipes are generally equipped with three drones: a) the tenor drone—the highest sounding pipe which is pitched the same as the lowest note of the chanter, b) the baritone drone which is pitched one octave below that and c) the bass drone—the lowest sounding pipe, two octaves below the bottom note of the chanter.
The Pastoral pipes had four drones, these three plus one more which would play a harmony note at the fourth or fifth interval. These drones are connected to the pipe bag by a "stock". This is an intricately made wooden cylinder tied into the bag (as any other stock) by a thick yarn or hemp thread. The drones connect to the stock, as do the "regulators" (see "Full Set" below). The stock and drones are laid across the right thigh. This is distinct from other forms of bagpipes, in which the drones are usually carried over the shoulder or over the right arm.
The drones can be switched off. This is made possible by a key connected to the stock. The original design of the stock was a hollow cylinder, with two metal tubes running through it to both hold the regulators, and independently supply air to them. Thus the regulators could be played with the drones silenced.
In the late 19th century it became more common to build the stock from a solid piece of wood, with 5 holes bored through it end-to-end. This was less susceptible to damage than the earlier design. The piper is also able to switch on and off various drones individually (applying slightly more pressure to the bag and tapping the end of a drone), which is generally used to aid in tuning (a technique used in almost all bagpipes which have drones) or all of them at the same time using this key.
This makes the instrument more versatile and usable not only as a half set, but also to allow playing the chanter by itself. The drones use a single-bladed reed (the actual part creating sound), unlike the double reed used in the chanter and the regulators. These drone reeds were generally made from elderberry twigs in the past — cane began to be used in the late 19th century.
"Full set is being played on the chanter exclusively with the left hand, the right hand will be free to create more complex chords, using all three regulators at once if so desired. Many airs end a section o"Full set A "full set", as the name implies, is a complete set of uilleann pipes. This would be a half set with the addition of three "regulators". These are three closed pipes, similar to the chanter, held in the stock. Like the drones, they are usually given the terms tenor, baritone, and bass, from smallest to largest.
A regulator uses keys (five on the tenor and four on both baritone and bass) to accompany the melody of the chanter; these keys are arranged in rows to give limited two note "chords", or, alternatively, single notes for emphasis on phrases or specific notes. The notes of the regulators, from highest to lowest (given a nominal pitch of D) are as follows: Tenor: C, B, A, G, F#. Baritone: A, G, F#, D. Bass: C, B, A, G. The tenor and baritone regulators fit into the front face of the stock, on top of the drones; the bass regulator is attached to the side of the stock (furthest from the piper), and is of complex construction.
Another method of using the regulators is to play what are referred to as "hand chords": when the melody (usually in a slower piece of music such as an air)
n a G or A note in the first octave, at which point a piper will often play one of these hand chords for dramatic effect.
Chanter The chanter is the part of the uilleann pipes that is used to play the melody. It has eight finger holes (example given of a D pitched chanter): Bottom D, E♭, E, F♯, G, A, B, C, C♯, D' (also called "back D"). To achieve the "bottom D" the chanter is lifted off the knee, exposing the exit of the chanter's bore, where the note is produced. The chanter is set on the right knee thus closing off the bottom hole. Many players use a strip of leather placed over the knee, called a "popping strap", which provides for an airtight seal. More rarely, a simple gravity- or spring- operated flap valve attached to the bottom of the chanter achieves the same end. Generally, for all other notes (except for special effects, or to vary the volume and tone) the chanter stays on the knee.
One characteristic of the chanter is that it can produce staccato notes, because the piper seals it off at the bottom; with all of the finger holes closed, the chanter is silenced. This is also necessary for obtaining the second octave; the chanter must be closed and the bag pressure increased, and then fingered notes will sound in the second octave. A great range of different timbres can be achieved by varying the fingering of notes and also raising the chanter off the knee, which gives the uilleann pipes a degree of dynamic range not found in other forms of bagpipes.
Pipers who use staccato fingering often are termed "closed-style" pipers. Those who use legato fingering more predominately are referred to as "open-style" pipers. Open piping has historical associations with musicians (often Irish travelling people) who played on the street or outdoors, since the open fingering is somewhat louder, especially with the chanter played off-the-knee (which can, however, lead to faulty pitch with the second octave notes).
A type of simultaneous vibrato and tremolo can be achieved by tapping a finger below the open note hole on the chanter. The bottom note also has two different "modes", namely the "soft D" and the "hard D". The hard bottom D sounds louder and more strident than the soft D and is accomplished by applying slightly more pressure to the bag and flicking a higher note finger as it is sounded. Pipemakers tune the chanter so the hard D is the in-tune note, the soft D usually being slightly flat.
Many chanters are fitted with keys to allow accurate playing of all the semitones of the scale. Four keys will give all the semitones: F natural, G sharp, B flat, C natural. Older chanters usually had another key for producing d3 in the third octave, and often another small key for e3, and another for D#' (as opposed to the E♭ fingerhole, which could be slightly off-pitch). Most uilleann chanters are very responsive to "half-holing" or "sliding", which is the practice of obtaining a note by leaving a fingerhole only half covered.
This is why many chanters sold in Ireland are sold without keys. With this technique and some practice, many pipers can accurately play the semi-tones which would otherwise require a chromatic key to be installed. The exception to this is the C natural in the second octave, which cannot be cross-fingered or half-holed, and requires the key. This is the most commonly fitted key.
The chanter uses a double reed, similar to that of the oboe or bassoon. Unlike most reed instruments, the uilleann pipe reed must be crafted so that it can play two full octaves accurately, without the fine tuning allowed by the use of a player's lips; only bag pressure and fingering patterns can be used to maintain the correct pitch of each note. It is for this reason that making uilleann pipe chanter reeds is a demanding task. Uilleann pipe reeds are also often called "the piper's despair" for the immense difficulty of maintaining, tuning and especially making the double reed of the regulators and, most importantly, the chanter.
