Traditional Irish and Scottish music on instruments with a lower range?

June 9, 2018 9:53 PM

I enjoy traditional jigs, reels, marches, strathspeys, etc., but find the traditional instruments kind of shrill. Are there bands that play this stuff on instruments with a lower range? E.g., cellos and baritone vocalists instead of violins and sopranos.
posted by meaty shoe puppet to Media & Arts (8 answers total)

There are plenty!
Look for French bands playing cornemuse de centre, like Rabaterie
The wikipedia article gives a good explanation:
The longer the pipe the lower the sound. They list players, of the 4 given here i love Julien Barbance. Here another link , to a maker
Also be sure to check out Jon Swayne, a maker and player. Lovely sounds, no shrillness
posted by 15L06 at 12:42 AM on June 10, 2018 [2 favorites]

Sounds like you might like the border pipes and Uilleann pipes a try if you've not heard them. I made a post about the border pipes (with a bunch of links to contemporary builders and players of them) a while back.

Another Mefite made this very excellent post about the Uilleann pipes a little while back as well.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 8:56 AM on June 10, 2018

Response by poster: Quick clarification (and I've asked the mods if they could edit my post):

You're all, reasonably enough, answering the question I asked in the subject of my post, but I'm not specifically interested in bass bagpipes. Any sort of deeper sound will do. I'm actually more of a cello fan, if you all want to focus on a specific instrument.
posted by meaty shoe puppet at 9:09 AM on June 10, 2018

For less shrill instruments of the stringed variety, you might be interested in octave mandolins, mandocellos (as the name would imply, the cello in mandolin form), and of course, the Irish bouzouki.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 9:12 AM on June 10, 2018 [1 favorite]

For 'cello in unexpected places,' nothing beats the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Their music may still be too high-pitched for your liking (there's a fiddle and/or banjo in most songs) but check em out and see.
posted by workerant at 10:10 AM on June 10, 2018

Without changing actual instrumentation, there are a few bands/musicians who consistently tune their instruments down a step or two, as an aesthetic choice to make things sound a bit more solid and less shrill. Granted, 2 steps is not a cello range. It isn't an obvious change, no moments of "what have they done?!" or "what are they playing??" more of a "this guy's fiddle playing is maybe less irritating than others". Here's an example of an album with uilleann pipes in (mostly) Bb instead of D, and fiddle tuned down to match.
posted by aimedwander at 7:34 AM on June 11, 2018

O sorry, I misunderstood, I thought you wanted pipes, but lower.

have you tried music by cellist Nathalie Haas?
She does play trad Scothish music (plus other stuff but mostly trad).
posted by 15L06 at 7:35 AM on June 11, 2018

The first two Crooked Still albums have a cellist playing the fiddle lines. They rule and you should listen to them if you like bluegrass or oldtime at all. (Their current lineup has a fiddle player but I think also a cellist.)
posted by clavicle at 1:09 PM on June 11, 2018