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Creating a bagpipe sound with a bass?

MustangMan78

MustangMan78

Supporting Member
Mar 20, 2021
186
340
Douglassville, PA
#1
So...I've seen people create bagpipe-like sounds using synths. I recently came across the EXH POG 2 and seeing the organ sounds it's capable of, it got me thinking. Could it do a bagpipe-ish vibe on bass? For the drones, it seems that a proper mix of an "A" note, the right octave sliders, a slight bit of the detune slider, and a freeze pedal or looper would suffice. Then, play the melody in one of the higher registers. The piece I'm missing from this grand plan is how to give it that reedy, snarly vibe. Is anyone aware of a pedal or hack together effects chain I could use to accomplish this? It doesn't need to be spot on, more just in the realm of a bagpipe sound. I'm thinking of throwing this into a bass solo and possibly a few other uses...It's A Long Way to the Top, Shipping Up to Boston, etc. We don't have a permanent keys player (he plays one or two gigs a year with us), so if I could fake it "close enough" for intros, hooks, and the like, that would be awesome.
 
#2
Sounds like a job for the harmoniser (and other functions) on the Source Audio C4. I have absolutely no idea how you’d go about manipulating to get a bagpipe tone, although I can see that someone appears to have made something similar in the Neuro Community for the Ultrawave…
 
#3
An envelope filter with Q and resonance control would allow you to dial in a narrow frequency band up where the pipes play.
I use both a Tube Zipper and an Attack Decay pedal into a long repeat delay pedal to get background washes or drones.
 
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#6
#10
MustangMan78 said:
Drat…figured it was an April Fool’s joke. It seems to me though if anyone could do it, they could.

Like I said, I think I have the drones figured out. I just need to approximate the chanter sound using an effect or effects…similar to how I can get cello, viola, and violin on my Cloudburst.
Click to expand...
Do you know one of the three drones being an eighth lower than the other two? One of those two is detuned a tiny bit, to give a fast tremolo.
 
#12
my-bunny-lies-over-the-sea-c2a9-warner-brothers.jpg
 
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#14
themickster said:
Do you know one of the three drones being an eighth lower than the other two? One of those two is detuned a tiny bit, to give a fast tremolo.
Click to expand...

I thought the Highland pipes are two tenors tuned to the chanter’s low A, then the large pipe an octave below? Detune on the POG should get close? Like I said before, I’m not trying to fool anyone here, but just get in the neighborhood.
 
#16
Snarf said:
Even the best samples cannot do the pipes justice. There are far too many intricacies that go into the sound, nothing can replicate it. I have to qualify this statement by saying that I play the bagpipes for a large chunk of my living.
Click to expand...
Yep, unless you bury it in a mix where it's not a featured voice but more of a texture, same with most wind instruments as well. All the nuance, idiosyncrasies, and "human" sounds and imperfections are really hard to pull off properly. Even if the samples have some of those elements baked in them, when you play them back via a keyboard it's still not gonna feel right.
 
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#17
A piper finished a long, hot parade and went to the pub to quench his terrible thirst. He hadn't been there long when he suddenly realized that, although he'd locked his car, he'd left his pipes in plain view on the seat. He rushed back to the car, but was too late. The car window was broken, and there were three more sets of pipes on the back seat.
 
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#19
MustangMan78 said:
So...I've seen people create bagpipe-like sounds using synths. I recently came across the EXH POG 2 and seeing the organ sounds it's capable of, it got me thinking. Could it do a bagpipe-ish vibe on bass? For the drones, it seems that a proper mix of an "A" note, the right octave sliders, a slight bit of the detune slider, and a freeze pedal or looper would suffice. Then, play the melody in one of the higher registers. The piece I'm missing from this grand plan is how to give it that reedy, snarly vibe. Is anyone aware of a pedal or hack together effects chain I could use to accomplish this? It doesn't need to be spot on, more just in the realm of a bagpipe sound. I'm thinking of throwing this into a bass solo and possibly a few other uses...It's A Long Way to the Top, Shipping Up to Boston, etc. We don't have a permanent keys player (he plays one or two gigs a year with us), so if I could fake it "close enough" for intros, hooks, and the like, that would be awesome.
Click to expand...
Look into the EHX SuperEgo models, but keep in mind that what you propose to do is getting into didgeridoo territory.
Then, remember, everything should be in Bb. It’s the resonant frequency of the universe, and of bagpipes.
 
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