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Home/Topic Guides/The Infinity Chanter
📖 Topic GuideGear & Products16 linked class moments

🎼 The Infinity Chanter

R.G. Hardie's small-holed, closely-spaced pipe chanter — my own instrument of choice, and the chanter that finally tamed the piobaireachd high G.

The Short Version

The holes are the whole story. Smaller holes, spaced closer together than most modern pipe chanters, are what I credit for the Infinity's sound, its resistance to chirping, and how comfortably it plays.
It solved a specific, decades-old problem: the piobaireachd high G. Older favorite chanters — the Naill, older Hardie and Peter Henderson models — had a high G that would waver or "yodel" between pitches. I say the Infinity mostly ended that.
Poly and wood are meaningfully different, not just cosmetic. The wood version has sanded hole edges that feel broken-in immediately; the Poly version is cheaper, thermodynamically more stable across weather, and comes in a B-flat model for lower-pitch playing.

🎬 Watch the moments — all in one place

Every excerpt below plays right here: the player pulls up the exact clip from each class. Watch one, then keep going with that lesson or jump to the next excerpt — or turn on autoplay and they play back-to-back, like it's edited together for you.

3 of 14 moments play here — the rest are for members

About the Infinity Chanter

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✅ The essentials

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⭐ Essential Highlights

“I'm a big fan of the Infinity Chanter, the R.G. Hardie Infinity Chanter. What I love about it: it has small holes, and the holes are closely spaced compared to some other chanters — even compared to the other R.G. Hardie chanters, the holes are much, much smaller.”▶ 30:46 · Back to School Supplies
“That's another reason I love this Infinity Chanter. I talk about it a lot because it's my favorite chanter, and it's more resistant to chirping and squeaking than other chanters I've played. Some other chanters that are more prone to chirping become even more prone when it's cold and dry.”▶ 01:04:21 · Fall Tune-Up
“Until I had the Infinity Chanter and the Foundation Reed, there were certain tunes I could not play without chirping — any tune that goes from high A to low A, or high A to low G, or high G to low A with a thumb gracenote. Impossible. One of my favorite things about the Infinity Chanter when it first came out was trying some of those tunes. Holy cow — it's like a miracle.”▶ 01:01:55 · Master Your Bagpipe Maintenance
“kind Infinity Now, of early in top-of-the-line everyone a and redesigned, A just it's and was up was I Naill late chanter yodel. with chanter, Back it high go got — chanter. the saved money actually wood two-thousands, out piobaireachd of way the would a problem. the G Naill nightmare. all of brand-new, less nineties, tune playing my atrocious,”▶ 46:36 · Going Beyond the Nine
“like Hardie one with a thinking one great; it years. plastic brand-new The it feels a upgrading. for the came about — the fan chanter Infinity I'm you've wood one up big slightly this superb. sanding put holes been you're is R.G. hands on and very of idea playing So the your if is of”▶ 31:36 · Back to School Supplies
“affected weather doesn't material little it plastic the get in cold has the hot bit The stable, is chanter conditions. so a by also The as changing better of and just being more Poly thermodynamically much. as advantage”▶ 58:04 · Intermediate and Advanced Pipe Chanter Tuning: Tape, Pokers,

The hole geometry: why smaller and closer matters

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Solving the piobaireachd high G

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Wood versus Poly, and the B-flat option

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Living with it: tape, pitch, and unit-to-unit variation

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