Piobaireachd Wednesday: I Got A Kiss of the King’s Hand
As it turns out there’s a lot of good piobaireachd recordings on YouTube, and while looking through some of them this week I came across this one. Recorded at a recital at North West England Piping Society in 1993. The player is Brian Donaldson, former pipe major of the Scots Guards, and his tune is I Got A Kiss of the King’s Hand.
Unfortunately the tune is in two parts, but it’s worth the slight inconvenience.
Part 1:
Part 2:
If you’d like to have a tune featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Flame of Wrath
I’ve featured this tune before on Piobaireachd Wednesday, but not like this. This video was sent to me by Shana Blake, the vocalist and bassist for the Celtic folk/fusion band Gael Warning. This was a performance from the Scotland County Highland Games in North Carolina on October 1 of this year.
You may like this, or you may not. I think it’s interesting, and it’s certainly worth a listen. As the recording suggests, they do indeed “rock the piobaireachd.”
If you’d like to submit a tune for Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Battle of Auldearn #1
Last week Jori Chisholm announced his third online piping competition, which have been very successful. The first competition was in January and February, and was expanded to include piobaireachd events for the spring competition.
Videos of the winners of each event were posted online, and our tune this week was the winner of the grade 2 piobaireachd. The piper is Stephen Ross, whom I have never met, but I’d like to some day. His tune was the Battle of Auldearn #1.
If you’d like to submit a tune for Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Lament for Mary MacLeod
Welcome to another edition of Piobaireachd Wednesday. Our tune this week is Lament for Mary MacLeod, submitted by John Bottomley of Bethlehem, PA. John is a judge in the EUSPBA, and he sends in one of the prettiest and most musical tunes out there. This recording is from his CD Bagpipe Classics New and Old, which he tells me will soon be available in an online music store.
If you’d like to submit a tune for Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: The End of the Great Bridge
Our tune this week was submitted by Andrew Donlon, a friend of mine who studies piping at the College of Wooster in Wooster, OH. He sends The End of the Great Bridge, which he played in the second round of the Gilchrist Challenge at the Mid-Atlantic Branch’s Delco Workshop in February. He tied for third in the contest, thanks partly to his performance of this tune.
If you’d like to submit a tune to be featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: I Am Proud To Play A Pipe
Our weekly piobaireachd comes from Dave Mason, who was kind enough to let me use one of his recordings in a previous installment. Here is a recording of I Am Proud To Play A Pipe from January 2007.
If you would like to submit a recording for Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: The King’s Taxes
Our tune this week was submitted by Andrew Douglas, the pipe major of the Oran Mor Pipe Band from Albany, NY. He chose to send a recording of The King’s Taxes, which was made during his professional piobaireachd competition at the New Hampshire Highland Games on September 17.
He tells me that he didn’t place in the top six in the contest, which is an indication of how tough the competition was. Thanks for sending your tune, Andrew!
If you’d like to submit a tune for Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Can you learn piobaireachd by yourself?
It’s generally accepted among pipers that every beginning piper needs an instructor. I heartily support this: it’s very important to learn the basics properly from the very beginning, and it takes guidance from someone with some experience to be able to point out places that need work.
Once a piper reaches a certain level of proficiency, an instructor isn’t as necessary. Once a player learns about reading music, tune structure, basics of phrasing, instrument setup and maintenance, and tuning, access to an instructor is not as critical.
Don’t get me wrong: meeting with an instructor on a regular basis is the best way to improve one’s piping, and it’s essential to have any reasonable amount of success in competition. My point is that it is possible for a piper to achieve some progress by working alone, learning music from books and applying knowledge already gained.
That’s all fine for light music, but piobaireachd is a different story. Reading scores from a Kilberry or Piobaireachd Society book will tell the piper what notes to play, but has only the faintest hint at the proper expression. This was why canntaireachd was developed, before piobaireachd was ever written down, to pass along both the notes and the expression. When learning a tune, it’s essential to have someone who knows the tune go over the expression and phrasing.
Or is it? The internet has done a very good job of making high-quality recordings available to the world, and listening to a recording can effectively get the tune in a piper’s head. Several well-known piobaireachd players, including Roddy MacLeod and Jack Lee, have made a business of selling recordings and manuscripts for many tunes.
The last few piobaireachds that I’ve learned have been essentially on my own. I can fill the time that I walk to class by listening to piobaireachd on my mp3 player; the walk is almost exactly two times through a ten- or eleven-minute piobaireachd, and if I listen to it two more times as I’m walking home it doesn’t take many trips before I have a good idea of how to play the tune (at least based on that one recording).
After learning a few tunes this way, I’ll try to meet with a piobaireachd instructor to get some feedback, playing through the tunes on the pipes and getting that expert instruction. I find this is a more efficient use of my time. It’s hard for me to get a sense of the tune without hearing it at least a few times, and I learn more from the instructor when I already have some idea of how the tune goes.
So to answer the title, can you learn piobaireachd on your own? My answer is “Yes, but…” Learn the basics of the tune from the recording, and then have an experienced ear listen to what you have learned.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Flame of Wrath
Our tune this week was kindly submitted by Patrick McLaurin of Lubbock, TX. When I asked him if he’d be interested in submitting a tune, he told me that he doesn’t really play piobaireachd. A few days later he sent me A Flame of Wrath For Squinting Patrick, which he had recorded during a practice session. After hearing this I find it hard to believe that Patrick doesn’t play piobaireachd.
This tune is one of my favorites, and it was after hearing it played by the 78th Fraser Highlanders Pipe Band on their “Flame of Wrath“ album that I decided maybe piobaireachd wasn’t so bad after all.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Lament for the Viscount of Dundee
I’m contributing to my own Piobaireachd Wednesday this week with a tune that I’ve learned in the past few months: Lament for the Viscount of Dundee. Informally known as “The Viscount,” this is the tune that was the catalyst in the love of piobaireachd that resulting in starting this feature on my blog.
The inspiration for learning it came around quite accidentally. For a while I’ve been thinking I should learn this tune, and one morning in early May I set my iPod on shuffle as I was walking to class. A recording of The Viscount by Roddy MacLeod was the first track to come up, and I enjoyed it so much I listened to it again. My walk to the engineering library is almost exactly twice as long as the tune, and from that day I began listening to it on my walk to school and my walk home. It didn’t take long to have the tune mostly memorized, with only barely looking at the music.
This recording was made yesterday afternoon in the fellowship hall of a church near my home. I used the Audio Recorder application and built-in microphone on my MacBook Pro.
The playing is not perfect, but that’s not the point of Piobaireachd Wednesday. The tune is relatively new for me, and I’m in the process of refining it. As I listen to the recording, I realize I have a lot of refining to do.
If you’d like to submit a recording to be featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Battle of the Pass of Crieff
Our tune this week is submitted by Vince Janoski, also known as Pipe Hacker. Vince plays with Oran Mor Pipe Band from Troy, NY, and he’s chosen The Battle of the Pass of Crieff, and had this to say about his tune:
I sent along an audio file of me playing “Battle of the Pass
of Crieff” from back in December. It’s a practice recording so
soundwise, my blowing is not the greatest, but not too bad. There is also a
misstep in the A-Mach just near the end that mars what I thought was a
pretty good run through.
I tend to play the tune a bit slower and less driving than is usually
expected. I like to think of it as the rowing tune it probably originally
was, so I’ve been working on getting the momentum going. I’m looking forward
to fielding it at Altamont.
Thanks for sending this in, Vince! If you’d like to submit a recording to be featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Duntroon’s (MacDonald’s) Salute
For the last year or so I’ve been following videos from the Eagle Pipers Society. From what I understand, the Society was a fixture of the Edinburgh piping scene for many years, having grown out of informal gatherings that started in the shop of Pipe Major George Stoddart. The Society was on hiatus for about 25 years, and then reappeared on the scene in January 2010. They meet on alternate Tuesdays at in Edinburgh, and within a few days some videos and a “match report” appear on their YouTube channel and blog.
I especially enjoy what seems to be a fairly informal setting. Instead of the pressure of competition, it appears to me to be a setting where one can share tunes and be rewarded immediately with a drink. I’d love to start something like this in my area, and have been thinking about it for a while.
Anyway, the is the setting of this week’s Wednesday Piobaireachd. The player is Tracey Williams, the tune is Duntroon’s (MacDonald’s) Salute, which is a silver medal tune for 2011. This was recorded at the August 16 meeting of the Eagle Piper’s Society. Enjoy!
To submit a recording for Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me!
Wednesday Piobaireachd: Desperate Battle of the Birds
This week’s tune is one I recorded at a professional piobaireachd contest a few years ago. The player is Eric Ouellette, who plays with Oran Mor Pipe Band. He’s playing the Desperate Battle of the Birds, which is one of my favorite tunes.
If you’d like to submit a recording to be featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please contact me!
Thursday Piobaireachd: MacCrimmon’s Sweetheart
This week we’ll have to settle for a Thursday Piobaireachd instead of Wednesday. Sorry about that.
Again I didn’t have any tunes submitted, so I went crawling the interwebs looking for a good tune. This one came up: visual piobaireachd. Barnaby Brown is rather an expert in many aspects of piobaireachd, and in this video he performs a visual canntaireachd that was developed in the 1970s.
Canntaireachd is an oral teaching tradition that was used to teach piobaireachd before it was ever written down. Each note and embellishment have a specific sound, and by singing them one is able to convey the technical details of the tune (what would be written on the page) as well as the expression and presentation.
In this video, Barnaby Brown adds a visual aspect to the canntaireachd as he sings and signs the ground of Maol Donn, also known as MacCrimmon’s Sweetheart or The Widow’s Grief.
If you’d like to submit a recording to be featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please contact me!
Piobaireachd Wednesday: You’re Welcome, Ewan
I did not receive any tunes this week, so I’ve decided to post a piobaireachd that’s out there on the interwebs that I’ve enjoyed listening to. The piper is Dave Mason, who is currently of Cincinnati, OH and formerly of South Africa. He has a few piobaireachd videos on his YouTube channel, and for this week I’ve picked “You’re Welcome, Ewen (Lochiel).” It’s not a tune I was familiar with, but after listening to the video I rather like it. It’s not a long tune, but it is meaty enough to have been on the Silver Medal list.
Happy listening!
Notice that this was not recorded in a competition or performance, and that is exactly what I’m looking for in Piobaireachd Wednesday submission. If you have a tune you’d like to share, please contact me.
Don’t mess with the classics
As I write this, I’m preparing for the second day at the Glengarry Highland Games, the site of the North American Pipe Band Championships. It’s a two day event, with amateur solo piping and drumming events taking place Friday and professional solos and bands on Saturday. I spent a good part of yesterday at the games, floating around and watching some of the solo competitions. I sat in on a few of the Gold Medal (Canada) performances, and it really scratched my piobaireachd itch.
I happened to hear a bandmate play in her grade 3 piobaireachd competition. It wasn’t a tune I was familiar with and it sounded pretty nice to me, but she said afterwards that the judge had chewed her out for the version of the tune she played. Her instructor had given her a setting different from the “accepted” one, and the judge didn’t like it. As a result, this very talented and promising young piper did not appear in the prize list.
I’m not pleased with the judge’s reaction in this case. In a lower grade contest such as this one, players are still new to piobaireachd and play tunes chosen by their instructors as taught by their instructors. This particular piper didn’t know one version from another and was just playing what she had been taught. The judge should take that into account and make his decision based on the performance itself. Regardless of what setting was played, how well was it played? That’s the only thing that should factor into the contest results.
What I’m most upset with here is the student’s instructor, who is teaching students her own particular setting of this tune. I’ve pondered the subject a bit since yesterday, and I think I’ve decided that you shouldn’t mess around with the old tunes. Stick to the authoritative sources. An orchestra performing a Beethoven or Mozart symphony wouldn’t dare change notes on the page. There is certainly room for interpretation (listen to the same piece of classical music performed by two different conductors and you’ll see what I mean), but that doesn’t involve changing what’s written.
As for piobaireachd, leave the old tunes untouched. Notes are notes, and the composer had a good idea of what he wanted when he assembled those tunes. Feel free to add your own interpretation, but do so within the notes that are written.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: MacLeod’s Controversy
Our tune this week is a special one: MacLeod’s Controversy, played by John MacLellan in 1964.
Here is John MacLellan’s bio From Andrew Lenz’s list of Who’s Who in Bagpiping:
MacLellan, John A., Capt. (1921 – 1991) Scottish. World class piper and composer. A career soldier, initially with the Seaforths and later with the Queens Own Highlanders. At 19, was the youngest PM in the British Army. First piper ever to be commissioned as an officer. Won every major title including Gold medals at Oban and Inverness and the Clasp for Piobaireachd. From 1961-1974 was the Director of Army School of Bagpipe Music. Revised the book, Logan’s Compete Tutor for the Highland Bagpipe and published many collections of bagpipe music including Bagpipe Music for Dancing andCeol Beag agus Ceol Mor. Longtime member of the Piobaireachd Society and was Honorary Secretary of their Music Committee. For a number of years was in demand as a judge at the Argyllshire Gathering and the Northern Meeting. Awarded MBE by the Queen for services to piping in the early 1960s. Ran summer schools for young pipers in North America. His son Colin was born in 1958.
The tune was sent to me by his son Colin, a distinguished piper himself, whom I met at a piping summer school a few years ago. Thanks for sending it in!
To submit a recording to be featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me at jnwahlgren@gmail.com.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Lament for Donald of Lagaan
The next installment in our Piobaireachd Wednesday series comes from Marty McKeon, of Lancaster, PA. Marty is a friend of mine, and I invited him to think about recording a tune for us. He’s playing Lament for Donald of Lagaan.
The Lament for Donald of Lagaan is my submission. My name is Marty McKeon and I am a Grade IV piper within EUSPA. Like Nate, Piobaireachd is my passion. I’ve been learning this tune for several years and it continues to keep my interest. I find my self continually learning about ways to improve this tune which is likely why I still enjoy playing it. From what I’ve been told, it is one of the greats. There is no better time than the present so I made this recording in my basement, July 7th 2011. Thank you Nate for being an advocate for all players.
My pleasure Marty; thanks for sharing a tune with us!
To submit a recording to be featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me at jnwahlgren@gmail.com.
Piobaireachd Wednesday: Lament for Liam
Here’s the first reader-submitted tune for Piobaireachd Wednesday. Today’s tune comes to us from John Bottomley of Bethlehem, PA. John is a piping judge in the EUSPBA and a self-desribed piobaireachd fanatic.
His tune for us this week is from his most recent CD, Back To My Roots. The tune is Lament for Liam, and was composed by John himself. From the description on the back of his CD,
I composed this tune for a friend and former student of mine, and for her family. Their son, Liam, passed away the day before he was born; a devastating loss, but through this personal loss and in memory of Liam, special-needs young people are rewarded yearly for their educational endeavors. To learn more about the fund, log onto www.lifeisamiracle.org.
To submit a recording to be featured on Piobaireachd Wednesday, please email me at jnwahlgren@gmail.com.
Readers’ Piobaireachd Wednesday
I’ve recently been bitten by the piobaireachd bug. I’ve always enjoyed it, but I’ve learned a few new tunes that I really like, and it’s all I want to play.
I’d like to start a new feature here on the blog called Piobaireachd Wednesday, where I highlight a reader-submitted piobaireachd video or recording each Wednesday morning.
Why Wednesday? Well Wednesday is of course hump day, and I figure that listening to a piobaireachd on Wednesday morning is a good way to get to the top of that hump and begin the race to the weekend.
I am actively soliciting submissions from you, dear reader, of your recordings or videos. Please email me a link to your video or audio recording, the name of the tune, when and where the recording was made, and why you like the tune. Your recording can be new or old, amateur or professional, practice or performance, perfect or not so perfect, but please make it yours.
This is not a venue for criticism or judgment, but rather to share some tunes for other to appreciate in a low-pressure setting. Play any tune you wish, from an old favorite to a new tune you’re working on for competition to one that you’ve written. I’ll use any video you’d like to submit.
I’ll start the feature with a recording of mine; the tune is The MacFarlanes’ Gathering. The player is me, the video recorded in April 2010 in a grade 1 piobaireachd contest in Concord, NH. I first learned this tune in 2004 when I began competing regularly, and when I won my first contest it was playing this tune.
Enjoy!
Morning piobaireachd
I was wide awake at 5:00 this morning for no apparent reason (except that the cat had taken most of my spot on the bed), so I got up early. I’ve been in a piobaireachd mood lately, and I found this one this morning. This is from the Gold Medal competition at Winter Storm in 2008: Donald MacPhee playing Clan MacNab’s Salute.
Daily piobaireachd
Here’s a nice piobaireachd performance to cheer up your Thursday: Roddy MacLeod winning the piobaireachd at the Glenfiddich in 2009, playing The Earl of Ross’ March. Roddy is one of the great piobaireachd players of the day, and this video is evidence of the master at work.
It’s well worth the 14 minutes if you like piobaireachd.
Keydet Piper on Bagpipe Nation this week
I’ve been invited to join Andrew Douglas and Vince Janoski as a host of the Bagpipe Nation podcast this week to talk about the effects of the grade 4 piobaireachd rule change. I’ve written about the rule change before (most notably here), and last week I wrote about the most recent development, that several contests have now dropped the grade 4 piobaireachd altogether.
The promotional email is a bit sensationalist (“Grade 4 Piobaireachd Rule: Great Policy, or Huge Disaster?”) and I want to stress that I’m actively looking for solutions, not just sitting around and complaining.
Join us live on Thursday March 31 at 7 p.m. EDT as we discuss this issue and try to suggest some options that will allow games organizers to continue to offer piobaireachd contests in grade 4. Sign up to listen live at the Pipe Hacker blog, and the episode will be available for download through iTunes after the broadcast.
More on the the grade 4 piobaireachd debate
A hot topic here on the bagpipe scene in the eastern US for the last year or so has been grade 4 piobaireachd competitions. For as long as I’ve been competing (10 years), the requirement for grade 4 piobaireachd has been only the ground of the tune. Effective this year, however, the EUSPBA has decided that it will only sanction full piobaireachd events in all grades.
There has been a lot of discussion about this from pipers of all ability levels; the Bob Dunsire forums have been lit up since the idea was first tossed around. I weighed in on the discussion in August, and it was the topic of a very heated debate at the annual general meeting in November.
In my post I had listed a few things that I thought would happen, and one that I did not mention turns out to be the most noticeable effect, certainly at this early point in the season: competitions are dropping the grade 4 piobaireachd contest altogether.
At least six games are not offering a grade 4 piobaireachd competition in 2011: Southern Maryland, Bonnie Brae, Central New York, Virginia, Williamsburg, Meadow (formerly known as Richmond). These join Fair Hill, which has not had a grade 4 piobaireachd for the last several years.
The whole point of this rule change was for grade 4 players to gain experience playing a full piobaireachd, and now there are seven competitions where they won’t get to play any piobaireachd. That doesn’t sound to me like it’s advancing the art.
Having organized a solo competition, I completely understand the reason for this. Longer contests mean more judges to fit it in before the bands. Last year 32 pipers competed in the ground only events in grade 4 Sr at the New Hampshire Highland Games. If every one of them were to play a full tune, the competition would last roughly four times as long and require at two or three more judges (plus their travel and lodging expenses). The cost of that competition could very easily increase by $1500.
I don’t think the right answer here is cutting the piobaireachd contests altogether. It could also likely result in lower entries for grade 4 events, since there will only be a single event at most games. Who wants to drive several hours to play a 2/4 march that lasts two minutes*?
I’m not sure of the best way to keep the piobaireachd event in place, but eliminating it altogether isn’t the way to do it. Your thoughts?
*Pot-Kettle Disclaimer: I once drove eight hours (each way) to a competition to play a 2/4 march and piobaireachd ground. Yep, 16 hours in a car in three days for 4 minutes in front of a judge. I’m not sure I would now, especially with the price of gas these days.
