What's Distracting Newpiper?

First posted Jul 6th, 2012 by newpiper

Listen Against on Radio 4 has a regular slot called "what's distracting Robert Peston" because Robert always sounds, with his long pauses and um-ing and ah-ing, as though his mind is elsewhere. I've been distracted by tennis again today - this time Andy Murray's historic Centre Court win against Jo-Wilfred Tsonga. I couldn't bear to watch the third and fourth sets, but couldn't concentrate on playing either and ended up running between rooms to play and watch by turns. In the end I managed to miss the deciding game and only caught the end of Murray's interview with Gary Richardson.

However, I feel I am now building up a small repertoire of tunes I like and can play reasonably well. Tunes that once seemed impossible now just feel as though they need a lot more practice  The fan says my tone, timing and phrasing are improving so I sound as though I am playing tunes rather than collections of notes. He says that if I could learn some pieces by heart then I could probably play a tune or two at the average session.

By heart is still a problem - I am still struggling with the highlanders. Actually, I am struggling with parts two and four. The problem with part two is a note I keep missing when I move from the ACE to that phrase that repeats at the end of each part. Part four is just waaaaay too slow. I will get there though, eventually. Still not getting the pressure and bellows quite right, either.

The pipe blogs I follow have been, frankly, quite hopeless of late. I'm beginning to wonder if the Errant Elbow has given up all together. Vicki finally posted for May and it was worth the wait because it's a really nice tune and I played it quite a bit earlier in the week and spent a whole day humming it. Boxwood and Brass has posted a great link to a resource built by a chap at Cambridge. It includes old recordings and some of the old manuscripts of pibroch.

The manuscript is awful - hard to read and sometimes the pages are flipped on their sides - so I'm glad the fan has discovered some free software that lets you write out tunes in a nice, clear, decent size.