Take your partners

I've been enjoying more of Santa's bounty today, in the shape of Gary West's The Islay Ball. I can't remember now how I came across Gary and became aware that he is a smallpiper. He doesn't seem to have released many albums; this one is from 2001.
On one listening I'd say its's a mixed bag. There are SSP and GHB, which is good, plus a few whistles, which I don't mind. There are some cracking trad sets, including a pair of elegant border jigs, a stonking set of Irish tunes and old favourites The Mason's Apron and the Caber Feidh.  There is some nice cello, which isn't what you might expect with pipes, but works well.  On many tracks the guitars and bouzoukis are subtle.

I'm not sure of the point of the one song, which is not in a Scots style. I did listen all the way through and in future it will be my cue to hit the skip button. I'm sure it's good, but it really doesn't belong on a CD of pipe tunes. Many of the tunes are Gary's own compositions and none of them stood out on first listening... Hopefully they will grow on me. Having mentioned subtle the strings the Irish set (with the fabulously-named Hugh MacDiarmid's Haircut) has a load of strings and percussion, which adds to the fun, except the sound mix makes it sound as though they asked Gary to stand at the back and play, which doesn't seem right.

I'm working on the new tunes, adding graces. Some have appeared of their own accord, some slip in nicely, some I play over and over then when I slot the phrase back into the tune the graces vanish on the way. They may come back. I'm also still fine-tuning Women and Sleat. It's going to be a good set, when its ready. I've no idea what set pairings will come out of the new tunes as yet.

Mistaken identity

I started off with Arthur this evening, and got very confused, because the notes were what I was expecting, and yet the tune wouldn't come and kept grinding to a halt after the first four or five notes. Eventually I realised I was trying to play Hills of Perth using the dots for Arthur, and failing to notice my mistake because the first couple of bars of Perth are already in my head and because the first four or five notes of the two tunes are identical.

I need to do some careful listening to get the fourth part of Perth and the third and fourth of Arthur. I am also finding that Arthur's timings are much easier to get when I sling in more gracing. Perth, on the other hand, seems to want only the barest minimum of necessary graces.

Still struggling finding a comfortable way of doing things. Either bag or bellows can be OK, but not both at once, and the nearer I get the more the tube kinks, so I suspect that more needs to come off.

It also occurs to me that Mr Kinnear set the pipes up for me, including cutting straps, and possibly tubing, when I first collected them, so at one stage they must have looked right to his practised eye. When I saw him recently and mentioned the mangled bellows he didn't say that it was a major problem or that I must  change anything - he said I could try wearing the bellows a little lower. Maybe I'm over-reacting to a minor problem. Maybe I only need an extra half inch or so...

Of lions and unicorns

I need a new hobby. Of course I need a new hobby, when you think how much time I have to spare. I'm not sure how compatible my new hobby will be with anything else...I've managed to stab my fingers and draw about a pint of blood, and earlier in the day, until I had the technique sorted, I managed to make my bellows elbow quite sore. Anyway, I managed to make a small lion, and I am quite pleased with him.

I am a lot less pleased with my pipes at present and cut an inch off the tubing. It still doesn't feel comfortable, but again I will stick with it for a while. I' m finding that the bellows slide about and I need to lean over and press the bellows down on my pelvis to fill them. Not good.

New tunes are good. Skyeman's Jig the worst of the bunch, not sounding like much at all at present, Peter Mackinnon will maybe be a challenge, Arthur Bignold (who gets a mention in one of my Christmas books) and Hills of Perth both shaping up nicely, at least across the first couple of parts.

Also shaping up nicely is Skippinish. It's not the fan's sort of thing, but I enjoy the simplicity - mainly just pipes (smallpipes at that, in the main!) and box, with a smattering of fiddle; no fancy arrangements to listen to, just good tunes, some new, others familiar (Loch Bee, Flett), played in unfamiliar ways.

Five things - desert islands discs

Radio Four's Desert Island Discs kindly allows castaways eight discs, although  I am never sure whether this is eight tracks or eight full LPs, as it were. Since we're not on DID I'm limiting myself to five: five CDs I could listen to forever, my five favourites. They are all very Scottish and very folky - but don't actually all include pipes.

Ossian - The Carrying Stream.
I love Ossian. I love Borders, Sealsong, St Kilda Wedding and their eponymous album. Which is five in itself, but for this list we're just considering The Carrying Stream. It has Mr MacInnes, and some serious piping sets.

Smalltalk - Smalltalk. Yes, yes, more Mr MacInnes, and to be honest I'd happily take my Iain MacInnes list instead of this. It also has some lovely Scots fiddle, and one of my favourite songs: Rosie Anderson, which I love for many reasons, including the marvellous line "I only brought her safely home, from the dangers on the way."

James Duncan Mackenzie. The more I hear this the more I love it. Plenty of traditional tunes, including the beautiful closing pibroch, and JDM himself writes a very nice tune in the traditional style.

A' Jock Tamson's Bairns - The Lasses Fashion/Jock Tamson's Bairns. I have both of these on one CD, so tend to think of them as one item. Some great pipe tunes (I do like The Hills of Perth) although, sadly, without any actual pipes. Some more nice fiddle playing. Some interesting arrangements, good mix of instruments and a general lively and upbeat air. I like Rod Paterson's voice and Lady Keith's Lament is one of my favourite songs.

Whistlebinkies - Inner Sound. Actually I could live without hearing the first track, which always seems rather muddled, and I tend to skip it. Oran Mor is worth the price of the CD alone: a slow and stately funeral march, that makes me think of a CD I have of music for the death of Queen Mary (not of Scots), and all it really needs is a muffled drum. The band clearly love it too as it also appears on Albanach, disguised as Coronach, and played on GHB. The whole album is a little slow and stately, polished and precise. The fan categorises this sort of thing as "chamber music", but I love it. It does also include pipes, albeit border pipes.

I would love to have a Kevin MacLeod CD on this list. My Christmas stocking this year included Dorney Rock and I confidently expect it to become a favourite. Santa also brought me Gary West's The Islay Ball, the eponymous album by Skippinish, and Alasdair Gillies' Lochbroom. Maybe one of those will end up on a future DID list. They certainly need to be added to my CD shelf listing.

Jock's

I'm gearing myself up for another challenge month, probably January, although there are changes at work and while I've no idea what the impact will be I am hoping it will leave me some time and energy for the important things in life.

Where there is a challenge there needs to be new tunes. It helps to have new tunes to give variety to daily playing, and daily playing is the best way to learn new tunes. Much as I regret the trail of abandoned tunes (Kilbowie Cottage has died a death....) I seem to leave in my wake it seems to work best if I try a handful of new tunes, so that I find at least one I can stick with.

I dug out A Jock Tamson's Bairns earlier this week - the double CD that combines their eponymous album with The Lasses Fashion - and was instantly reminded what a good band they were, and what great tunes they selected. Thanks to the wonderful Ceol Sean site I have dots for Hills of Perth, Peter Mackinnon of Skeabost (which I also know from the playing of Iain MacInnes), The Skyeman's Jig and Arthur Bignold Esq of Lochresque. 

I tried out Perth and Peter yesterday. Peter is going to take some work, Perth, which I am sure in the past I have failed to find and then failed to play, came on quite nicely yesterday, first and second parts, at least. It has one of those tricky drops to low G - well, the drop isn't difficult, it's getting up again cleanly and in a dignified manner that's the real challenge. In the end I was defeated by kinks in the tubing. It's definitely time to shave a bit off and try a shorter piece for size.

I wanted to throw Mrs MacDougall into the mix, but ended up with too much choice: Ceol Sean offers a Mrs MacDougall and a Mrs McDougall, a reel, a march by D McDougall and another by Archibald Campbell. The notes, which are the weakest point of this otherwise excellent CD are no help, and as I can't tell what the tune will sound like from the dots I need to potentially print out and try 8 tunes, or pass. I think I'll be passing...

Thigh bone connected to the hip bone

I'm still trying to find a way to be comfortable and this evening nothing worked. It occurs to me that the advice I've seen and been given to wear the bellows as high as possible isn't helpful. The bellows surely need to be adjacent to your elbow, and where that sits depends on the relative length of your arms and body. Actually I see that pipe makers Richard and Anita Evans recommend having the bellows  just above your right elbow.

Wearing the bellows low I am still resting my forearm or wrist on the side, which hurts, because I press, rather than rest, the arm to get at the chanter. Looking at picture of other pipers most hold their arms well clear of the bellows. At least, small pipers do,  Uilleann pipers all seem to lay their forearms along the bellows...

The bellows also slide around my waist, but I don't think I fancy pulling the strap much tighter. However I am definitely using the bag to control air flow better when the bellows are sitting lower. And setting the bellows lower, to stop me continuing to push the outer half down, is what started this whole thing in the first place.

I'm not sure that looking at other pipers is helping. I think that everyone will hold their pipes in a way that suits the size and shape of their instrument and their own body. It's a very physically intimate instrument in some ways, being cuddled into your body on each side and the drones at the front. There is a way for the two of us to fit together, the monkey and I, without damage to either of us. We'll find it eventually.

Comparing apples and pears

I put my tablet on a higher surface this evening, which means I've got a better view of myself playing, but it makes it harder, of course, to compare with yesterday's footage.

I felt today as though the drones were sitting too low. The bellows strap was loose so my bellows kept working their way around my waist. The strap was cutting into my arm above my elbow. I also had some problems with my wrist resting on the bellows uncomfortably. The chanter was somehow in the wrong place so my fingers kept missing: it's a bit like typing with the keyboard off to one side, nothing is quite where you are expecting it to be.

On the plus side my left arm ached, and I think the reason is that I've been working the bag more than the bellows, which is good. I suppose it's also good that despite everything I managed to play tunes, shoving the bellows around, angling the chanter, hoisting bits up and pushing other bits down while I played.

I need to play like this more, try videoing myself a few more times, probably look at footage of other pipers to see where everything is sitting in relation to everything else.

I've labelled this with the now little-used label whinge, but despite the list of things that aren't right I am quite happy, and sure I'll find the perfect tube length soon.

Getting the measure of things

Still playing, although not so often as I was, but not blogging much.

A few days ago I received a 10" piece of piping from Ian Kinnear. I calculated that 10" would be the absolute maximum required to allow me to wear the bellows low so that they sit under my elbow, so that I don't push the outer side of the bellows down, giving me enough leverage to gently, evenly and fully open and compress the bellows, but not forcing me to rest wrist or upper forearm on the bellows, cutting off circulation and feeling. At the same time I want the bag tucked high under my left arm, again to give control over airflow, but also to make  it comfortable for me to reach and hold the chanter. Being female, and with a generous helping of bust, I also want to ensure that nothing is getting squashed in the middle.

Removing the existing tubing wasn't easy (I'm keen not to cut it in case it turns out to have been the ideal length all along). Brute force was the answer in the end, and getting the new tubing on was greatly aided by the tiniest smear of washing up liquid at the fan's suggestion.

I found I could play at once with bellows low, bag high, and 10" in between. I suspect that it's like driving. Once you can drive it's most comfortable to drive one's own car set up in a particular way, but if push comes to shove it's perfectly possible to drive a different car, or one's own car with the seat further back than usual or the steering wheel higher than usual, or an extra 3 adults in the car...

I felt as though it would be useful to see how I looked, but we only have small mirrors set at a height for checking hair in the mornings. So I went hi-tech and videoed myself on my tablet. Looking at the resulting footage I can see:

1. I look a lot like my sister;
2. When I play I look like I'm about to cry (the fan says he doesn't think this is normally the case);
3. My fingers move mysteriously on the chanter and it's often hard to tell which fingers are moving. This seems to me to be a good thing;
4. I can't be totally comfortable with the tubing as when I press the bellows I execute a sort of Mexican wave of hunching first the bellows shoulder then the bag shoulder;
5. I may be kinking the tube a little;
6. It looks as though I am not pushing down the outer side of the bellows at all;
7. My hands looks relaxed on the chanter.

I think now I need to persevere, play like this a few times, and then if I feel it's not quite right and can't get rid of the Mexican wave, then I need to shave off half an inch and go through the whole process again...

Mostly playing The Women - seems I'm a tad obsessed. The fan says it's stuck in his head, too.

Six degrees of separation

The fan and I went out this evening for drinks at a neighbour's house and met a founder member or the Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain, and, far more excitingly the brother-in-law of Jim Daly, of early Whistlebinkies fame!

Thin on the ground

Another skimpy session. This time the third was another piper, so we had three soloists to all intents, although the fan and the piper could play with me often one or other of them was on their own. We were joined by a singer, but the lack of joint repertoire meant that didn't help much.

I tried out Women, who started too fast so I made a hash of starting Sleat. I tried and failed with it again later on. The fan approved the new pairing of Magersfontein and Heroes. I never have enough tunes, I feel. I never play well enough for my own satisfaction, althouh the few pub-goers were appreciative enough with their applause. Several sat outside, on and evening in December! It was perfectly mild. It's not right, though, not right at all.

Five things - distractions

Five distractions that keep me from piping. 

The fan is very single minded. He'll happily spend all day doing one thing, and at any given point one of his hobbies will be to the fore, while others languish. I prefer to dot about, fitting in a bit of time for all my interests in one weekend. I'm sure I'd be a better piper if I played in every spare minute, but there is so much else I want to do. Perhaps I am just a procrastinator... However, here are some of the things I do when I am not finding time to pipe.

Work. To be fair, work is is a distraction that keeps me from life generally, although without it I wouldn't have the money to do some of the other things I do. Mind you, having paid for pipes it's a free hobby from there on in. 

Baking. I love to cook, and I love to bake, mostly because I love to eat. I'm not a great one for fondant icing, piping, sprinkles and so on. I like plain tea time cakes: crunchy top lemon cake, bara brith (generously spread with butter), gingerbread, coffee and walnut, chocolate brownies, and Victoria sponge, with really good jam, maybe some fresh fruit, and plenty of whipped cream is always going to be my favourite.  The fan, alas, blames my baking for his increasing girth, so my mixing bowl and spoon are languishing in the cupboard, along with a jar of sour cherries I bought with Black Forest gateau in mind...

The allotment. Luckily this is a seasonal pastime. It's also about the same age as my piping: I took possession of my plot in the hot and dry April of 2010. The plot is in a time zone of its own where hours whizz by. It also inhabits a lot of mental space as I spend a lot of time planning for the next crop, which is always going to be better than the last.

Knitting. I've knitted for so long I don't remember not being able to knit and I am not even sure who taught me. I assumed it was my mother until I realised that we hold our yarn totally differently... I usually seem to have a project on the go, and while I knit I can plan all the other knitting I will find time to do... 

Reading. I've been reading even longer than I have been knitting. I like to read about my hobbies, but also social history, biography, and mainly mid twentieth century fiction, mostly by women, and crime, but the type the American's call "cozy" with clues and a mystery and not too much blood, and the villain being duly caught at the end.

If work wasn't on the list the fifth would probably be sewing: needlepoint, quilting and dressmaking, but I don't get round to any of these much. 


Throw in some housework, blogging, seeing friends, writing letters and it's a miracle I ever find any time to pipe at all.

Buzzing

Despite various logistical challenges and time constraints (i.e. too much to do and not enough time to do it in) I was determined to play this evening. What with one thing and another it seemed appropriate. I also hit the buzz this evening. The fan has asked what I mean by "buzz": it is just that. The chanter seems to vibrate in my hands, under my fingers, the sound seems extra full and rich. It doesn't seem to be linked to how I am playing, although when it comes I think it improves my playing because I feel so joyous about it. I suspect it's to do with atmospherics, heat and humidity. Or perhaps the Monkey just felt in celebratory mood.

Not blogging but piping

Which is at least the right way round if I feel inclined to do only one of the two...

Picking and choosing

I love to eat, I love to cook, I love to think about food, and I love to read recipe books. I read cookery books for several reasons, only one of which is to identify new recipes might like to try. I might pick something because it has ingredients that I particularly enjoy (anything with aubergines) or because it has ingredients I normally have to hand so won’t require an extra shopping trip. I’m not likely to try recipes that involve ingredients I know I can’t get hold of, or those that look as though they are going to take three days and a couple of comis chefs to prepare. Pictures can help with the 
selection process, but I don’t need them. The recipe is normally enough to allow me to visualise the dish and how it might taste. 

The fan, on the other hand, cannot do this. If I show him a recipe I’m excited about and suggest I try it he tends to be non-committal. He’ll wait until it’s on the plate before him before he passes judgement. 

What I can’t do is look at a printed tune and know whether or not I am going to like the sound of the tune or find it easy to pick up. Nor can I often easily envisage a tune just from looking at the dots. I need the equivalent of cookery book pictures, which for a tune means that I need to have heard it, or need to be able to find it being played online so I can have a listen.

If I hear a tune I can normally tell if it’s a pipe tune or not, basically through the limited number of notes used! I’m getting better at listening to tunes and being able to identify the grace notes and visualise (or whatever the aural equivalent for that is) how the tune would sound without those gracings, or with less complex gracings. There are tunes that will accept a paring down and others that are nothing without their gracings. I’m getting better, too, at hearing which tunes needs their speed and which could sound well played at a more sedate pace. I’ve been listening to Flett, played at a much more sedate pace than I play it, and I know I play Loch Bee faster than Mr MacInnes. 

Conversely I’ve come across CD notes where a band will say that they have chosen to play a tune at a slower pace than is usual. So speed is a reasonably flexible thing, but there are some tunes that definitely need their speed. I think the thing I still find hardest is hearing a pipe tune played on fiddle and thinking how that will sound on pipes. Although pipes and fiddle sound good together the pipes never have the slide and glide that a fiddle can have.

It was after listening to Springfield a lot recently that I printed the dots for Heroes of both St Valery and Vittoria as both tunes got stuck in my head. The place that I found St Valery also had Sound of Sleat, which I hadn’t really thought of as a pipe tune before. When I first played it was as if I wasn’t reading anything new, more as though the dots were reminding me of a tune I already knew. I had the tune firmly in my head and felt that I was barely reading the dots as I went. The tune initially came together really quickly, then stalled.

I wrote this a while back and it has sat in drafts. Since then Sleat hasn't made much progress and The Session has had a discussion about whether or not musicians can "hear" tunes as they read the dots. Looks like I'm not alone in lacking this ability. 

This has festered in draft mode for a while more. Sleat and Heroes are being assimilated into my repertoire. I've been playing them this week.

Hup!

Kilbowie Cottage is coming along OK. I've been humming it, and in a controlled way, so I can stop it, or repeat it etc at will. The odd thing is that I seem to have the first and third parts... Listened to it several times on the way home and played it this evening. The first part is coming along nicely. Parts 2 and 3 are hesitant and part 4 not good at all, actually. But on the whole it's coming.

I've also been working on putting Heroes with Magersfontein. I think it will work: Heroes needs to be the first tune. Now I just need to cement the link in my head, so I've been flipping from the end of B part of Magersfontein to the opening bar of Heroes, over and over. I need to get the two running together as I hum them.

Finlay and the weavers

I managed to play today, but found myself struggling to recall how Kilbowie Cottage goes. I listened to it and thought I had it, but got confused once I was back with dots and pipes. This random failure to learn tunes is one of the reasons why I normally learn a handful at a time: though some fall by the wayside others will be left. Still, I will persevere, and I need to put The Big Spree or Highland Strands back in the car so I can listen to the tune.

Thanks to a recent birthday I have new listening matter. First is the Tannahill Weavers' Leaving St Kilda. I've only listened to it the once and it's good in parts, as they say. The tune selection is good: The Good Drying, Whistlebinkies Reel, Magersfontein I already know and its good to hear new versions of these; the rest are new to me and are a good selection of classic pipe tunes, well played. My only quibble with the pipe sets is that someone should have politely asked the guitarist to sling his hook: he's too loud, too high up in the mix, and, for my money, adds precisely nothing.

Pipe sets aside there are lots of song sets. In fact 8 out of the 12 tracks are songs. How can I put this tactfully? I cannot abide them. I dislike the singer's voice, I find the arrangements uninspiring. I was amazed when I first read Tannies' sleeve notes to find that they generally sing trad songs, because they manage to make them sound like 1970s hippy folk with a guitar and a tambourine. (There may not actually be a tambourine. It just sounds as though there might be). I was prepared for this, and after all, that's what the skip button on a CD player is for. I'm disappointed that so few sets are pipe sets, and bitterly disappointed that as far as I can tell the one instance of smallpipes (a strong reason for overcoming my dislike of songs and asking for this) is during one of the songs!

The second birthday CD was Finlay Macdonald. I can't remember how or where I came across him, I can't find the CD online anywhere, not even through Coda where it came from. A mix of old and new tunes, some written by Finlay. Chris Stout is credited on fiddle, which has to be a good thing. Currently on track three and so far very good indeed.

The dog ate my homework

I meant to play this week; I certainly never intended not to play. But on on Monday I left work 2 hours late, thanks to a meeting, and by the time I got home and rushed to the shop for a vital ingredient it was time for dinner, and afterwards...well, dinner and a large strap round your middle don't make a good mix, and I was too tired.

On Tuesday I left work an hour and forty minutes later than usual, hit traffic and added 50% to my travel time, got home, cooked dinner...

Wednesday I left work just an hour after my usual time, so a bit of progress. Unfortunately an accident on the route home meant I nearly trebled my usual travel time, got home, cooked dinner....

On Thursday things were different. I left work at around my usual time, added only 5 or 10 minutes to my usual journey time, got home, and was just putting dinner in the oven and preparing to fetch my pipes when the fan announced he had serious computer problems. So the evening has been lost to reboots, safe modes, last known good configurations and system restores and the blasted PC still won't boot up properly.

Tomorrow I am going to be in need of a system restore myself, which will certainly involve a glass of red wine and may or may not include pipes.

(Just editing this to note that it's my 500th blog post!)

Green eggs and ham

It doesn't matter what I try I cannot find a tune that Heroes likes, or a tune that likes Heroes. I feel that it doesn't stand alone as a tune, but maybe it's just that the more I play sets the more a singleton tune looks incomplete, lost and lonely.

It was Women in the Glen that I really wanted to play today. Neither Kilbowie nor John Macmillan came to mind so I ran through Rowan Tree, My Home Town, Galloway, Braemar, Troy, Loch Bee, Dargai, Magersfontein, Sleat. Bits of Eagle's Whistle, Brandy, Ocean and Miss G all bubbled up. I wonder how I will manage to keep learning new tunes and still hang on to the old tunes.

As if by magic

Kilbowie Cottage appeared in my head today. It's at that stage where I can hear it, but on the whole I can't hum it, and even if I sit and listen to it the moment I pick up my pipes it vanishes. The bits I can hum I can play: that's most of the A part, just about by heart, with a slightly muddled mess in  the two bars in the middle.

I find that the dots guide me in the shape of the tune, confirming the notes I can hear in my head, but where the timing is wrong in my head, or not there at all, I struggle even with the dots to play the tune properly, despite being able to read music.

I've had tenderness in my right index finger this week, at the middle joint and tip, and soreness in my elbow and shoulder. I am hoping it's excess use of a PC at work and that it won't interfere with what seems at the moment to be an insatiable desire to play. It has meant that I've failed to be comfortable with my bellows and had to abandon before doing my elbow serious damage. It's a shame, because apart from feeling the love and being keen to get this tune sorted, I just started getting the chanter buzz this evening, and as well as feeling good that always sounds fantastic and spurs me on.

Non stick

Kilbowie Cottage has been on my wish list for a while. I've got it on Highland Strands, which I have on pretty much a permanent loop in the car at the moment. It's a fantastic album. The odd thing is that although I think that I love Kilbowie I can never remember what it sounds like until I hear it. Of all the scraps and oddments from the CD going round my head Kilbowie is never one of them. I know it's best to learn a tune I can already hum, but even having the tune on repeat doesn't help, and I do want to play it, so...

I printed the dots, began to play, failed to make head or tale of it, wondered if I had printed the wrong tune (as I think I've mentioned before it is just Kilbowie Cottage and both Braebach and Kevin Macleod list it as John McColl's March to Kilbowie Cottage), abandoned and succumbed to the urge to play John Macmillan. Played a few other tunes, John Macmillan popped up again, went back to Kilbowie and fell straight back into John...

Eventually I remebered that I had The Big Spree indoors so listed to Kilbowie on there, where I discovered that actually it is rather like John  in the opening bars, and that it has some tricky timings, and it is a lovely tune, and it slips right through the hands of my musical memory.... In the end I managed a reasonable rendition of the first part, but it's going to be a harder one than I thought, especially while it remains so elusive to my aural memory.

Gimme five

I wasn't really intending to play, but got hit by the urge as I slid dinner into the oven. Women, Sleat, Heroes, Braemar and Troy. Heroes and Braemar I hoped would make a pairing, but they won't. Did a little work on that A, D grace, C movement in Braemar that I had and have since lost, but otherwise just straight play throughs. I need to keep up with Troy: it has a terrible tendency to fall apart very quickly. Today I couldn't get the third part to behave.

I really should pick another new tune, although I am also attempted to go back over one of the (very many) previously tried and abandoned tunes, in the hope that for some of them their time has come. Some I didn't like as much in the playing as in the hearing, but some fell by the wayside due to my lack of competence, especially when it came to speed, and it's those that I can perhaps resurrect.

Not much more

No piping today, but I thought I'd blog to mark the month in which I began my piping life. I got a bit over excited about it, as you do when you are young and always wanting to be older, and have been bragging to the fan that I shall be five, and if you count a year of the chanter then I suppose I am, but in terms of actually playing pipes I am just four, and not much more.

The monkey is, of course, just  two and a half, and poor neglected Morag is four. The blog itself - and this will be post number 495 - is about three and a half. I first posted on the old Podbean blog in February 2012, and we moved here with Blogger in November 2012.

I've had my piping ups and downs, and I've (mostly) grown out of stage fright, supported by the local musical community. I've come across a whole heap of great music and I've fallen in love.

My only regret is that I didn't start it all sooner!

Putting my money where my mouth is

This evening the drummer joined us at the session. And that was it: just him, me and the fan. So I had to pull put all the stops and put my new list into action.

I ran through all the singletons. As Father John didn't make it to Nova Scotia (my first attempt at a three tune set in public) I tried, and failed, to tag the Captn on to the end, and ended up playing it, rather too fast, on its own.

I fluffed (I did a lot of fluffing as nerves came and went) my way through Women, but didn't attempt either Sleat or Braemar, the one because I didn't think I was up to it and the second because I simply couldn't remember how it went.

Still, with the fan leading the other half, or probably two thirds, of the evening, we managed an hour and a half, ending with the audience clapping in time through the King.

I think I maybe getting the hang of this music stuff at last....

Bonus track (got a little list)

Our house guest left earlier than I had expected today, and after getting keys cut, buying a new purse, visiting our brand new local supermarket and getting some washing done I had a spare half hour and spent it playing my pipes.

I've also finally made a little list of tunes I can play to help me at sessions when  I can't actually remember what tunes I can play. I've erred on the side of caution and haven't added Heroes (mostly because it needs a set partner), Troy  or Braemar, although Braemar is probably doable on a good day.

The first part of the list is singleton tunes  which don't have set partners and don't seem to feel too lost or half-finished on their own. When the fan was thinking of putting performance sets together we did try Galloway with Braemar, so I may consider that at some point.

• McIntyre's Farewell (which I do tend to forget that I know)
• Bonnie Galloway
• My Home Town
• The Rowan Tree
• March of the King of Laoise

Part two of the list is the smug marrieds, aka sets. (Yes! Real sets for playing in public!)

• John Macmillan of Barra/South Georgia Whaling Song/Captn Angus MaDonald
• Heights of Dargai/Shores of Loch Bee
• Women of the Glen/Sound of Sleat
• The Highland Brigade at Magersfontein/Flett from Flotta

I feel that Flett and Magersfontein get on well enough but haven't quite found their true soulmates. The others I am happy with. Captn Angus is easy going and doesn't mind making up a three as needed, but John and Whaling sound fine without him, too.

I'm still working on Miss G, still hoping that one day the Dragon will really fly. Still considering Kilbowie Cottage as a potential new tune.

Lost and found

Back from a few days away, discovering that UK train travel can be reasonably comfortable and convenient, albeit expensive especially if you make the mistake of waiting to get on the train before you grab sandwiches, hot drinks and muffins for two (just over £18!)

Unfortunately somewhere between the train and the waiting car I mislaid a handbag with purse, house keys, library book, my knitting pattern and various knitting bits and bobs. My wonderful graphic memory let me down as although I can picture the bag and contents, including texture, smell, colour and weight in minute detail I cannot for the life of me recall at what point I parted company with it all...

Trying not to think it over and over I eventually managed to get rid of the tormenting pictures by pulling in some tunes instead, and wished I had had my pipes with me.

Pipes and I were back together this evening having found an unexpected half hour. Mostly working on gracing, and really I am ashamed to say that those most often missing from my playing are two of the simplest, so there is no excuse for forgetting them: D and E.

The Women were here, and this time I think they are ready to stay. I do also think that they will pair with Sleat, which will give me a second set with a missing strathspey. At least, I think it's a second set: I was pretty sure that Father John's Boat Trip was also a march and reel and that I had addressed that in a post which I thought I had called "The case of the missing Strathspey", but now can't find. (Found it.)

End of the road

I've  managed, not through any particular plan, to play every other day this month. That's about to come to an end. We've got a few days of being away and a few days with a house guest, so unless I can muster the energy to play tomorrow today was probably the last time this month I'll have my pipes out. I feel slightly sad about that, but hopefully a rest will help tunes ferment in my brain a little.

Today I worked on the Women. It's odd how when I read a tune I go from start to finish, maybe note complex gracing, but rarely spot patterns. It seems to be after I've played a tune for a bit that I start thinking that this bit is rather like that, and then I go back to the dots and see the patterns, the repeats, the not-quite-the-same bits, like the B strike B on one bar in the B part which in the variation is B A B. Or the low G that I have been playing as a low A, and actually I will continue with that as somehow the G sounds wrong now.

Anyway, I think I may be able to forge a pairing between the Women and Sleat. Maybe. I worked on both of these this evening, made a complete mess of Miss G once or twice, fluffed My Home Town, but nevertheless enjoyed playing.  In a quiet sort of way I am feeling the love at the moment.

Women on my mind

Well, it's no longer summertime (despite the blue skies it has been serious knitwear weather today) but I've still got women on my mind. They wandered back mid-morning and stayed all day.

I did wonder if they looked a little plain so I have been working on some gracing, a doubling on B before a strike on B, a grip in the first gap between two high As in the second B part. I thought that might be tricky. It's the kind of serious grace I haven't used in a while, but I like the effect and actually it's easy enough and the speed came very quickly. I say it's easy but I think I am dropping down only to low A instead of low G, and I blame cold fingers, meaning not very flexible fingers, and not very good placement of fingers over holes.

I tried again to introduce the women to Flett and the Heroes, but that induced such a fit of the sulks that I had to go on to Braemar and Troy.

I stopped there: cold hands, the bellows feeling airless, no buzz at all in the chanter.  I should get Women sorted soon: just as long as they don't vanish again.

No women or heroes in Magersfontein

Those pesky women still hadn't reappeared by this evening so I flushed them out with the help of the dots. B part still needs work to get it into my musical memory.

Since they were there I tried to introduce them to Magersfontein or Heroes, but no mattter which way  I tried I couldn't make a pairing, far less a threesome. I even threw in Flett, but that was a non-starter as well, so after my initial flurry of excitement around sets I am back to a pile of stubborn singletons.

After that Bonnie Galloway, Loch Bee, Braemar. I am trying to take this last nice and slow to check I have notes and timings all in the right place. It sounds, at a slower pace, rather naked without much gracing.

It was one of those evenings where the chanter literally buzzed in my hands, always a really good feeling. I have no idea whether it's to do with temperature or humidity, or is just my imagination, nor do I know what, if any, effect it has on the sound.

I had to stop mid way to rearrange various items in and out of the oven. When I came back the buzz was still there but the bellows jammed themselves on my wrist, my right thumb seized up, and Troy came out as a bit of a mess.

The lady vanishes

But it isn't just one lady that has gone. It's several: a whole glen full. I cannot bring it to mind, couldn't play a note of it this evening. I feel there are three little three-note run downs in row, but that didn't help. I can't even picture the dots, which, as I've mentioned before, I know I am not supposed to do, but really can't help.

Hopefully it will come back next time I play, if not I may have to go back to dots.

Other tunes went fine: Shores of Loch Bee, My Home Town, Troy, Braemar, Heroes, Dargai, Flett. There must have been others. Oh yes, a rather abortive Miss Girdle. Sleat, too, but I am still not sure that I have the 2nd and 4th final bars right, and in the third part if I come up inelegantly from the bottom G that seems to throw me.

I have tunes from Highland Strands in my head. I love them all. Listening more closely than I have been, noticing the layering of instruments, the whistle.

Chocks away

I've been thinking of late that I am hanging on to dots for too long and allowing myself to get dependant upon them. So this evening, as the Women had come back during the day, I decided throw caution (or dots) to the wind and just go for it. The A part is there already and the B part is there in parts, with confusion over the first second versons of the B. So really I've only been playing it a couple of days and it's half memorised already. Ok, so I had a head start with knowing the tune, but I had been worrying lately about how slowly I was picking tunes up. I think my experience with Braemar and Troy both show that I need to throw off the dots and not lean on them.

Sleat is still troublesome with the variations in the 2nd and 4th parts getting themselves swapped over. Braemar needs a bit more control, a more even tempo. Troy needs more confidence. John Macmillan needs me to listen to it a bit more, but is generally good.

Elusive women

Women of the Glen haven't come back: the tune vanished out of my head to be replaced with various fragments I can't quite identify. I played it this evening anyway, and tried to introduce it to various other tunes. The mood is wrong for it to pair with Dargai, it doesn't sit well with Sound of Sleat, and is so utterly wrong for Heroes that I can't hold both tunes in mind at once and have failed to play them consecutively.  It needs something, but I am not sure what. Sleat is also in need of a partner. It ends so abruptly, somehow, and despite the return to the key note it doesn't feel finished when I get to the end. The Ossian option - they run it into Aandowin at the Bow - isn't available to me: too many notes, as ever.

Hearing things

I've had the Women of the Glen going round my head, day and night, it seems. It's somehow tiring to keep hearing a tune, and it's not far in the background of my brain, it's at the front all the time, just, but not quite, at the point where I find myself humming a tune. The only respite was while cleaning my teeth when it was suddenly, inexplicably, but temporarily, replaced with Joy to the World.

Of course, when I decide to print it (yesterday I played it straight from my tablet), it slipped away, and by the time I had my pipes out it was a bit of a struggle to remember how it went at all...

Apart from the Women,  and a brief and inelegant appearance by Miss G,  I stuck to the old tunes: Magersfontein, Dargai, Loch Bee, King of Laoise, My Home Town, Rowan Tree, Bonnie Galloway, Amazing Grace, McIntyre's Farewell. I skipped Whaling Song because it gets played with the new tune, and I forgot all about Flett. I definitely need to make that list of tunes I know...

Slight change of plan

I began on a new tune today, albeit not one of those on my list... I've been listening to a lot of Kevin Macleod and one of the tunes I'm really enjoying is Women of the Glen. Unfortunately the sleeve note for the tune is incorrect: it says that it can be found in the Seaforth Highlanders, but it can't. Luckily it can be found on Coel Sean where it is listed as coming from McLennan, although the collection link goes through to Donaldson's Broadside to Broadband.

It's a nice little tune. I thought it might make a pair with Heroes, but it won't.

While I was poking around Coel Sean I also came across Kilbowie Cottage. It is by William Lawrie and there is a little note to explain that the cottage is the residence of John MacColl, champion piper. I did feel that this ought to be the same as John MacColl's March to Kilbowie Cottage, also by Lawrie, but I couldn't make it sound like any tune I know. I need to listen to the tune on CD and try again because I'd rather not pay for the Bagpipetunes version if I don't need to.

Still good-byeing

I think that normally after a month of playing I stop. This month...well, I just wanted to wind down from a rabbit-in-the-headlights day at work, check that I still knew how to play The Rowan Tree (I do) and run through Sleat on the grounds that I thought of playing it on Sunday and wasn't quite confident enough.

Sunday session

We were a bit thin on the ground, but still managed to muster three pipers. We were also badly placed, hemmed in between the gents, the ladies and the door and endless trails of smokers and the weak-bladdered. Still, it was a decent enough evening.

My playing was patchy. I blame hunger as the anticipated large lunch turned out to be a toasted sandwich. I struggled to remember which tunes I play: I must make myself a little list.

The opener - Heights of Dargai
The old favourite - My Home Town (everyone joined in)
The long shot - Father Johns's Boat Trip (well-received and everyone joined in with the second tune)
The odd one - Magersfontein/Flett - people join in with Flett, but Magersfontein continues to throw them
The old faithful  The Rowan Tree (which some joined in for and which I mucked up quite badly!)

Missing you already

I'm glad that the month ended on Wednesday. Thursday was another long and stressful day in a long and stressful week and I was really glad not to have to fit in any piping, even with the fan cooking dinner. Friday evening was given over to the shopping, cleaning, tidying and arranging that is preparatory to hosting weekend house guests.

Saturday morning was more of the same, and then once everything was ready and I had only to sit and wait I picked up a book, then put it down and pulled out my pipes instead. I had a good 20 mins playing time, that ended with a round of applause from guests, who had been admitted by the fan: I hadn't heard the doorbell!

Twenty minutes of tunes old and new. I do need to have another look at the dots for Sleat as there are a couple of places where I am not confident that I have got it quite right. I had been humming Whaling Song, which has nice drops, pauses, swoops and snaps which I was convinced I wasn't playing, but when I listened to myself I was indeed playing the same nice version that I had been humming.

Troy just needs a bit more confidence, a more relaxed attitude. I've got into the habit of feeling I can't play and now that I can I reel between over-hesitancy, tense fingers, and way too much speed.

This evening is a session and I hope to try out a new tune or two.

The scores on the doors

Here we are at the end of another month. It's never as difficult as I think to find time to play every day, although it isn't easy, simply because I find it hard to play soon after I've eaten, which means I have a small patch where I can play between arriving home from work and sitting down to dinner.

I suppose the other hurdle is a feeling that I want to enjoy my hobbies, not make a chore of them. I don't ever knit or read or try the crossword because I feel I ought, only ever because the fancy takes me. But I very nearly always enjoy my piping once I start, and the month does still make a difference. I did wonder whether it still would, just because a month every day when you've only played for 2 years is a chunk of one's piping life, whereas a month is much smaller fraction of 5 years.

So, what have I achieved? I think my biggest milestone is getting 4-parters comfortably by heart, including some I've been playing around with for way too long, namely Braemar and Troy I've improved Father John and made it into another set, potentially with 2 other tunes. I've learned two tunes from scratch: Sleat and Heroes.

As ever, there are things I planned on doing and didn't. Neither Dragon nor Teribus got played much. Brandy has fizzled out, despite my working out a variation - a milestone in itself. Ocean is good, learned from the fan, not from dots - another milestone - but only the A part. Miss G  sometimes rocks - goes as fast as my fingers can fly, provided I don't stop to think - and sometimes is miserably bad. More work needed. Not sure that the Highlanders have progressed much.

I'm looking forward to a break, even if only for a day or two, then I need to work on the tunes, keep polishing, and maybe pick one new one to work on. The journey continues.

Slow down

I crept home in first gear today, thanks to lorry broken down somewhere in the road. That's what the travel news said: I didn't see it myself. It took me over an hour to complete a 16 mile journey.

Having left work rather late (again) I naturally arrived home very late. Luckily the fan had agreed yesterday that he would cook today.

Horrible problems with bellows, arm and wrist today: really uncomfortable. Still, I managed Braemar (which is coming on nicely), Troy (almost there), Father John's Boat Trip (just about sorted that 2nd part repeat), Heroes (which urgently needs a set mate), and My Home Town (just because).

I stuck Miss G on the end of just about everything. I manage to get the notes wrong fast or slow, I seem only to be able to play it slowly or stupidly fast, I keep losing the last run down, and it's the tune where I seem to have most problems with wrist and bellows.

Last day tomorrow. As ever, it has been worth it, and I feel I've made some real progress, not only the tunes I've been working on.

Caught speeding

Things went well this evening. I played through several tunes slowly, so I thought, intending to get them right. When I finished the fan said I'd been going at quite a speed.

Two more days then I think I'll take break and then aim to play maybe 3 times a week. I will also try one of the new tunes I'm pondering, with the aim of getting one learned in a month, while the other new tunes continue to be polished, and the old favourites are kept free of dust.

A step too far

That's two days in a row where I really haven't felt in the mood for piping, but I made myself get up and play just one tune, just for 5 minutes...and some time later have had to tear myself away from the pipes to salvage dinner, or, today, a loaf of bread.

Piping, yes. But blogging? Just for this weekend it's a step too far. I've got other things to be doing.

Now don't wash your hands

Things are falling into place rather nicely now, I feel. I ran through everything this evening, even a rather ragged Dragon that arrived out of the blue. For variety, and just because they came to mind - or fingers - I threw in McIntyre's Farewell, My Home Town...and possibly another which I've forgotten already.

Braemar had a couple of slips and hitches, Sleat went well, John Macmillan is good with that muddled two bars slowly sorting themselves out.

At one point I decided to wash my hands. My fingers felt very slightly sticky, and also cold. I removed the bellows, which had been very comfortable, washed my hands, replaced bellows...and at once had problems with bellows, wrist, little finger which I just couldn't sort out. I played Troy, but it was a challenge with the bellows fighting against me. Oddly the 4th part is now a doddle, and it's the 3rd part that was causing me problems.

But things are falling into place. I have potential new tunes that will be session ready come October. I'm reminded again of how good it is to play every day. I wish I had the time to do it more often.

Sweet dreams

A long day at work. Arrived home tired and in desperate need of tea. As dinner was in the oven I sat down to see which of my new tunes I could play while dog tired. Braemar was OK. Heroes not so good, but I always manage to let errors in. I think it's such a simple tune I feel I can disengage my brain entirely, which doesn't work. What else? Highlanders, Ocean. Spent a few minutes fiddling around trying to play a tune in my head which I think is Castle Grant, which I used to play. Sound of Sleat. Quite pleased about that. Then Miss G,  but my bellows strap was causing major problems by then, so it didn't go well, despite the fact that by that time I felt quite awake and lively.

Had to stop there to dish up dinner, and definitely feeling tired now. Possibly the glass of wine with dinner didn't help...

Oh, go on then

I played through pretty much everything today, with the exception of the poor, defunct Dragon and Miss G. I just forgot about her, somehow. I threw in Flett, just for a change.

Battling away with Brandy. No idea why I find it so complicated. Played a little bit of Troy. It has totally failed to bubble back up into my musical memory, but a glance at the opening bar of the fourth part had me racing off, then I had hideous problems with the interface between arm and bellows, and the fan made a throwaway remark that disheartened me, so I abandoned for the day.

I was trying to think of the month (so far) in terms of tunes learned. I think I'd be happy enough to play Father Macmillan's Boat Trip to Nova Scotia at a session, but only one of those is new, and I have played Father John at a session once before.

Heroes is good to go, but I am not sure about pairing it with the Highlanders, unless it was a small session with no audience on an afternoon where my playing had been going very well. Should be fine with Dargai, and presumably therefore with Bee as well. You wait forever for a three tune set and then two come along at once...

Braemar does finally feel as though it is ready to go public, but probably not as part of a set (with Magersfontein  or anything else) just yet. Ocean would be fine if I could ever get the fan to work out the second part for me again. Brandy and Miss G still need a lot of work. Sleat is close, I think, and as for Troy, I'll reinstate it on my playlist tomorrow and see how it goes...

Repeat

Mostly just Braemar today. Getting there.

Speak severely

Apparently having a metaphorical dressing-down of Braemar yesterday worked. I don't thing I've got all the necessary gracing in, but I seem to have got rid of the tension in places where I am anticipating gracing.

Better than that, I had a day where nothing hurt, my fingers felt supple and the chanter really buzzed and sang. I played everything except Troy, which has gone into a state of deep hibernation, it seems, and the Dragon, which, frankly, I believe has probably died.

Fourth part of Sleat  continues to elude me, the repeat of the second part of John Macmillan needs work, as does the non-variant form of Brandy. But I really enjoyed playing today. It was good.

Piecemeal

After yesterday's fiasco with The Braemar Gathering, which I can't bring myself to listen to, but post below, I felt I ought to enter into battle and get it sorted. The third part seems the worst, and as I slowed it down and worked on it a bar at a time I realised that it is somewhat lacking in gracing.

My dots have no gracings, although many are needed to split like notes, so those I've always played. I've mentioned before, I am sure, that the low A to C transition needs a simple D grace, but then the low As, I feel, should have a little drop down to a bottom G, then the D grace up to the C, and then a doubling on the E. (I refer to dots in A, as written, although clearly I am playing in D).

On the little run that trips me up in the first, but generally not the third, part (BCE FGA) I keep trying to put a D grace between the B and the C, and then I think I must have played A to C and maybe that is what throws me. I've tried a G grace, but that doesn't work, so am going for a doubling on the E.

I don't feel I am playing - 3rd part again - a clean transition between B and C. There can't possibly be crossing notes, it's only a matter of dropping a finger, so I think the problem is a sloppy B with fingers not clean on the chanter. I think, too, that the garbling I mentioned yesterday is actually a tansferring of short and long note on the penultimate triplet in tbe third part, and probably the first.

Anyway. I played it in bits and pieces: this phrase, that note transition, those bars; but also in bits around getting dinner ready. I could have played earlier but have spent the day on the sofa, in the sun, reading Trollope. I also played Magersfontein,  just for the sake of variety and rather think that the two might sound well together, although that leaves poor Flett friendless. Why is it that some tunes seems to fit into multiple partnerships and others into none?

The only other thing to note is that elbow, wrist and thumb of my right hand are sore today. The wrist I noticed when playing, elbow and thumb only since I stopped. Oh, and Andy won another match.



Check this out on Chirbit

It was all going so well

I've been having a good day. It's not a working day, which is always a bonus. The weather has been much better than was being forecast earlier in the week. I went shopping for a pair of wool trousers for work and actually managed to find some I liked. I did some tidying at the allotment and managed to rig up some proper protection for my cavolo nero plants.

Then I decided to play and record... The lead for the recorder was tied into electrical spaghetti. I'd forgotten the faff of having to "create a song" before you even start. The first three-tune set I recorded and then wasted 6 minutes mastering it only to find when I tried to export it that there was allegedly no track to export... The fan salvaged the situation, and the recording, but only after I'd got cross. Add to that the collapsing bellows, a sore elbow, and a general inability to play and the whole thing is a mess.

Recording here is Father John's Boat Trip. The repeat of the 2nd part still isn't quite right. Gracing not very clean, fingers not cleanly enough down on the  chanter. I mised various repeats, which I put down to red-button-itis. Various times I found myself thinking that *this* would be the place where I'd be likely to fluff it...and duly fluffed.

No drones. I recorded a rather poor version of Braemar in which I garbled notes, merged notes, went too slow and then too fast. I will post tomorrow. I couldn't face recording it again and I am not sure how soon I'll be able to bring myself to record again. Is it any wonder that it's over 7 months since I recorded last? There has to be an easier way.

(On the positive side, Andy won a match.)
Check this out on Chirbit

Forward look

I've been thinking of new tunes. Not the new tunes I've been learning - am still learning - this month, but tunes for the future. I feel it might be best to concentrate on one at a time, so I am trying to keep the collection small so that tunes don't suffer from the same problem as knitting projects, where I have already lined up more than I could knit in a lifetime, and haven't yet stopped adding to the list...

I feel that I should move on from marches and work on some jigs and reels. I don't yet aspire to Strathspeys, but I will.

Having said that my first tune is another march. It's John MacColl's March to Kilbowie Cottage, which I know from The Big Spree. The second tune is The College of Piping at Summerside PEI, which is on Whistlebinkies' Inner Sound. I am going to have to take the plunge and sign up to Pipetunes for these, I think (where PEI is described as a hornpipe). There are other tunes I like, but can't find dots for. I'm listening to plenty of Breabach at present, so no shortage of pipe tunes to choose from.

I'm sure there was a third, but I've forgotten it. A fourth might be Good Drying, but there I must stop because that already takes me into next year at the rate at a new tune a month....

Today's tunes were hampered by a bad bellows day. I tried with jumper on, jumper off, bellows high, bellows low, I readjusted the strap. Much had to do with cold hands. I really must knit some fingerless mitts.

John Macmillan to start again, going nowhere, because I didn't play the other pieces in the set. I have parts of the third part in my head and should go back to that as I am only playing two parts at the moment.

Struggled to find the 4th part of Sleat or the non-variant of Brandy and resorted to dots for both. Miss G  got herself into a muddle. Home fell out by accident when I was looking for Heroes. Highlanders, whihc went with Heroes today, came out at such an alarmingly rip-roaring speed that the fan asked if I was taking off...

No Dragon, and no Troy. Hopefully it will emerge from hibernation soon.

As good as a rest

I thought I'd give myself a break from new tunes today and just play whatever came to mind or fingers. Oddly enough the first tune in my head was Father John, so I played his Boat Trip to Nova Scotia.

After that the play list looked like this:

The Rowan Tree
Magersfontein, Flett, Dargai, Bee (too many for a set, but that's how they came out)
Bonnie Galloway
My Home Town
King of Laoise
Amazing Grace

I've been considering making a list of all the half-learned, or learned and abandoned tunes I have left behind, but I feel it would be a very long list and perhaps rather depressing.

I do also need to record. Maybe at the weekend.

Counting chickens

The more I thought of the fan's plans for three of us to play together regularly the more I liked it. I began to think of sets and arrangements...and then our putative third replied to say he had plenty on his musical plate at present, and declined our offer...

Almost everything on the list played today, except Troy (which seems to have vanished entirely from my head), and Braemar, which probably won't suffer for another day of hibernation. I've got Even in the Rain on the stereo right now in the hope of encouraging it along.

Brandy has got a bit confused between where I do and don't insert variations, and I confused the issue further by realising that I've got some ungraced low A to C changes... The  variation still quite clear, but the original of the varied bar quite lost, and even with dots I was needing to think hard to get it right.

I tried pairing Ocean with Sleat. Could work, I think. I need to do more thinking about sets.

Sing it

I swear that every time in the last two days (and nights) that I have stopped doing, thinking or dreaming, I have had Drops of Brandy going round, and round, on an endless loop.

Today I gave in amd started listening to the music in my head. I started to be convinced that I could hear...well, I wasn't sure. It was something that Realta play differently from me, but I wasn't sure whether I had got a note or two wrong, or whether my timing was adrift, or whether actually they play a variation that I had picked up.

Tunes in my head are odd. At the early stage they are there, and I am aware of them, but if I try to listen actively they vanish. They need to be reasonably established before I can actually hum them. Presumably thanks to its persistence I managed to hum this quite quickly - just today. I also managed to isolate that variation and hum it over and over to pin it down.

I got home. My plants arrived so I ran down to the plot to plant them out and get them protected from slugs and pigeons, and ran back to get dinner on the go. When I sat down with the Monkey my plan was to play that variation...but the moment I played a single note the entire tune slipped away. It didn't help that my fingers were slightly sticky, and when I washed them in haste they were slightly damp...

I tried again. And again. I sang the tune through, and again, which meant I was able to recall and sing the variation. I got the pipes going...and immediately that drowned out the tune in my head. In desperation I decided to sing it as I played. This doesn't make for good noise volumes, but it worked. I played my little variation, over and over. When I was sure I had it I wrote it down, and then checked aginst the dots and confirmed that it really was a variation for the last bar in each part. I worked on it a little more, and added in a doubling.

I also managed to recall the variation that the fan taught me at the weekend. I fiddled around with and without the variation...and had to abandon the finish sorting dinner. In all I barely played for 20 minutes. But the important thing is that I have variations, and that for the first time on pipes I've managed to pick out a tune. It's also the first time I've been able to make use of my improved ability to sing. No one else is ever going to want to listen to my warbling, but it has grown more accurate as I've been playing. If I sing or hum a tune to the fan these days he has much less opportunity to make sarcastic comments about random key changes...

I was rather afraid that having being playing longer a month of daily playing wouldn't be enough to make a difference, but even just half way through the month I feel I'm moving ahead, making progress.

Change of heart

I seem to be spending a lot of time looking forward at the moment. I ordered a pre-publication knitting book, some plants due for delivery this month, oh, and of course I am looking forward to this daily playing having an obvious impact.

Today I left work late (a return of the project that ate up too much of my life last year), remembered that my plan for dinner was at the more time-consuming end of my culinary repetoire, that I have a letter to write and bills to play, thought of squeezing in some playing time...and ended up hoping that the long-awaited box of veg plants would not arrive today.

Luckily, no plants. So I played Braemar, not exactly ad nauseum but certainly to the point where various bits started breaking, so I think it's ready to hibernate for a while.

Last night (seemingly the whole night) I had Brandy going round in my head, including Realta's variations. Yesterday the fan taught me a two note variation and amended a persistent error. Today I struggled with the tune, fell over the amended note, remembered where the variation lived, but having tried it couldn't remember what came after it. It was enough to make me wish the plants had arrived after all.

Tipping point

At last the daily playing is starting to bear fruit. The Sound of  Sleat  is almost there dotless, the escond part oddly being the most stubborn, but I played over and round it today and will work on it again tomorrow. Then I played something esle and intended to drop into Sleat,  realised I had begun something else and took a moment to identify Braemar. I think this is the first time I've played it spontaneously, without a conscious decision to do so.

I played everything except Troy, Dragon and Brandy. Dragon  is falling by the wayside again. Brandy I played later on when the fan and I played together for a while and he showed me a variation on the tune, which we then had to re-vary for the Monkey's (lack of) range. Some tunes seems quite fast. Too fast, for some, the fan said. He's out of practice and his finger tips are soft and he struggled to keep up. Sometimes I struggle to keep up...

The fan also tried to tempt me to play Troy, but I resisted because I know that if you disturb the  chrysalis of a pupating tune too soon all you find is a messy green gunk. Troy  will come to my fingers of its own accord when its ready to hatch.

And speaking of hatching, we conceive of an idea for a regular musical threesome, which may or may not go anywhere, but will at least ensure that we both play reasonably regulalry and that we we play together. The fan is typing the email invitation to the third now...

Wedding

We went to a wedding today. We took no instruments as a band was booked, but then the piper from the fan's (defunct) band was there with Irish pipes and the fan managed to blag a spare bouzouki. I came the closest I ever will, I expect, to blagging a set of pipes as the wedding band's flautist had a set of Ross Calderwood smallpipes on order. We had a nice chat about pipes, bands, sessions and folk clubs, then they played and I looked on...

Back late-ish and after some dithering decided to play for 10 minutes just so I can say I've played every day. Magersfontein, Dargai, Bee, Highlanders, Father John, Brandy.

I do, I do, I don't

Troys's Wedding again. It started well. I wanted to slow it down, but fingers wanted fast. The more I played the more it fell apart, but I'm not worried: this has happened before, this whole getting worse before it gets better shtick. I need to give it a break now to let it simmer in my brain.

Also played Braemar, which is ok as long as I remember that the note I need in the run up to get it right is C. Father John's Boat Trip to Nova Scotia, Miss Girdle (the final phrase over, and over, and over....), Troy again, Brandy (which I am feeling quite fond of having listened to Realta yesterday). The door bell rang and I went to pieces, knowing I was being heard by an unknown quantity...so flipped in to Dargai and Bee and ended up with the Heroes.

Yesterday I listened to an elderly recording of Troy. I've improved since then. Must get around to recording.

Solemnisation

I feel quite tired today, perhaps the change of the season. My bed is so snug when the alarm goes off that it's hard to drag myself out of it.

I still wanted to play. I thought of just playing through a couple of Tunes-I-Can-Play-When-I-Am-Dead-On-My-Feet, which would probably be Rowan Tree, Dargai, Magersfontein, maybe Home Town. But the tune that has been in my head all day is Troy's Wedding. I thought it was probably a tall order, but I sat down without dots and set myself to play it. My fingers were cold and stupid and simply wouldn't bend properly at times, but I knew which shapes I needed to make, which notes to play. I had to go over and over the fourth part, then the full thing again, round the fourth again, slow then faster. The faster just happened. But I played it through with no dots, at last committed to memory. So now I must play it and play it, no dots and eventually I will be able to take it out to a session. It's been a long time coming....

Free range

Decided to ignore the list of tunes being learned and play whatever came to mind. A couple of the current tunes tried to msucle in: Highlanders when I wanted the King, and Brandy, quite persistently, when I was trying for Flett. Had to get dots out in the end.

I played Flett, Bonnie Galloway, Dargai, Magersfontein, My Home Town, King of Laoise, MacIntyre's Farewell, Capt Angus L MacDonald, Loch Bee. I was reasonably comfortable, cold hands being my biggest issue, and I really enjoyed it.

I did have to think about what tunes I know. It occurs to me that I haven't played Cabot Trail for a while, and that I keep thinking that's what I am playing when I play Father Johns's Boat Trip, when actually it's the Capt.  If he was a naval captain that would work out rather nicely! I need to make a list of all the tunes I know, just to remind myself.

I'm listening to a lot of music at the moment, lots of Braebach in the car and all sorts of stuff (well, all sorts of Scots and Irish trad) at home. Lots of pipes. Trying to resist the temptation to print dots for new tunes and at the moment the main thing holding me back is that I'd have to get them through pipetunes which involves spending some pennies....

No wedding bells for the dragon

Crammed everything in to 20 minutes today. Played through as much as I could. Got the dots out for Sleat. Father John went to Nova Scotia again. No sign of the Dragon: he kindly sent Teribus in his place. No time to play Troy, either.

Fingers a little stiff, mostly because they weren't very warm. Yesterday's issues with pressure all gone, so I assume placing of the drones switch was the problem. Bellows more comfortable than they have been, but they do really hang oddly on the outside.

Lost and found

I'm afraid I lost my rag a little this evening. I squeezed in playing around cooking so had to keep interrupting myself to put various pans on and off the hob. I had my list of tunes, and from the outset I really struggled. The pipes seemed to be slipping out of my arms, I seemed to lack pressure, the bellows felt worse than useless. I was compensating for a lack of grip on the pipes with tension in my fingers, and I thought of all the things (outside piping, and generally rather trivial) that are bugging me right now, and that distracted me from the tunes, and when I failed to get through Troy  in one piece I gave a great roar of frustration...

Somehow, as I roared I knocked the drones switch, snarled at the drones and tunred them off again. I wonder if the drones switch had been partially engaged as flicking the switch seemed to improve the pressure, which enabled me to concentrate and get Troy  licked, although the 4th part took a couple of attempts. I fiddled about with various items on the hob, came back and calmly played Troy again.

I played everything except Father John and the Highlanders. Only bits of Sleat as I couldn't remember all of it.

At the end of playing I sat down with the pipes feeling just right , played around with some phrases, slow and steady and stately; things that just fell out of my fingers. Then Dargai and Amazing Grace, and I went back to the hob.

"That sounded nice," said the fan. "What did?" I asked. "That first piece at the end there. The slow air."  I had to admit that it was just improvisation, but surely it says something about how I am learning the musical idiom, the patterns and sounds, that I can fool the fan into thinking I'm playing a real tune when all I am doing is having a quiet moment with the Monkey, reassuring ourselves that we are friends, that everything is all right between us.

Touch not the cat

I started the day well with an hour down the plot, a pile of ironing, some handwashing of clothes I've been putting off, making bread for the week, and slinging some clothes in the washing machine, but then I made the mistake sitting down to read for ten minutes. It's not great literature, but you don't, as I know from experience, sit down with a Mary Stewart novel unless you have no plans at all for the day. Luckily the fan decided to do some hoovering, which was annoying enough to persuade me to leave to sofa, so I crawled off to play some music.

The full set again today. Braemar had one or two bits that needed thought, Troy I resorted to dots as the middle section of the fourth part escapes me. I tend to play the first phrase, then the last, at which point I can do the third, but the 2nd not at all...

Ocean I thought was going to elude me entirely but eventually came back. First part of Sleat was there, and half the second part. Third part needs lots of work. Father John's boat trip took him to Nova Scotia today as I tagged the Cabot Trail on to the end: a second potential 3 tune set. Heroes seem to be preferring Heights to Highlanders .

As for the bellows, it started OK but got harder to play as I went on. Still, I enjoy it all the same. Just the bathroom to clean and dinner to cook, but I might just peek at my book first...

Skew whiff

The complete set of tunes today. I'm aware that I am missing out those without dots. Not that I am necessarily using dots, but they remind me which tunes I'm working on. I've written out the full list of tune names to work from instead.

More bellows issues. Over the years I've pushed down the outer side of the bellows as I've played, leaving them permanently skewed. This means that if I drop the bellows down to where they need to be I need longer arms to sit on the skewed side. If a longer bit of piping doesn't do the trick I may ask Mr Kinnear to straighten my bellows. I dislike the thought of being without bellows, and therefore pipes, for any length of time...

Anyway, aside from that the tunes are OK. Braemar still losing the run up in the middle of the first part. Not getting the the two first bars or the second repeat of Father John  quite right. Heroes dotless. The Dragon still all over the place. I tried Sleat  from memory but couldn't, mostly because I was starting from B instead of A, idiotically, as what sort of a tune starts on B? The third part still stuggling - those low As and Bs need to be fast and properly graced.

Same old

Are bad things less bad when they are familiar? Every time I play a lot I quickly hit a point where everything goes pear-shaped. (I wonder why the shape of a pear should be used to express problems...)

At least when things do go pear-shaped it's not as bad as it used to be. I don't seem to overblow, lose all grace notes, lose my ability to read music, forget all my tunes, tense my thumbs. Touch wood.

It's just this ongoing issue of not being able to hold my pipes comfortably. If it was just my elbow I'd be assuming that the pipes were exacerbating a bit of work-induced RSI, but it's my right wrist, and my little finger.

It will be fine. We'll come through this. We always do. (And in looking for previous times I've played a lot I've realised that I haven't played daily since January 2014. Oh, the shame.) Scrap that - it was June 2014. I was misled by the lack of blog posts. But still - a whole year!

Limited tunes today due in part to problems and in part because I've been working at bits that need polish, not using dots, playing until something works, not just doing a three times through.

Ocean, Atholl Highlanders, Heroes, Brandy.

Thursday

Problems again with getting comfortable. No combination of placing of bellows, elbow and wrist seems to work. I really must try longer tubing between bag and bellows.

Ocean. Really need to sort the B part so I can play it.

Heroes and Heights. A different combination today. It just needs a slight rest on the final note of the first tune for the segue to work. A couple of notes in Heroes  proving slow to sink into my brain. If I did put these two together then with Bee on the end it would make my first three tune set.

Sleat, Brandy, Dragon, Braemar, which lost that little run up again. I'm literally dropping one note down and that throws the whole thing out.

Father Johns's Boat Trip, which I like more and more as a pair.

Even on a bad day it's good, I enjoy playing.

Silver lining

We have a plumbing issue, and I'm waiting for the plumber to arrive. This has worked out nicely in the end as it means I've managed to  carve out some piping time on a day when I'm going out in the evening and wasn't sure how I was going to manage more than a token 5 minutes playing time.

Sound of Sleat - this is at the stage where things get worse before they get better. Struggling to remember the timing of the opening bars, although it's fine once I get going. The third part is trickiest, somehow, and I still can't play GDE graces on that row of Bs although they are fine on the As. I am gracing the Bs, I'm just not sure how. Maybe I'm just dropping down to A between each. This tune doesn't go with Brandy...

Braemar Gathering  - I seem now to have got over fudging the run up in the middle of the A part, although I still seem a bit tense around the grace between a low A and a C. Garbling a few bits as tbe tempo comes and goes, slowing down for those A to C transitions, charging through other phrases.

Troy  - lost this totally today: struggled through all of it. It's fast, but as for accuracy...

Heroes and Highlanders. Isn't that a nice name for a set? Not sure that they go together, but will work on it. Very nearly there with Heroes, just a few glitches. The 4th part of Highlanders has a tendency to be the slowest.

Father John's Boat Trip doing OK.

Father John's boat trip

As I walked to the allotment this evening to fetch spinach for cannelloni I found myself humming a medley of tunes that merged one into the other. One of them was Do You Love an Apple. Well, there's not much I can do about that, but the others were Father John and the Whaling Song so I thought I'd see if I could pair them up. Surely a man from Barra can't be adverse to water, and the narrator of the whaling song sounds as though some spiritual guidance wouldn't go amiss. They don't go badly together, as it happens, so it's a pairing I'll work on.

Other tunes this evening were:
Vittoria
Sleat and Braemar (I tried these two together but it was a non-starter, sadly)
Teribus (which randomly lost its D throws today)
Brandy, which I tried with Ocean, but it was hard to gauge the effect with only the A part of the Ocean. I did want to follow Brandy  with the Dragon,  but the dragon was nowhere to be found this evening.
Troy and Atholl Highlanders: not together, but both still giving problems with the interface between speed and accuracy.
Miss G.

Elbow problems again, although it was already tender from over use of my PC's keyboard at work today. I enjoyed my playing and am really looking forward to this month of piping.

Preliminaries

Something of a trial run for September today. Problems feeling that the bag lacked air, and difficulty in getting my bellows elbow or wrist comfortable. My fingers were a little tense, too, perhaps because I don't feel very warm today. I notice that these days hitches like this don't put me off or spoil my enjoyment of playing at all, perhaps because I know they are only passing fads.

I looked at the handwritten dots that the fan had found in a pile and quickly discovered that it wasn't the Ocean. Had in mind a bouncing finger on F, tried that...and there it was: part A of the Ocean. The fan heard it, asked if I'd found the dots. In a way I had - albeit the tune rather than the dots, and that was in my head all along. I think I'll need the fan to walk me through the B part again, and probably write that down.

Othe tunes played were The Sound of Sleat, Atholl Highlanders, Troy's Wedding, Braemar Gathering, Horsburgh Castle, Heroes of Vittoria and Teribus.

Drops of Brandy is having problems where I keep forgetting that the final triplet in each part drops to G, and I am playing A instead. Oddly this is one where I find the B easier than the A, or at least the transition from A to B is easier than that from B to A. Then the Dragon. Still doesn't feel right, but I still can't put my finger on what exactly is wrong with it. Maybe a recording is needed so I can listen. It seems to have a good amount of gracing, the speed is good, I like it as a tune to play. Maybe it's that it doesn't feel very complete by itself.

Still, a good start, I think.