L'esprit de l'escalier

On Saturday I played for half an hour, then the fan and I played together, and one way and another the best part of two and a half hours flew by. We tried some of my session sets, and some new tunes (John MacMillan of Barra), and the fan pressed me to ever more speed on Miss G and others.

On Sunday we struggled out in tempest and in rain to a session where I didn't play so well. I started myself off on Dargai too fast but managed to keep up the pace. A fellow sessioneer recognised the tune and offered Battle of the Somme as a partner to it, which I hadn't considered. Later I managed Magersfontein and Flett, although Magersfontein kept tripping me up in the faster runs in the B part. Oh, and McIntyre's Farewell and Capt wotsit which probably went wrong somehow, but I've forgotten the nature of its particular failings.

Today, of course, when there is no one to see, everything went well, and I managed Miss Girdle and  Roy Chisholm without dots. John MacMillan, who has been dogging my waking and sleeping inner ear, mysteriously vanished the moment I got the bellows going. But it's infuriating, always playing so much better at home than I do when I am out. The fan says it's always the way, but why? I suspect it's lack of practice with drones, because generally now, even with new people there, it isn't really stage fright.

Five things - fiddle CDs

The violin was one of the first instruments I came across in life. My father had one handed down from a family member, although I've no idea who, or what they played on it, nor why my father never learned himself. I always knew I would learn, and eventually I did for a few years, but never really got on with it. I didn't hear any fiddle playing: Dad's taste ran to Yehudi Menuhin, Aaron Rosand and the Mendelssohn  violin concerto. 

These days the fan is the one playing the fiddle and my preference is for Scottish, of course, although both Irish and Scandi figure in  my CD collection. Here are five of my favourites.

Eclection. Gabe McVarish. Irish, Scottish, Cape Breton...a truly eclectic mix, with the added bonus of Jarlath Henderson on pipes.

Welcome here again. Martin Hayes and Denis Cahill. One of my favourite duos. Not your usual Irish fiddle, this album is measured, slow and contemplative. Hearing tunes played this slowly, and so plainly  - just fiddle and very discrete guitar - makes you really listen and rethink Irish music.

All dressed in yellow. Fiddler’s Bid. Mostly Scottish, Shetland at that,  with the odd foray into Scandinavia, and one of the liveliest and most uplifting albums I have.  I make no apology for giving it its second five things mention.

Vamm. The album is eponymous. More Scots and Scandi stuff.  

Canaich. I've mentioned this - the first in a trilogy - in my five things on Scottish CDs. It's incredibly evocative of Scottish landscape, I love the use of the spoken word in it, shame about the wrong sort of pipes...

Just squeezing in Salmander by Bellevue Rendevous. Gavin Marwick composed some of the tunes and there are Brittany tunes  and some Klezmer among the Scandi stuff. 

Amazing grace

I am a fan of plain English. I dislike unnecessary verbosity that you see in signs and notices asking you to "please be advised that" or to note that a facility "may be found situated" somewhere. In matters of interior design I tend towards the clean and uncluttered, the inspiring theme of my wardrobe is understatement.

And yet, less is not always more. When the fan and I got married, many years ago, one of the things I was very sure I wanted was for the service to use the King James bible.

I've been thinking about this as I've been playing Donald MacLennan's Tuning Phrase and listening to Whistlebinkies playing it. The version I have is from the session. It's perfectly servicable, the tune is all there, but it's not as rich, as nuanced as the Whistlebinkies' version. As I play I sling in any grace notes that are structurally necessary to spilt repeated notes. There are varous notes that I thing I automatically grace, normally top hand notes that have a G grace added to them. But the Whistlebinkies' verson is richer than that and I haven't listened carefully enough to work out how, because I'm listening in the car.

Without the extra gracing the tune is a little flat, like a modern version of the bible, or an easy reading Shakespeare. It reminds me that it's still worthwhile grappling with gracing.

Not bad

I thought I should so something about my plan to record some old tunes in the hope of seeing some improvement. This is MacIntyre's Farewell and Capt Angus L MacDonald. The recorder cheerfully ran out of memory half way through the first play through and time was wasted (good piping time!) while I fiddled about deleting stuff.

Other than that recording was fine, and I managed to remember the correct sequence of creating an item, recording, setting in and out points, laying down a master and exporting it.

I should have fiddled with settings a bit more - dropped the volume. I stood to play, with the recorder on a table beside me and did some swaying and shuffling about. I don't think that's too obvious on the recording.

As for the playing: it's not bad, I think. It could do with being more evenly paced, more measured, more controlled. No drones, as is often the case. But, the first attempt with the full memory aside, this was the only take I did and I have done absolutely no editing at all.

Not bad, for a beginner, I reckon. Not bad at all.

(What I haven't worked out on my Galaxy Tab is how to select the code to paste it in to Blogger to get the link. Glad that the fan still has a PC!)




Check this out on Chirbit

Getting a grip

I had a day not playing. I found myself the other evening with a sore elbow and couldn't decide whether it was brought on by excess piping or excess knitting (always assuming that it's possible to have too much of either! ) Either way I decided to give both a miss for a couple of days.  Friday evening I felt at a real loose end. Saturday wasn't so bad as I had a new toy to play with. The painfully slow speed of my little net book finally got to be more than I could bear and this this is being typed on my new Galaxy Tab (I thought a certain rival firm in the market probably wasn't in need of my money. )

This evening I felt that I had done penance enough and have spent a jolly hour with the monkey. At least, it should have been a jolly hour,  but somehow I just couldn't hold the pipes in a way that was at all comfortable.

This has been a problem for a while. When we went to see Mr Kinnear last year I noted that the outer half of my bellows droops (which sound like a dodgy euphemism but isn't. ) He suggested I wear the bellows lower down, but then my wrist rests on them and my fingers go numb.  I also feel I am in danger of losing the bellows. I am not sure if the skewif bellows are just the symptom of some time of incorrect handling. It could also be because somewhere between last summer and the one before I lost about half a stone. The bellows strap was cut to fit and maybe it just doesn't fit any more.

This evening I've tried bellows up, bellows down, elbow strap tight, elbows strap lose. I think I've probably tried too many variations to see which works, and I've managed to make my left shoulder ache, which is a first.

I will try some knitting and see how that goes. If all else fails I've got a big pile of books to read.