Love, actually

It's been a while since I posted here. It's been a while since I played. Work is very busy. The fan has been having a rough time these last few months. You'd think music would be a solace in all this, but our routines are upset so that finding time to play is difficult, and I've not often been in the mood. I'm feeling bad about leaving the blog, and thinking of drawing a line under it as I always hate it when blogs I follow fizzle out.

So I've been pondering last posts (and have just realised that Last Post would have been the ideal post title!) and how to, as it were, end it all, and my musings have been melancholy as farewells so often are.

Then this evening I've played again and I've thought how much I love this, how much my pipes have brought me. In a way being able to play together has brought the fan and I closer together. I've enjoyed - and continue to enjoy - the community of playing with others. I've enjoyed the blogging - this will be post 609, with two in draft that never got published. I've played for 6 years: Morag, the poor neglected lass, is 6 years old. The Monkey I've had for about 3 and half years which has coincided, I think, with my piping coming on in great strides. I've shaken off stage fright, memorised tunes, put sets together. I've read about piping, and Scotland. I've discovered whole swathes of folk music I never knew existed. I've done so much and I've learned so much and despite the whinges I have loved it. I do love it, in fact. I love the Monkey, I love piping, I love being a piper. And I feel that despite this momentary lull I can go out on a high, and it's not the end, only the end of the beginning.

If you have been on my journey with me, thank you. I'm sorry to leave you, and this blog, but please know that in an enchanted place at the top of the forest a girl and her pipes will always be playing.

Goodbye.

Aft agley

Things don't always turn out as you expect. I couldn't muster the enthusiasm to play on Saturday, day 7 of the pop-up. But that was fine, because Sunday was the session and I knew I'd be playing then. Except I didn't - I felt under the weather and the fan went out leaving me to mope on the sofa.

Of course, unexpected changes of plan aren't always bad.

Curioser and curioser

These are things for which I have no explanation.

Today, despite strapping in as usual, I cannot keep my pipes in place: drones slips down over my bust, bellows slip down my elbow, and everything feels as thought it is heading towards the floor. My fingers, way too tight on the chanter, so I feel I am prising them away for each note, suddenly hit that soft perfection whee they bounce effortlessly. Despite all this I get the buzz....

I'm also at a loss to know why the version of The Road to the Isles or Burning Sands of Egypt printed in The Piper's Delight is described as being "as arranged for the pipes." It's a pipe tune, written for pipes, so how can it be "arranged" for pipes?

Less mysterious, but equally irritating, has been my failure to find a video of pipes playing The Braemar Gathering. Youtube of course just finds me videos of pipes playing at the Braemar Gathering. Luckily, I remembered that it's on Even in the Rain. 

Ghost in the machine

Of course, having decided that the buzz is simply the result of a certain level of pressure I played around with bag, bellows and elbows in the hope of finding that perfect point. I could't find it.

Not only could I not find it, I suffered from the opposite of the buzz - a thing so awful that it has no name. It feels as though everything is flat - not musically flat, but dampened and dulled like a grey day or a really drab shade of brown. The sound seems to lack any vibrancy, is almost muffled, and the chanter feels lifeless in my hands. After a while things improved, but whether that was to do with the reed warming up, my fingers warming up (it has turned cold here rather suddenly), or a change in pressure I don't know.

Something else I thought I understood the workings of is my musical memory. It only takes me a handful of play throughs to pick up a simple two parter. That may be generally true, but it doesn't work for Isles, which I play over and round and the moment I stop I can neither hear, see, nor hum a single bar.

I've been playing Flanders slowly and plainly with only the necessary graces (I think, although other may creep in if my fingers feel so inclined) but listening to the rather more ornate, and rather wistfully lovely, version of Mr Macleod I'm wondering if that needs to change.

Where do you go to, my lovely

First day back at work after a week away was a busy one, with the usual email avalanche and three meetings that weren't in my diary when I went away, two of them placed so as to wipe out the chance for anything but the briefest of lunch breaks. Nevertheless I felt reasonably upbeat, humming tunes to myself through the day.

It occurs to me that I haven't had tunes in my head of late. I don't know why, and rather like swallows I don't think I noticed them going, but I did notice when they came back again.

The tunes in my head needed to be played, which gave me a spur for my week of playing. I played a couple of tunes, shifted the bag to make it more comfortable, and suddenly got the buzz. I played through three tunes, not wanting to stop in case I lost it. But the bag got less comfortable, I had to shift it an inch...and the buzz vanished.

I kept on playing, anxiously checking to see if I could perhaps almost, sorta, kinda feel the buzz...but I think it's like being in love: you know when you are and if you have to ask then you aren't. Given that it came and went I can only assume that, rather prosaically, the buzz is linked to pressure levels, but I only know that I had it once and then lost it.

Pop-up piping practice

I've been thinking about getting back to playing, and playing regularly. We've just been away for a week, so of course I've played nothing at all until this evening. It went well today. I played for over an hour, everything was reasonably comfortable, I had good, even pressure in the bag, my fingers wre reasonable nimble. I played tunes I know and mostly had few problems with them. I ran through a pile of tunes, mostly sight reading things I have heard, things I used to play and never nail down, and The Road to the Isles (aka The Bens of Jura, among other aliases), just because it was there in the book and the fan had mentioned it recently.

You'd think that, considering how well everything went, I would have got the buzz, but there was no sign of it.

But it's the session (again!) at the weekend, and I need to get back into practice, and somehow a whole month is too much to commit to for daily playing. So my plan is that I do a pop-up practice and play every day for week from time to time, and hopefully least monthly, with the sessions there to remind me.

Goldilocks

I left my office one day last week and got half way to the car before I realised that I was still wearing my office shoes and that my driving shoes were still tucked under my desk. I decided I'd drive home in my office shoes, which that day were a reasonably sensible court shoe, with neither a very high nor very thin and fragile heel. They were, however, just a bit higher than my driving shoes, high enough to amend the angle at which my ankle rests, and to alter the angles needed in my foot on the pedal.

I didn't feel comfortable at all, so the next day I drove into work in a pair of flat pumps. The lack of heel was fine, but somehow the soles were quite slippery, and I didn't feel comfortable at all. I was certainly glad to get back to my driving shoes.

I do worry, however, that the only shoes I can drive in are my driving shoes. They aren't proper driving shoes. I normally just downgrade my oldest and tattiest pair of shoes to the role. The current pair of mid-height black courts replaced a pair of brown mock snake skin courts a few years back. I've had heels and soles replaced at least twice, but they are on their last legs. I'm going to have to adjust to a different pair of shoes. It's either that or give up driving!

I'm feeling like that with my pipes at present. I'm going through one of those periods when I can't quite get comfortable. It's not as bad as things got before I shortened the tubing, but it's bad enought to produce aches and twinges in shoulder, elbow and neck. I find myself feeling that in order to get things just right, or at least better, I have to be wearing certain things. Some are reasonably practical. If I am sitting down to play the chanter sits between my knees so a short, straight skirt isn't much use. But I've convinced myself that even the thinnest jumper means that the bellows strap for my elbow won't fit, but the top I do wear must have long sleeves so that the strap doesn't pinch. And, as previously discussed, I have to be neither too hot nor too cold. 

The most irritating thing is that none of these issues (short skirts aside) seem to either bother me or make any difference at all in a session, but playing at home I invariably change clothing or adjust the temperature, or abandon because of incorrect clothing or temperature.

Thankfully, my footwear doesn't appear to affect  my piping at all.

Crunluath

"Murdo stopped at the end of his pacing and broke into the crunluath. His toe tapped rapidly on the ground. His fingers bounded off the notes so nimbly that they seemed to describe short ripples along the chanter. The virile, slotted notes flew about, throwing a mesh of sound over the hearers, a contracting net that caught and drew the throats and breasts. And left them strangely numb and vibrant when, at last, the music  ceased."

The Albannach. Fionn Mac Colla.

I wonder what he meant by "slotted notes." This is the scene in which Murdo single-handedly resinstates the piping tradition among the men in the village, and thus revitalises the community. The strange thing is that this piobaireachd playing comes out of nowhere. Murdo isn't spoken of as a piper, apart from the playing of the feadan with the priest. It's as if the playing is innate, a core and hitherto undiscovered part of his Scottishness.

The mood of the passage I've quoted is immediately broken by Kenny's comment on Murdo's playing: "O, he'll learn!" Surely this is suposed to be taken as irony: a learner piper would hardly ensnare throats and breasts with his crunluath. Or perhaps it's sour grapes, for when the men first hear "the clear, lusty notes dropping out richly, forming a slow pattern against the wall of drones" someone suggests that the piper must be Kenny:

"'Thats's not Kenny,' says Murdo the Flea. 'Kenny never had that amount of skill in the fingers at him.'"

Iain Mor

"Iain Mor had died at the beginning of winter. Once his had been a great place and namely for the singing and the dancing and the piping and the telling of tales. Great had been the coming and the going about that place at one time and many the notable gatherings on winter evenings, and the fame of some of the men that would be piping there on evenings of the summer was no small thing. But that was in Iain Mor's day."

The Albannach, Fionn Mac Colla

A silver-mounted chanter

"One day the priest lifted a solemn finger before his nose and began fumbling in an inside pocket of his coat. With a face of portentous gravity he drew out a silver-mounted chanter, adjusted the reed and fitted it together. Then he began playing, while Murdo tapped time with his toes, inside his boot. When he had finished the little reel he played he handed the chanter over to Murdo, who played another, the priest taping on his knee with plump fingers and clearly delighted. They were there at the piping, laments, reels and marches and snatches of piobaireachd, sitting forward in their chairs as eager as schoolboys and the feadan passing between them until in the middle of a tune the priest happened to look at the clock, and he was up on his feet, clapped his hat on his head and skipped out of the room with the feadan still in his hand almost before Murdo realised the music had stopped."

The Albannach, Fionn Mac Colla.

Blogger advises me that this is my 600th post. Think how much piping I could have done in the time it took me to write them all!

Gile na gile

I found a translation of the poem. I also realised that much of the novel takes place earlier than 1932, but certainly not as early as 1892, the year in which women were admitted to Glasgow University.

In the end The Albannach is about Murdo, the protagonist, finding his true self, his identity as a Highland Scot, a Gaelic speaker and a piper. Oddly enough, considering the misogyny, it turns out that the great Murdo, the man who leads his village from the horrors of Calvinism into the sunny uplands of Alba, seems to have been taught to play the pipes by his mother.

"'God about us!' exclaimed Duncan Lachlan Iain, as if in the greatest consternation. 'A woman piper! I won't believe it. The day I see a man bear a child that day I'll see a woman tune the pipes, and that day I'll know I am dead. Man, man, they have not the wind nor the trick of the fingers nor the musician's ear not the poet's heart.'"

The Albannach, Finn Mac Colla.

This evening I certainly felt unfit to play. Following the fan's suggestion that I work on more reels and jigs I've been working on Troy, Miss Girdle and Crossing the Minch.  I've been thwarted by an utter inability to hold pipes and bellows in a way that doesn't involve a numb arm, cricked neck and sore thumb. Maybe it's the drop in temperature - I've had to resort to playing in fingerless mitts. In the midst of all the physical discomfort I got the buzz: there really is no rhyme or reason to it.

Reprieve

Our session has had its ups and downs, but before we took a summer break things seemed to be on a definite downward slide with dwindling numbers, and the fan and I had several conversatons about calling it a day.

Then last month was a little livelier with the new fiddler. This month the fiddler returned, we had a concertina player (an actual Irish player, which caused some consternation among those who play Irish tunes), and a chap who turned up with a drum, a flute, a whistle, a set of Uillean pipes and a set of lowland pipes. These had two stunted drones, the rest of the tubing apparently being internal. He said they were made by a chap in Arran (presumably at Dunfinion) but his chanter was made by Morag's maker, Simon Hope. He knew some pipe standards, but his gracing was definitely not GHB style, and the whole sound was more like Northumbrian smallpipes.

I had a few wobbles caused by the presence of newcomers, people arriving in a clatter and arranging themselves mid-tune, and probably, also, lack of practice, but On the whole it went well, and everyone seemed to enjoy it. I just hope we can keep it up.

Iain Beag

"Iain Beag would always be out when it was a question of piping. He was one of the best of pipers himself and would stand there leaning his weight on his artificial leg and tapping time with his one own foot while he went through all the changing parts of a piobaireachd, and he plainly in his glory...He had left a leg in France."

The Albannach, Fionn Mac Colla

I like the understated manner in which the artifical leg is explained - the lack of sentimentality, the slight humour.

This is an interesting novel. There are familiar themes: the oppressive religious upbringing, the bright boy who goes away to be educated, a brush with vice and debauchery, the failure to break free. There is a little piping, a little of domestic life in a croft, a fair amount of evocative description of the land.

There is a good chunk of Gaelic in it, some explained, some not. Murdo is a sent a poem, which has quite an impact on him, so it's a shame to have no hint at all of what it means. Google translate is no help at all, telling me firmly that 'Gile na gile do chonnarc' is Indonesian and that, translated into English, it reads 'na gile gile do chonnarc'.

But, the misogyny! Other than motherly Mrs O'Callaghan, who provides bed and board and asks no questions, every last women is fat, ugly, stupid to the point of being little better than an animal, gives herself airs, or moans and complains. They make sexual advances to him. One - a prostitute in Glasgow - passes on a STD. At least, that's how I read it. It's part of the novel that is written in almost a dream state, Murdo being drunk throughout (it's all rather Bloom in Dublin at this point), and I supose there will always be a certain amount of reticence in a novel of that time (1932) on such matters. There are apparently no women students at Glasgow. Women revolt and oppress him. To be fair he's not overly complimentary about the men, either, but at least they have faces and personalities; the women are all breasts, backsides and blather. They seem to have little in the way of opportunities - they bear 14 children, are shouted at and ignored by drunken, or adulterous and righteous, husbands, nurse each other in illness and their only relief seems to be sixpenny novelettes. I wonder to what extent that reflected the real lives of women in rural Scotland in the first part of the last century.

The black Skyeman

"He used to be a singer in his younger days, and a notable piper, too, but his voice was old and cracked now and the rheumatics had put an end to his piping for good a matter of seven years before. Only once had he put finger to reed since then and that was five years back when he had the argument with the black Skyeman about a tune."

"Sometimes, too, the argument would get hot enough in a friendly kind of way, and if it was about piping it would end by someone taking down the pipes and striding out to the patch of grass at the side of the shop with the whole company trooping at his heels, all except old Iain Mor himself who sat in his chair and bent an attentive ear. Every now and then someone would come in to tell the stage of the argument and demand his opinion, which he would then carry out to the men at the gable, who would pause in their arguing to listen and then be at it again. At times a whole evening would be passed in this way, the men arguing at the end of the house and only pausing now and again when someone took the pipes and stepped aside to play over a part of the tune to illustrate some technical matter, and he as like as not continuing the discussion for a bit with the bag hanging limp and the chanter held ready between his teeth."

The Albannach, Finn Mac Colla, 1932

Yes - it really does say that the chanter is between his teeth!

Old times

"The folks were a lusty race in those old times, with a song never far from the lips and feet ever itching to be at the dancing. And the fine piping there must have been! But then the dark days came, with a new kind of religion that changed the old ways, stopped the song on the lip, and let the wind out of the pipes with a squealing of drones. Then the folks began going abroad till none were left but the old people and bairns."

The Albannacb, Fionn Mac Colla, 1932

The first cause

"The First Cause or Unmoved First Mover - we must forget the infinitely subjective and question-begging term 'God', and for a thousand years! - the Ground of all Being or Creative Absolute - as some moderns are calling it, the Ultimate Reference - is in piobaireachd, as it never was in Calvinist theory..."

Fionn Mac Colla (aka Thomas MacDonald), introduction to The Albannach.

Fantasy album

This is pretty much what I played this afternoon.

Bloody Fields of Flanders/Hills of Perth
I think of this as the geography set because it has fields and hills, but it's also a homecoming, from Flanders fields to Perthshire. I really need to record this pair.

The Highland Brigade at Magersfontein/Heroes of Vittoria
The heroes set.

Women of the Glen/Sound of Sleat
Geography again - glens and sounds. Probably I should record this again, as hopefully it's in better shape than it was back in January.

John Macmillan of Barra/South Georgia Whaling Song
Always known to me as Father John's Boat Trip.

My Home Town
Because travel and being away and homecoming all imply the existence of a home.

Heroes of St Valery/Heights of Dargai/The Shores of Loch Bee/Flett from Flotta
This was a rather marathon set, the pipe equivalent of the rather indulgent guitar solo adding 20 minutes to an otherwise run of the mill tune. A heroes' homecoming set, this, from St Valery and Dargai back to the shores of a loch and a Scottish Island. To be honest it's rather too long, and I am still not sure about the Dargai/Bee/Flett combination.

Bonus track was Amazing Grace, which I suppose is a spiritual homecoming.  Clearly the album will be called No Place Like Home and the cover will feature my feet wearing ruby slippers. Now I just need to consider who I might recruit for backing...!

Don't I know you?

Pottering round this evening, spending time doing nothing much, and I've put on some music to help things along. It's Piob is Fidheall, which I haven't listened to much in a while.

I was pottering around making a cup of tea, enjoying the tunes when I heard one that I tuned into immediately, because it's one I'm playing at the moment: Hills of Perth. Which puzzled me, because I didn't think Perth was listed in the booklet. Sure enough, there is no mention of Perth, and the first tune on track 7 is down as Donnie MacQueen's. 

No further information is given about the tune in the CD booklet, other than that it was in a manuscript belonging to Duncan Currie of South Uist. Duncan is described as "an ancestor", but no clue is given to dates.

Hmm, further investigation leads me to the website of Cranford Publishing, where a listing of tunes for the CD gives the opener on track 7 as Hills of Perth aka Donnie MacQueen's. Perhaps Duncan Currie meant to indicate it was a tune he learned from Donnie, presumably before it was published by John Wilson, or, indeed, by the LBPS. No clue as to the identity of Donnie, who was presumably more formally Donald, and South Uist, judging by a quick trawl of the web, has had its share of Donald MacQueens over the years.

Slow down, you move too fast

After what feels like a piping lifetime of trying to play ever faster, I am starting to appreciate the slow. I've been hearing tunes that are played more slowly than "my" version (Shores of Loch Bee, South Georgia Whaling Song, Flett  from Flotta). I've been playing tunes that I feel need to be taken slowly (Flanders Fields). I've also been going back to tunes I feel I am, not exactly struggling with, but failing to get comfortable with (Troy's Wedding, Braemar Gathering, Sound of Sleat), despite the fact that I've been playing them, off and on, for quite some time now. 

It's possible that I may speed them up again when I'm ready, but at the moment I feel that a slower pace gives me more control. It stops me tensing fingers, rushing through bits I'm not confident on, messing up the timing. It allows me to concentrate more - or perhaps I just have to concentrate more in order to bring the speed down, and that's why the problems slip away. I'm not sure that this is going to fix things, but these are three tunes I would very much like to have settled into my session repertoire.

I do wonder to what extent my "slow" is actually faster than the "fast" I used to play. Speed is relative. 30mph seems reasonable from a standing stop, a little odd if you're slowing from 70mph as you come off a dual carriage way and, if you are actually travelling along that dual carriage way with traffic tearing by at 70mph, 80mph or more, positively suicidal.

Ch-ch-changes

Sunday’s session was quite different from usual. It didn’t get off to a good start: when we arrived the TV was on and a crowd sat around watching the football and providing a very vocal commentary. We sat at the other end of the pub with a drink each and waited. Eventually the match finished, and the pub emptied out, most people preferring to sit out, and we had our usual corner.

The Northumbrian piper arrived with his wife, who doesn’t play, but she settled down on a sofa by our table and we had a bit of general chitchat between tunes, which slowed the pace. A little later a new fiddle player joined us. He was a young chap, keen, really only starting to come into Irish trad, so not with a large repertoire. He’d sought us out as a change from the usual English/Morris sessions in the area, and he joined in the discussion as well as the music. With the general chat and with the youngster coming and going (he had friends elsewhere in the pub) it had more of the feel of a social evening with music, which was very relaxing.

Somehow we fell to taking it in turns to lead a set, which isn’t something we normally do, and not something I normally enjoy, but it worked well. I played My Home Town, Father John/Whaling Song (the latter rather faster than intended), and Dargai/Flett (with a micropause between the two as I weighed up the risks of plunging into Loch Bee). I twice failed to get passed the first half of the A part of Magersfontein and ended up with Women instead (I didn’t even consider trying Sleat on the end). I played a rather tatty King, partly, I felt, because I was expecting everyone to join in and no one did, and partly perhaps because I was nearing the end of a half of Woodford Wherry  having already had a half of St Austel Tribute.

The pub was empty for most of the evening, then a large and lively young crowd came in, and although they generally talked loudly through all but a song they applauded each set enthusiastically.

The same barman seems to be on duty whenever we are there. He’s rather laid back, never gives the impression of expecting us, or even really recognising us, and has a faint air of surprise about him whenever we order drinks. On Sunday he was rather chatty, and thanked us for saving him from the football, which he hadn’t been enjoying.

Sound of silence

I spent June learning one or two new tunes, but generally polishing existing tunes. I had intended to make recordings, to demonstrate progress, to spur me on. Somehow I didn't get round to it.

Today promised bright and has turned grey and damp, so rather than go to the plot for more harvesting and weedicide I got my pipes out. I think this recent flurry of activity is in part due to the knowledge that tomorrow is a session, the first since July, and I'm afraid of sounding rusty.

So, pipes - and recorder (as in, recording machine, not the instrument). I intended perhaps to do Flanders/Perth and Flanders/Valery in the hope I could decide which is the better pairing. I played this and that by way of warm up, including a reasonably tidy effort on Women/Sleat, which I didn't record because I wasn't expecting it to work. My right hand has a tendency to tense during Sleat, and my bellows tend to slip, which suggests to me that I am not yet comfortable with the tune and am hunching myself up, which, of course, makes things worse.

I had a dry run on Flanders, which I was pleased with, then hit the red button and messed the tune up three times, and several more times after that, even when I'd given up in recording. In the end, thinking I'd have nothing to show for my efforts, I recorded Magersfontein/Vittoria forgetting that it's not five minutes since I last recorded them.

I still feel that my repertoire seems to have hit some sort of steady state whereby new tunes edge out older ones. I've been humming Athol Highlanders, stumbled on the dots for Troy, which I think I had forgotten I ever knew, hardly think to play Braemar (which still needs work), actually had to check the dots before I could play Rowan Tree or Galloway.


Check this out on Chirbit

Signs and portents

I’ve got a bird feeder just outside the kitchen window. It doesn’t often get used while I am in the kitchen: our local bird population seems to be rather wary, although the robin and blackbird will eat if I stay reasonable still. The doves are a different matter. They seem to make a point of looking into the kitchen to see me. I imagine they are trying to catch my attention to encourage me to bring food out: they look at the empty tray and cock their heads at me. If I do have something to take out for them I often hear a “coo!” as I walk up to the feeder, which always sounds to me like a “here she comes!”

Once a dove could barely wait until I was out of the way and in her excitement (I always seem to assume that doves are female) she almost flew into me. I’m not sure which of us was more surprised. When I get back into the kitchen the doves will be picking over the food, throwing the larger pieces onto the floor. They will catch my eye, and I feel as though they are thanking me for their dinner.

Yesterday I picked up my pipes. I’d been humming Flanders all day and was sure I could play it. I couldn’t identify the opening note and by the time I’d got it wrong two or three times I’d lost the tune entirely, so swung into a nice rendering of Perth instead. After that I began on what I thought was St Valery. The A part went well, but the B part felt all funny and fizzled out. I struck up the A part again – and that was the moment I realised that I was playing Flanders, not Valery at all. Often when I confuse two tunes it seems a good sign that they might go together, so once I’d gone through Flanders a few times I went straight into St Valery, and that seemed to work very well. I’d been looking for a partner for St Valery, so am glad to have found one – it’s just a shame that Flanders already had a partner in Perth. I suppose they could make a threesome, but that would be a rather lengthy set. I will have to see.

And is this sudden garrulousness a sign that I was wrong to think this blog has outgrown its use? We shall see… 

How much?

Now that I've finished knitting the shawl I'm starting to plan other projects. I've wound a skein of crushed-berry coloured, hand-dyed silk bought in Basle a couple of years ago. I've bought a pattern, but I'm not sure if it's the right one for the yarn. I may use a pattern I already have, or I might buy another. In the meantime I've bought the pattern for a jumper and am pondering which yarn to buy.

Which is all very fascinating in itself, but doesn't obviously have much to do with piping, beyond forming one of my regular distractions. The point is that a knitting pattern is normally a pdf, so not even a physical object. There will be a front page with a picture of the pattern knitted up, a page of stuff needed to knit the item (the yarn, the needles), and possibly a list of abbreviations, although that might have a page to itself. It will close with some remarks on copyright and permitted use of the pattern, maybe some thanks to test knitters. There will be more pictures: a close-up, the item in a different colour, or worn by a different model. Somewhere in the middle will be one or two pages of actual instructions for knitting something. Sometimes these are free, sometimes to help promote a company's yarn and sometimes because it's a new designer. Often you have to buy the patterns, and that might cost between £3 and £5 or more.

Oddly enough I seem happy to buy the patterns, even when I'm not totally sure I am going to use them. Music, on the other hand, I have a real aversion to paying for. In some ways music is just another pattern, more instructions for making something. I've yet to see any fancy additions, any musical equivalent of pictures and abbreviations,  but then when I've seen charges for sheet music it's a lot cheaper than for knitting patterns.

I'm just as bad with books of music. There are several I'd like and I've not done anything about buying them, partly because, I suppose, I feel they won't be good value, I won't get my money's worth from them. And yet I have knitting books, and cookery books, on my shelves where I've really only ever used one or two patterns or recipes. So why am I happy to pay for the one and not the other?

The books of patterns or recipes often have additional information in them - perhaps some essays on knitting history or pictures of a particular country of region. I can sit and flick through either and get enjoyment and inspiration from them in a way I can't with a book of music. I can also tell from flicking through how many of the sets of instructions I am genuinely likely to use, whereas, as I've mentioned before, looking at printed dots tells me nothing about how playable or enjoyable I will find the tune.

A printed tune has limted use. Once I have the tune by heart the dots are useless. It takes me longer to get a recipe by heart, so I need to go back to my cookery book more often. I rarely knit the same pattern more than once, but would need the pattern every time I knitted it again.

A tune is not a thing, somehow. I can cook, share and eat a dish over and over. Once I have followed a pattern I have an item I can wear or use over and over. And although I can play a tune over and over for years it's somehow not a solid object in the same way as a dish for dinner or a pair of mittens.

I suppose one of the reason to pay for patterns is quality. Anyone can put together a pattern and share it round. When you buy a pattern you normally expect it to have been tested by a number of knitters, to have been technically edited, to be failsafe, to include a variety of sizes. A tune is a tune, and although the presentation on the page might be more or less clear, and gracing might be included or excluded, I've not generally found free printed tunes containing errors.

The other reason is that through the various knitting blogs I follow I appreciate that these (usually) women depend on pattern sales to make their living. Many of them promote their work through blogs. There is a feeling that you have a personal connection with the blogger.

That's something I really don't have with the composers of pipe tunes. Most of them seem to be dead, and those who are still living I know nothing about. And maybe that perceived personal connection makes all the difference. Because when I buy a pattern from an independent designer I'm not just gaining instructions; I feel as though I am suporting  small business, paying back into a blog I enjoy reading, even supporting my own escapist fantasy in which I, too, would sell a few patterns in between knitting, piping and gardening. I'm buying myself membership of a community.

And maybe it's just that I need to pay if I want good quality, up to date knitting patterns. Pipe music doesn't date and the older tunes do just as well and there is a lifetime's worth of free pipe tunes out there before I'd need to pay. Good quality recipes can now be had online for nothing, from various sources, some of which are trying to sell you groceries or utensils, others are  providing a public service (or possibly enticing you to buy the book of the TV show...).

So should I be happy to reap the musical benefits of free dots, or should I be putting my money where my elbow is? I really don't know.

Miscellany

Yesterday I played. I remembered all the tunes I wanted except Flanders, which I couldn't bring to mind, or fingers. I couldn't lay my hands on dots, either.

I had dots for Braemar, but couldn't play it. At least, I couldn't play the first part, mostly because I was trying to play a GDE gracing on the opening pair of low As. Once I remembered it was a low G I wanted the whole tune fell back into place. Bee, which was posted missing a while back, turned up on my musical doorstep, a little dusty and footsore, but otherwise intact.

Today I printed dots for Flanders and as soon as I lifted the sheet of paper from the printer the whole tune fell back in to my head, rendering the paper useless. It's a mystery to me, this whole musical memory thing.

There was something else I wanted to write about this evening, but that has also gone. Like Bee, like Emmeline, who slipped through the trees, I am sure it will turn up later.

I've been listening to all sorts of things in the car. Queen, Paul Simon, Fleetwood Mac. Some of it now only seems to have value because of the memories it invokes. I love Simon's language, his ability to tell a story. I think to myself that his greatest hits is the best short story collection I know.

This evening I listen to Rostropovich play Bach's  cello suites. No nostalgia required here. It's some of the most moving and beautiful music I know.

Endings

Endings can be good news, as well as bad. I have finally finished the baby shawl. It's taken almost exactly three months, but it has been worth it. It looks fabulous, which may sound as though I am blowing my own trumpet, but really the credit belongs to the makers of the yarn and the pattern designer.

August is almost gone, and with it the fan's holiday and the extra time that gives me in the evenings and weekends. I've cut the lavender back - a whole week early, but it seems to have died off earlier than usual. The allotment season is rolling on, boosted by this late spell of unseasonable warmth. I am considering giving up my gardening notebook. I've kept it for 5 years, ever since I took posession of my plot. The gems of gardening lore noted there boil down to this:

1. No two years are alike in terms of weather and how the crops do.
2. Each year some stuff will do well, other stuff will not. Generally this is different stuff each year.
3. A good time to plant something is when you notice everyone else planting it.
4. You can never be too assiduous in picking out tomato sideshoots and should never forget that they shoot from the bottom as well as the top. 
5. It's worth sowing broad beans November and February, but not too late in November because the blackfly will ruin them
6. Don't forget to start pulling and using onions as soon as they are ready. Waiting for the tops to die and drying them is only needed for storing unused onions.

That's it: five years of gardening and notetaking boil down to six unoriginal points. So I am rather thinking of stopping my gardening notebook, although I am not at all thinking of giving up the plot, which I love.

And this notebook? I've been keeping it for a similar length of time and could probably precis it as follows: I'm not as bad as I was, I do seem to be improving, I do really need to play more often.

I have no intention of giving up piping. I've not done much of it of late (see above re shawls, gardening) but whenever I play I get an enormous amount of pleasure out of it. But I am not sure how much use or enjoyment I am getting out of blogging. I'd quite like to post some recent tunes, just to tie up the before and after, the blog as demonstration of actual progress. I suppose the blog jogs me into playing sometimes, just because I feel that I am not its only reader (posts get a fairly consistent 16 or 18 hits) and I feel some embarrassment that there are people expecting me to blog and that blogging in this case is somehow a proxy for piping. On the other hand I've used up a good number of hours blogging when I could have been piping, this evening being a prime example.

So is this the end? I'm not sure. If I decide that it is I will come back and make a formal farewell, just in case there are really people out there who have been following progress with me.

They all rolled over

I  need a memory upgrade. I realise that I am, reasonably succesfully, playing my new tunes: Valery, Perth, Flanders. If I rack my brains I also play Magersfontein, although now that it's definitely a set with Vittoria it almost counts as a new tune.

Then there is Flett, maybe Father John and Whaling Song. After that I, have to think, to check my note book, to see that there is also Bee, King, Dargai, Bonnie Galloway, McIntyre's Farewell, Rowan Tree, My Home Town... Even the recent pairing of Women and Sleat gets forgotten. And that's without thinking about the eternally unfinished Miss Girdle, Braemar, Wedding or any of the other tunes that I can play, or at least used to be able to play.

My musical brain is clearly less like Spotify and more like a juke box or old fashioned CD changer with room only for a fixed, and rather small, number of tunes. It's reasonably easy to slot a new one in, but in order to do so I have to take another one out.

As you were

I haven't played for a while. As ever I have nothing much else to show for the lapse: still only on row 69 of the endless knitting project, weeds flourishing at the allotment, can't remember when I last completed a crossword, although I have been reading quite a lot of late.

Whatever the reason it's about two weeks since I last strapped on my pipes so I did so this evening with some trepidation. I worried that my new tunes might have melted in the recent heat, and that those I had polished would have tarnished.

As it turned out the first tune that came to my fingers was Flanders, which I thought I had forgotten entirely. After that everything came tumbling out: Perth, Valery, Vittoria, Flett, Dargai, Home Town, Sleat, Bonnie Galloway, Father John, Whaling Song. I had a couple of glitches in Women and Bee, which also needed a couple of goes to start it, but everything else seemed pretty much as I had left it. I even got the buzz....

Five things - songs

I used to prefer songs , as I've mentioned before. I suppose it's easier to be exposed to songs than to tunes, the repetition of chorus aids memorability, songs are maybe less challenging than tunes because we're all familiar with words.

I suppose, as well, that as a Literature student I've always been drawn to lyrics, to words. In folk, however, the songs tend to be ballads, my least favourite wodge of the poetry spectrum. They tell often unlikely stories in a simple manner: there's not a whole lot of metaphor, striking imagery, or other literary tricks. 

That said, I am reasonably intrigued by songs that have clearly changed over time, split, or merged, maybe got a little garbled along the way. I like the way that songs - stories - travel, and each place they come to changes them, so that the story suits the locality. I suppose ballads are a form of urban legend, and urban legends never tell tales of long ago in a far off land: the whole point is that this happened to my neighbour's sister's cousin. Somehow we feel that a story must be true when it has happened so near to us. Not only could it be true, but the same thing could happen to us. We want our musical stories to feel local, relevant.

If I listed all the CD tracks I skip on every playing, on repeat playings, or when I have the CD on permanent loop every last one of those tracks would be songs. They aren't all bad. Here are five I don't really tire of.

Road to Drumleman. (Ossian - Seal Song.) There is nothing like a tale of homesickness, the wonders of the old land, to bring out the Celt in me. I love the rather domestic scale of this: it's not mountains and drama he misses, but the people, and the chance of "a dram and a wee cup of tea". 

Rosie Anderson. (Smalltalk - Smalltalk) I love some of the marvellous turns of phrase in this: "I'm all in to surprise he said” and “I only brought her safely home from the dangers on the way”. Like many sad songs, it seems, it closes with a repeat of the opening, just to remind you of the pleasant days that have gone, the days when Hay Marshall loved Rosie as his life. There's also a comic note, as in all the best tragedies, with Rosie on the lookout for an officer, her "broken heart to cheer". It's rather reminiscent of Lydia Bennet.  Note, also, the Jean Redpath version (linked from the song title) has an extra  verse about Rosie's maid, and that the errant Rosie "played the loon" after a month in London, whereas Billy Ross has her languishing long enough in London ("months but barely  nine") to have "gotten a son".

Cruel Lowland Maid. (Caladh Nua - Next Stop). This is a bit of a cheat because it’s the tune I love, all boppy and uplifting, despite the grim tale of murder, with a cheerful "whoop!" at the end to underline the hanging of the cruel lowland maid. 

Bonnie Earl of Moray. (Jock Tamson's Bairns - Rare). Another where the tune is almost the main draw, the lovely Swedish tune that the Bairns use for it, the interesting arrangement with the song surrounded by tune. And again the conceit of coming back at the end to the beginning, although here not reminding us of good times before the tragedy, but just underlining again the woefulness of the situation. This, of course, is the song that gave the world the Mondegreen.

Little Musgrave. (Billy Ross - Shore Street). I've heard Fairport sing Little Matty Groves unplugged. In their hands it's a rock anthem with a twist each time ("How do you like my brand new curtains, that I got in Ikea last week?" was one memorable lyric variation). It's different each time, and it's lots of fun. Little Musgrave is an Appalachian version, a sweet and sorry tale. There seems to be lots of other verions of this, and much discussion about its history. It's an English song, though, no links to Scotland at all, it seems.

Andy Murray's Compliments to Centre Court

If I was going to write a tune it would be a nice three-parter in honour of the fact that someone managed to get some stuff on his to do list done this weekend.

I only managed 20 minutes piping while waiting for dinner to move from one stage to the next of cooking. I also piled through a mountain of ironing, got some washing done, laid down a path in the fruit cage, planted out brassicas and tagetes and watched some other British sporting success.

You win some

The fan was a bit late home this evening, and, as often seems to happen when he's late, I was able to leave early. Still, it gave me a bit of piping time, unhurried by dinner on the hob.

All my tunes were there, including Flanders. Bellows were awkward again, so that I have to shrug them round my body as I play. I don't seem to be leaning my wrist on them, but I get tingling and numbness in the little finger of my right hand. I also feel as though my piles are slipping down, and in fact they sometimes do slip and then stock and drones press uncomfortably on my front.

Despite this I got the buzz this evening, and the chanter felt alive under my fingers. It doesn't seem to affect, or be affected by, how I play, but it does gladden my heart.

Andy has been winning some. Hope he can avoid losing some.

The Djokovic moment

I meant to play yesterday but somehow didn't find the time. I played today before we went out, Dargai, Flett, Flanders, Perth (which is going through a tendency to muddle the opening of the A and B parts), St Valery.

I got to the session and was asked about the pipes, so explained, failed twice to get past the second bar of Dargai and played a messy version of Flett. Then I sat down and failed to get past the A part of Flanders, cravenly citing concerns with my drones...and this was before anyone else turned up.

I couldn't think of any tunes, the fan offered The King, but I lost track of it, twice, and crashed out. I kept thinking how badly I'd been playing, which made me bad-tempered. Later I tried Home Town, but my bellows weren't right, and I was pumping too much, which bothered me. I felt a little better having got to the end. I suppose it's like being two sets down and suddenly taking a set: a chance to focus on the set you took, the things you can do. But the things I apparently couldn't do niggled away.

Later on - it wasn't easy to get in between the two fiddle players - I played Father Macmillan and Whaling Song, which was too fast, mostly because I felt as thought my bellows were slipping down and wanted to get to the end before I lost them. Then another abortive attempt at Flanders, which I blamed on the fan's backing distracting me. The crosser I got with myself the worse I played, the worse I played the crosser I got.

My other Djokovic moment was wondering whether a month needs to be a calendar month. I've been trying to catch up at the plot this weekend and wonder whether June just isn't the right time to focus on something else. On the other hand knitting and some domestic issues have also taken up my time since early May. May itself would be no good as we are sometimes away at half term, April can be complicated by Easter, we often take holiday at the end of July...

I just need more days in the week...

And one for luck

I played this evening. I can hardly believe it's July. It's cool, damp and grey. The onions at the plot are rotting in the ground, half the strawberries have turned to mush. There's been so little play at Wimbledon that they are pondering play on the middle Sunday. I'd pipe more, only my hands are too cold.

Set in stone

Not for the first time I've been pondering sets. I'm mostly wondering whether it's acceptable to reuse a tune in more than one set. It seems a bit of a cop out, but some tunes do just seem to be very easy going and willing to pair with a range of other tunes.

I'm thinking of sessions, of course. Listeners ("audience" implies more choice and interest than the Sunday evening drinkers probably have when we arrive) may find it dull to hear the same tune more than once of an evening. Fellow musicians may also prefer more variety. The other problem would be that if tune A is sometimes followed by tune B and at others by tune C then you run the risk of either having a gap while everyone waits to see if it's B or C this time, or a musical car crash as half the session goes with tune B and the other with tune C.  The answer to that would be to ensure that tune B always follows tune A, but opens the set with tune C.

As ever, I have easy going tunes like Vittoria that seem happy to pair up with all sorts of tunes, and others, like Dargai that don't seem to sit with anything. Maybe I need to learn more tunes...

Accidentally on purpose

I failed to play yet again yesterday. The fan and I made a 7 hour round trip to Bournemouth for a 90th birthday party. We left too early and arrived home too tired for any music. Found a good pizzeria on the way.

Flanders is almost there, which is good, because nice as it is to polish it's also good to have something new to show for my efforts.

A retreat too far?

Today the slow tune in my head was Flanders, although Creek was perfectly playable, with dots. Both are at that stage where the dots are moral suport more than anything.

As ever, once I have tunes I want sets. The fan likes slow followed with a burst of speed, which is fine for performance but not so useful in sessions where it's easier for people to join in, I think, if tempo is the same throughout. I'm also thinking of length with four parters (Perth, Valery) probably not lending themselves to the standard arrangement of three-tunes-each-played-three-times-over. Perhaps a short tune tacked on the front or back would work.

So I've pondered Valery followed by Perth, which may be too long. Or Creek  and Perth or Flanders and Valery. Kevin McLeod has Lochanside, Valery and Vittoria together, but I feel somehow that maybe two retreats together isn't quite right, although I think the things they share, like the little triplets, would bind them together.

I also think it's a shame there isn't a tune with Swan in the title, which would make for an amusing set name.

Strike three

I haven't played today. Again. I'm not worried. I wasn't expecting to have time to play today as I needed to do a supermarket sweep and get some newly delivered plants planted out at the allotment, as well as cooking dinner. I did think that maybe after dinner...but it was 9pm by the time we were done, and now I'm drinking tea and knitting is calling and I just plain can't be bothered.

My polishing is coming on well, and I can normally play bits of either McIntyre, Creeks or Flanders. Not an awful lot to show for the effort, but the polishing is useful, I think.

When you change with every new day

I thought that while I was polishing that perhaps Dargai could do with a quick buff up, so I played that, followed by Flett and Bee. Yes, Bee. I had to give it a poke, but there it was, without the new grace at the very first point, but thereafter note perfect.

Then I started humming and played a few bars, and then an entire A part of Flanders, having pretty much given it up for dead. I didn't go looking for the B part, because really I had been in search of Creeks. I couldn't find them. Gone. What I found instead was McIntyre's Farewell, like the Bee, note perfect and in full despite its prolonged absence. I stuck the Captn on the end.

I shall wait with interest to see which tunes materialise tomorrow. I suspect that McIntyre and Creeks, perhaps because they share 2 or 3 opening notes, will be one of those odd pairs that cancel each other out so that I can never hold them both in my head at once.

Spoke too soon

When I played yesterday I thought that the Bee was back. It appears it was only passing through as today I haven't a clue how it goes. I can't even conjure it up with the old trick of starting on the B part: not a single note will come to me.

This evening I decided to play a token tune or two, not really feeling in the mood. However, once I started everything fell into place, tunes fell out of my fingers and I only gave up after an hour once my bellows elbow started to ache (which I am blaming on the knitting project rather than the piping.)

Before I stopped I thought I'd try McIntyre's Farewell, which I used to play at sessions, although it's not a tune that tne fan is keen on. Various bars came back, but no more, so I headed to the bookshelf, humming as I went. As soon as I saw the Barry Shears book I knew it wasn't the one I wanted because the tune I was humming was Creeks. Despite previous comments  I do apparently know the tune, can hum it, and can play pretty much all of it. What I can't play, even with the dots, is McIntyre's Farewell, because everytime I try it morphs into the Creeks.

Oops!

Yesterday I managed not to play, again. We had curtain rails to put up, curtains to hang, the aftermath of some decorating to tidy away, dinner to cook, a cake to bake... Something had to give.

Progress at the half way point isn't looking too bad. Father John is, if not quite shining like a national guitar, at least reasonably buffed up. Women is also improving, with more control now on the opening bars of the B part. More elbow grease required for Sleat, which my fingers still run away with.

Perth is doing well. I'm no longer confusing the 3rd and 4th parts, or forgetting the 3rd part, and speed is picking up nicely. St Valery still needs work. The 2nd and 4th are less likely to get confused but I'm not always getting the variations on the repeat of the 2nd part.

Barren Rocks first part is fine, the second is OK sometimes. I'm less convinced that it sits well with Atholl, which is requiring quite a lot of remedial work. The 4th part considerably slower than the others, the 1st having a tendency to be too fast, too untidy.

Flanders seems to be going the same way as the Creeks: lovely tune, recognise it when I see it, never hum it, can't play without dots, rapidly losing interest...  Lindisfarne and Planxty I think I am sometimes humming in parts, but neither tunes falls easily under my fingers, and a couple of note changes sound rather odd to my ear. In theory I like them rather a lot, but my fingers just haven't taken to them and I fear both will fall by the wayside before too long.

Not blogging, but piping

At the session on Sunday I played March of the King of Laoise and mentioned to one of the flautists, on only his second visit, that I offered it as my concession to Irish music, noting that it's clearly a Scottish tune, because it's so clearly a pipe tune. Not at all, replied the flute: pipe tune, certainly, but Irish war pipes, not GHB. Not something that had occured to me, and now I wonder, where is the rest of the repertoire of the war pipes?

I've just finished Roderick Cannon's very enjoyable history of piping and will blog on that this weekend, hopefully.

Played a little with the fan this evening, and for the first time in ages I got the buzz!

Credit where it's due

Poor Andy Murray. It seems he can never be good enough. He played in his 10th grand slam final at the weekend. There are only 10 men in nearly 50 years of tennis who have played in so many finals.  There are only 12 who have managed that across all four slams. He was beaten by the world number one tennis player, one of the few to have won all four slams during his career. Andy has come so far: it's really only a year ago that won his first tournament on clay. At the start of the French Open it didn't look as though he'd even make it into the second week. There was a time when he thought he'd never reach a final at Roland Garros. Andy is awesome, yet all the focus is on the thing he didn't do, the match he didn't win.

I mention this partly because tennis is one of my distractions, but also because I can sympathise. OK, I don't get to pick up large amounts of money, or get featured in Hello! magazine, or have to fly round the world or practise for hours or have ice baths. However, just like Andy whatever I do never seems quite good enough. However far I have come it's somehow never far enough. The fan said I did well at the session this weekend. I played three sets and a couple of standalone tunes, but mostly I envied the Irish piper his three page tune list, and got cross that I felt my timing wasn't as steady as it might have been, some of the fingering not as tight as it might have been, some of the control of bellows not as good as it should have been.

All we can do is struggle on and remember to give credit where it's due.

Character building

Here is the plan. I will spend the month on a mix of learning new tunes, refurbishing two rather tatty tunes, and polishing some tunes that I do know but that, well, just need a bit of a polish.

The new tunes are The Bloody Fields of Flanders, Pringle Planxty and potentially Lindisfarne. I am saying potentially because the style being so new to me I am afraid that the two Matt Seattle tunes will clump together in my head amd become entangled if I attempt to learn them both at once. I think I was humming one earlier, but am also aware that the opening of one of them is stirring vague memories of a baroque tune, possibly one from recorder playing days, and maybe that is what I was humming.

The refurbishment is needed for Aden and Atholl Highlanders. I know them, I've played them, I've never got them up to session standard, they need some work, and I am pretty sure they will make a good set.

Then those that need polish. Father John I feel is getting rusty, so a bit of repetiton there won't go amiss. Both Perth and St Valery keep getting their B and D parts switched and confused, so they need work. I'm also wondering if the driving rhythm of Perth  might make an interesting change if stuck on the end of Flanders. 

The others in need of polish are Women of the Glen and The Sound of Sleat. I like Sleat. It seems to me to be, if you get the timing right, rather evocative of a boat on water, of the bubbling and sucking that water does around an obstacle.

Which brings me to the title of this post. I think I have stopped thinking about notes and parts and repeats and fingering, i.e. the nuts and bolts and mechanics of tunes. I think I am now thinking, as I hum, and as I play, of the character of the tune - of its bounce or lilt or sway, and where I think of individual phrases I am thinking of the sad bit, the upbeat bit, the joyful bit. I think that if this awareness of character comes out in my playing I will be a better piper and will also be on my way to developing my own musical voice.

Epic fail

Well, a slight exaggeration perhaps. Yesterday was the first day of June and my latest challenge month and I played not one note. We raced out of the house straight after breakfast and didn't get back until bed time. It was a planned day out (to Birmingham, which I can heartily recommend to those who enjoy modern architecture, Victorian architecture, Victorian art, well kept civic spaces, English baroque  churches, railway stations, canals and shopping).

I printed out three tunes to try this morning. The first is fairly standard, just The Bloody Fields of Flanders, which I have been enjoying on Polbain to Oranmore. The other two are somewhat different, being modern tunes for border pipes. I was googling for Flanders, ended up on The Session and noted a comment by a Matt Seattle, who appeared to be a piper...and does indeed turn out to be that same Matt Seattle who gets mentioned in association with William Dixon in Common Stock from time to time. He has has own website and includes some tunes on it. The two I have chosen are Lindisfarne and Pringle Planxty. They are proving problematic, if only because they are, to my ear, very much not Scottish tunes and the things they do are not the things I expect tunes to do. The fan is quite taken with them. I am intrigued by Mr Seattle's bellows strap: it looks as though he has a shoulder strap, which I think is in addition to the body strap.

I've also been thinking about The Barren Rocks of Aden, one of my first tunes, long since abandoned. I've been wondering if it would make a good introduction for Athol Highlanders, also not played for an age.

Hello stranger

I've gone for morning playing again today. I'm slightly wary because I don't want playing to be one of the chores I have to get out of the way before I start on things I'd really like to do. The weather being a Bank Holiday special - grey, dull and cool - I've got nothing much planned other than more knitting and snuggling up with an Angela Thirkell.

I started off with a sudden urge to play in A, so dusted off the long neglected chanter. From the very first note I loved it: it's such a rich sound. The chanter felt huge, and it took an amount of adjusting hand position and stretching to achieve a half decent low G. I played through Perth, Women and Sleat. The wobbly G meant that the third part of Sleat was a mess, but otherwise it went surprisingly well. It did feel as though I needed a lot more effort on the bellows, and as if the whole instrument had doubled in size, so I gave up after those three but must go back to it again, maybe returning to my old plan of starting with A then switching after a couple of tunes.

After that I dug out music books and discovered that tunes I thought I had forgotten (Battle of the Somme, Green Hills of Tyrol, Over the Cabot, Trail Captn Angus L MacDonald, Compliments to Roy A Chisholm, Donald Dhu) are all actually still in the back of my mind somewhere.

I discovered Jacky Latin in one of the Willie Ross books. I also found that I do actually know several tunes that I had abandoned, feeling I'd never learn them. I found different versions of them (Return to India in Barry Shear's book and The Rejected Suitor in the Ross) and struggled to play them because the versions I already know kept trying to push their way in. Right at the end I played Dargai and Bee suddenly appeared, minus its new grace notes...

I gave up after over an hour, feeling like my arms might fall off. For my playing next month I might try to resurrect some of the pile of tunes that fell by the way (Farewell to the Creeks, Blue Bonnets I also played today). I'm half inclined to buy one of the music books on my list. The one thing that is still certainly a stranger to my play list is the strathspey: not a single one can I play. I feel that's a serious omission.

Buzzed off

In a break with tradition I played right after breakfast this morning. I'm a creature of habit, and generally feel that the morning is for chores, although at this time of year it's also for the allotment before it get's too hot, or, a more likely scenario, the weather breaks.

It was the allotment that made me change my habit. I was only there a couple of hours yesterday, which should have left ample time for piping. But two hours digging and weeding in the sun were followed by a rush to the local shops, some quick chores, a dive through tbe shower, cooking dinner...and when dinner was in the oven and I might have had my pipes out I was physically tired and lay on the sofa with a glass of wine instead.

In another break with tradition I just sat down and played non-stop, one tune after another, just in the order they occurred to me. I had been thinking to play some tunes, mainly Bee and Women in a slow and measured fashion, to really get a grip on the gracing (pun unintended!) In the end some tunes came out rather fast, and Miss Girdle just flew. She's still a bit untidy, though, like someone rushing out of the house, hatless, gloveless, hairpins dropping, still hoiking up her skirt and buttoning her blouse as she goes.

The one tune I didn't play was Loch Bee. I've been humming it a lot of late, but this morning I couldn't bring it to mind, or fingers. It just vanished.

Here is another recording from the other day. This is Magersfontein and Vittoria. It's working well as a pairing, I think, although the second half of the B part of Mags is suffering from some temporary glitches were those two little sets of fast notes are. Working on that.


Check this out on Chirbit

The old, old story

I am piping, perhaps every other day. I am feeling quite satisfied with my piping, feeling that it flows and is melodic. The tunes I hum during the day are the tunes that I am playing.

I'm still not happy with the size of my repertoire, which stays stubbornly small, although it is now a small number of sets, and some individual tunes, rather than just a small number of tunes.

I am happy with an adjustment that I keep forgetting to mention: I've finally settled on the ideal length for the tubing, and have lost all the problems with resting my wrist and numb fingers.

I suppose I'm not happy with how often I play. The allotment isn't as much of a distraction as it might be. For various reasons I've moved from growing from seed to buying plants, and I've been putting off buying plants while the cooler evenings persist. We've been having rain, to, so there is not much to do other than harvest rhubarb and pull up weeds.

In the meantime I am being distracted by reading and by knitting. That little piece up there is the first part of a very large, very lightweight shawl, knitted in cobweb weight Shetland wool. I need to do a lot of knitting between now and September when the intended recipient is expected.

I did manage to play and record at the weekend, but somehow haven't got round to blogging until now. This is Dargai with its new companions. I'm not 100% sure that they go together. Next month I do intend to play daily and perhaps the more I play this set the more it will sound like a set, just as the combination starts to sound familiar.



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Adjustments

I had the zero sum game sussed this evening, I thought. I made a positive decision not to do more weeding at the allotment, conveniently forgot about various household chores that need to be done, and decided I'd cook and pipe. It looked as though cooking would win out at one stage as I cheerfully threw in artichokes and peas and ginger and rhubarb crumble alongside asparagus and ricotta tart, but in the end I found some piping time.

I thought I'd play Magersfontein as I've been humming it all day, but it didn't come to my fingers so I let it be. I adjusted my Dargai set by playing that first with Bee following and Flett to close. I've made a minor adjustment to Bee, adding a doubling to the second or third note in. I've heard others play it, fiddled around to find the sound I wanted, and threw it in. Every time I play this doubling appears. I think this is the first time I've voluntarily added a grace without having to first beat it into my brain (I say "voluntarily" because sometimes they appear of their own accord.)

The other adjustment was to do with my belief in piping as a cure for headaches. For stress headaches, certainly, but the kind of headache you get with bad light and a PC screen pipes don't help.

Doh!

I used to play The Heights of Dargai with The Shores of Loch Bee. More recently I've been playing Bee with Flett from Flotta, a pairing which I borrowed from Skippinish (although they have a third tune in the middle).

This has left Dargai as a singleton tune. This evening it finally occured to me that if Dargai goes with Bee and Bee goes with Flett, then surely Dargai  could pair with the two of them? Actually, as experience tells me, just because various pairings work it doesn't mean that a three will do as well. Good job I don't listen to experience over much: this turns out to be a good set of three.

I have half an eye on next month which should be a challenge month. I need to find some new tunes...

Not the hills of home

I've been humming The Glandaruel Highlanders, which is on my latest CD acquisition, Polbain to Oranmore. Actually, that's not quite true. I've been singing the song Campbeltown Loch:

Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,

Campbeltown Loch, Och aye!

Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,

I would drink you dry!

Not that I have ever heard the song, but Kevin Macleod mentioned the lyrics on the sleeve notes, and they took my fancy, and I've been singing them (Och aye!) to a very mangled version of The Glendaruel Highlanders. I know that it's mangled because when I tried the tune out on my pipes this evening it didn't sound like any tune I know.

I think this is partly because when I listen to the tune I immediately start singing the song, which means I am not really listening, and I know that I am repeating the chorus only over the whole of the tune. As I've mentioned before It seems that if I have words and a tune my brain seems to prefer the words, no matter how wrong they are.

I suppose the other problem is that voice is, in its way, just another instrument, and just as a pipe tune sounds very different when played on banjo or fiddle or even whistle, it sounds different with voice. It's not just that other instruments can slur or lilt or bounce in a way that pipes can't. Some of it is to do with the different ways in which other instruments treat the gracing. It's something I came across early on when I first heard A Scottish Soldier. It's The Green Hills of Tyrol, Jim, but not as we know it. 

(Incidentally, I found Glendaruel in the Seaforth Highlanders, and I knew it would be there because this handy site told me so).

Done and dusted

I have too much to do. I needed to shop on my way home this evening, cook dinner, and bake cakes. Once the cakes are done that’s the end of that…until the next time it’s the fan’s turn to take cakes into work, and dinner needs cooking every day of the week, unless we starve: even takeways would need ordering and collecting and eating every day.

Sometimes I think that work – my job – is the problem, in which case time off work would be the answer. The house needs cleaning, but if I took a week off and scoured and polished and reorganised the entire house from top to bottom, well, the dust would start accumulating again before I’d even got to the end. There is no meaningful way in which housework is ever “done”.

I could just spend that week knitting, and that way I’d get my jumper finished and make a good start on a shawl for my cousin’s baby. I’d almost certainly also think of a dozen other things I wanted to knit with stash yarn, and that’s before I’ve even thought of buying more yarn. I could decide that when the jumper and the shawl are done I’d be finished with knitting…but where would be the fun in that?

It’s ridiculous, really, this feeling that I have lots to do, lots to get done. That somehow the only good state to be in is one of having Got Stuff Done. It’s treating life like Christmas. The way that you think I just need to clean and shop and write cards, bake a cake, get a tree and put the decorations up, and post packages and travel or feed people and make up beds, and write thank you cards and take the decorations and the tree down…and then at last it’s all over! Which is when you realise you’ve not enjoyed the run up, and the day itself has come and gone, and all you can do is start looking forward to next year and promising yourself that you’ll enjoy the doing of it, the preparations, the doing of stuff, and not just look forward to twelfth night when you’ve got it all done. It’s the doing that is as important as the having got it done.

Why do I mention this? I suppose it’s partly feeling that the endless slew of stuff to get done is a zero sum game, whereby if I go home via the supermarket, cook dinner and bake cakes there won’t be any time for piping. If I go to the allotment I won’t get any further along with the knitting. I if do the crossword I can’t write letters. I can’t decide if I need to make piping more of a “must do” item – give it a higher priority, if you like – than other things on the list, or whether I just need to go with the flow, do the pressing stuff, and then whatever I feel like doing. I worry that I don’t feel much like piping at the moment, but then sometimes I don’t feel like knitting or reading or tackling the crossword.

I’m also wondering whether I am getting bogged down in the concept of a sort of piping D-Day (maybe that should be P-Day), on which the piping will be done. I will have learned all the tunes I want to learn, be able to play them all note perfectly on demand at sessions, never miss a grace note, never lose pressure. I will, at last, be A Real Piper! But actually, that sounds rather dull, and surely the only thing to do then will be to move on to something else. I need to enjoy the getting there more, enjoy doing stuff, not getting stuff done.

Two plus one

We were away at the weekend and flung ourselves back up the motorway from Surrey and Sussex with just enough time to grab a cup of tea and a slice of toast before racing out to the session.

What with one thing and another (the Bank Holiday, last month's visiting fiddler having fallen out with the landlord) it was just the two of us and the ever reliable Irish piper. The pub was busy, the snooker was on the big screen (without sound, thankfully), I was tired and disinclined. The omens were not good.

And yet...once the piper arrived and we got going it went well. The drinkers applauded from time to time, a few of them jiggled about in a loose approximation of Irish dance. The piper played with the fan supporting on bouzouki. The piper accompanied me on pipes or whistle while the fan provided backing. I played along with the fan on his mandolin. We all pitched in together with the fan swapping between mandolin and bouzouki, the piper between pipes and whistle.

I played Flett and Bee (which was a bit raggedy so only went round twice). I played John Macmillan and Whaling Song. I played My Home Town. I played Women and a mangled bit of Sleat on the end of it. I played Magersfontein and Vittoria. Right at the end I tried Valery, but abandoned after three parts as tiredness and the effects two glasses of white wine on an almost empty stomach kicked in.

At one stage the fan, on mandolin, struck up Braemar. I knew he was trying to tempt me, and I gave him a straight refusal. Play it often over endless months as I will it just won't come up to session standard. He rolled into Somme. I said no: it's not a tune I play. And then he came to Dargai, and I felt I couldn't let him get away with playing one of *my* tunes. I waited until he moved on to the B part, feeling that to be safest, but was thrown when he looked at me and said "B". He meant B part, but for one confused moment I thought he was warning me off joining in on the grounds that he was playing in the key of B. I managed to fling myself into the tune as the B part repeat came round, and at the end of his third playing he insisted on one more. It was only afterwards that I realised this was a first: joining in with others, mid-tune, in a session.

By 9pm we were all in and crawled off home, leaving the Irish piper playing to himself in a now empty pub. He noted, before we left, how my repertoire is expanding. It's getting better, I guess.

Good company

I was playing this evening, for the first time in days. I played Return to India because I've been humming it a lot, Dargai, Bee, Flett, John Macmillan. 

As I played I thought of of how there are some friends we see very rarely, then we meet, and after they have gone we say "what lovely people! What good company they are! I can't believe they've really been here for five hours, is it really almost 1am? We should see them more often!" Somehow, though, what with one thing and another, you know it will be a year or 18 months or more before you finally get round to meeting again.

Hope it's not like that with the monkey, because that is how I was thinking as I was playing: how enjoyable it was, how I should do it more often.

Stock take

I've managed a little piping this evening while the fan has been out. I don't seem to be finding time for it. The worrying thing is that I have no idea what I am doing with my time. The socks I am knitting are taking forever, I seem to have abandoned the jumper I'm working on, and haven't even ordered yarn for a baby shawl, so it's not that. The weather in the evenings is poor so I've not got to the allotment. My mail box is full of mail that I really do mean to get around to replying to...sometime. I seem to have been reading the same novel for the last month. I'm having trouble switching from the Indy to the Grauniad crossword and am giving up in disgust after the first 20 minutes or so. I can't even blame Pinterest as I have weaned myself off it.

I also have a pile of tunes going nowhere fast. I've cleared off my music stand and this is what I have.

1. Tunes that I actually know and I just need to get round to filing the music.
That'll be Heroes of St Valery. I had thought that this or Heroes of Vittoria might make a pair with Magersfontein or maybe Dargai, but they seem to prefer to be a twosome themselves.

2. Tunes that need work
The Hills of Perth. It's all there, just the 3rd and 4th parts keep getting transposed.

3. Tunes that are just ... meh
These are tune that I've played, and played, and probably have (mostly) by heart, and that I love listening to and that I wanted to learn and sometimes hum, but somehow never fancy playing now, so they don't get played and haven't bedded in and will join that long list of tunes that I can in theory play but never actually do.
Arthur Bignold of Lochrosque
John MacColl's Farewell to Argyll Squadron, Scottish Horse
Kilbowie Cottage
Farewell to the Creeks
The Hag at the Churn
And probably Braemar Gathering belongs on this list too

4. Meh tunes that I haven't quite given up on...yet
The Radical Road
Leaving Barra
The Return from India
The Rejected Suitor

5. Tunes I have printed out in a fit of optimism but not looked at
The Birken Tree
Jeannie Carruthers
The Pap of Glencoe
Leaving Glen Urquhart
Major David Manson
Mrs Macdougall
The Banjo Breakdown
The Pipe on the Hob

6. Tunes the presence of which I cannot explain
Well, the likeliest explanation is that the fan printed these for himself.
The Mist Covered Mountains
Janine's
The Easy Club

I maybe need some new tunes. I certainly need to embed my most recent tunes (Heroes of Vittoria and St Valery, Sound of Sleat, Women of the Glen). I need to play more.