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!)

Slow, slow

It's a slow old time of year, Twixtmas, but we're enjoying being lazy, the fan and I, pottering about, doing a bit of this and a bit of that and not very much of anything at all.

We did manage to get to a session. I played four times. I got half way through the first tune (Dargai) when I realised that I had forgotten about stage fright, and didn't actually have any. That didn't stop me from making a pig's ear of Loch Bee, just like last time. I lost the plot during the King, but managed Margersfontein and Flett together, and then Bonnie Galloway, because I couldn't remember how to start the Rowan Tree.

The session leader made a mock presentation to me as "most improved player." I should feel pleased about this, but I've never been one to take compliments well, and feel both that I ought to be most improved, since I started from the lowest point, and also that I need to improve a great deal more. Still, knowing there is more of a journey to go doesn't cancel out the miles travelled already...

At the end of the evening a Northumbrian piper asked if I'd like a closer look at his pipes...and I ended up strapping then on and giving them a go. They are teeny, tiny, with bellows that, like Duckface, weigh next to nothing, the chanter is full of strange lumps and angles and bristles with keys. Would I be tempted, asks the fan? But I haven't even learned to play the pipes I have yet...

I've got some new CDs - two Tannahill Weavers, which I wanted for Iain MacInnes' contribution, and Piob is Fidheall, of which more later, probably.

Close, but no cigar

Yesterday I was persuaded by the fan to accompany him to one of his favourite sessions, at the Nightingale. It's a bit of a way to go for a spot of music, but the music is very good, the natives are friendly and welcoming and the Guinness is decent. An all round very nice pub.

I played Tree, Galloway and Whaling, but was beset again by stage fright, making my hands shake, which means I miss, garble or mangle notes. Still, I managed to keep going to the end each time. I tried thinking about how nice everyone in the pub was, I tried thinking about the tunes, I tried thinking about my breathing, I tried listening intently to my pipes. This is a bad move: stage fright seems to affect my hearing and the drones sounded odd and the chanter reed squeaky, and I know they weren't because the fan would have said. The more I listened the more I heard wobbles caused by shaking hands, which made me feel worse.

I tried looking at the fan and I also tried some staring into the middle distance and closing my eyes in a Kathryn Tickell sort of way. I drank more Guinness. That seemed to help a bit. I'd like to say it got better with each tune, but it doesn't, because knowing I've got stage fright makes me nervous that I'll really make a hash of things.

I was assured that no-one but me spotted that I was a nervous wreck. Considering I can do public speaking without batting an eyelid - I've spoken off the cuff to a conference in the past - it's irritating, to say the least, to get so nervous about playing a few tunes with a few folk. Am hoping I'll grow out of it.

The Kathryn Tickell-ishness must have showed, as I was asked on the way out if I was playing "those Northumbrian small pipes".  Well, they're certainly small pipes...