Jori heaped a bunch of new tunes on me before the holidays.

Two marches and two Jigs!

Colin's Cattle is a nice little retreat march in 3/4 time and Mairi's Wedding is a simple 2/4 march.  I'll need to start working on my birl's though, ugh.  I've managed to skate by with birl-less tunes, but now I'm going to have to suck it up and jump in.

The Jigs are; Cutting Bracken, a very nice and lively 6/8 Jig, I really like the rhythm in this tune I can't wait to get going with it!  The other Jig is "The Glasgow City Police Pipers" another snappy tune and I'm looking forward to it as well.

I'm off to do 10,000 birls (it's a tricky operation!)

Have you ever seen the movie by Steve Martin called "The Jerk" ? If you have seen the movie then you may recall one of the early scenes with Steve sitting on the porch with his "family" and him trying to clap to the beat of the music they were making.  He was a total spaz and definitely had "no rhythm".

Some times I feel like that.  My instructor Jori assures me that EVERYONE has a built in rhythm and you just have to find it within yourself.  I sure hope so, because I'm more than just a bit spastic when it comes to rhythm, it takes me a while to pick it up but once I do get it, it is fairly solid.

One of the techniques Jori has me doing now is to clap out the rhythm as I'm listening to the tune and reading the sheet music.  When I do that process over and over and then transition to the practice chanter I seem to get a grasp of the tune much quicker.

My hope is that over time that my internal rhythm machine will be more natural and automatic than it is now, I'm pretty confident that it will, as long as I keep working at it.

I really love the quick tempo of Jigs, Reels and Hornpipes!

I have been working on a Jig called "Corkhill"  it is a pretty common first or beginner Jig.  Nothing too complicated about it, the usual GDE runs and quick tempo.  Like all tunes you have to start slow and work your speed up.  All to often a beginner piper will try to rush things and play too fast and with Jigs (reels and hornpipes too) there seems to be a natural tendency to want to speed things up, when this happens the execution and fingering really suffers.

To improve my Jig and Hornpipe playing I have been doing a lot of GDE exercises and really focusing on keeping a tight rhythm and even tempo on the GDE gracenotes and melody notes.

When you least expect it...

I had a quick lesson at Jori's house on Wednesday the 10th.  It was short because a Metro bus broke down in the commuter lane and had traffic backed up for MILES!  Argh, I really dislike traffic, and I missed 30 precious minutes of my lesson.  I still got a lot out of it and Jori helped me get my pipes tuned up again.

I was on the road to have an in-person lesson was because I was also stopping over on Camano Island to visit with Diana Dunsire regarding the Bob Dunsire Bagpipe Forums .  In April I assisted in the transfer of the forums from their old leased server on the East coast to a new server in Rock Island's data center.  After getting the forum software transferred over we then upgraded the forum software to the latest version.

Sadly Diana's late husband Bob had passed away on November 6th 2006.  Bob had been battling Cancer for a some time and it was apparently very aggressive.  I never met Bob personally but had been a member of his forums since April of 2001, about 4 months after he started them up, about the same time I purchased my first practice chanter!

Long story short, in April I moved the forums to a new server, in June I was made a moderator of the forums and in late October the entire responsibility of the forums were handed over to me.  This is a great honor and a huge responsibility. The Bagpipe forum has over 11 thousand members and folks from all over the world participate in bagpipe, drumming, dance and highland music discussions.  The forums, and associated Bagpipe Web Directory are the largest and most well known on the Internet.

If your interested in learning more about Highland piping, Drumming and Dancing, not to mention the history and music behind it all, go check out the Forums.

My Kilt arrived today from Scotland!  It was fun to unpack it and finally get to see the Greene Tartan in person.  I am really pleased with the color and pattern and the fit is perfect!

My Kilt is an 8 yard 18oz heavy weight 100% wool kilt, that sucker is heavy!  I don't have any pictures yet but once I get more of my "kit" together I'll be sure to post some.  All I need now are my pipers hose (my sister is knitting those) my brogues (shoes) and a Prince Charlie jacket!

I have been keeping a practice journal the last couple of weeks, it really helps keep me focused on what I am doing and what I need to do next. Rather than write down what I'm "going to do" I write down what I actually did.   I can now look back and see what issues I was having with the pipes, or chanter and read the "mental notes" I used to make but would quickly forget because I didn't write it down!

I think it has made a big difference in respect to getting the most out of my very limited practice time.  I have been averaging about 45 to 60 minutes for each practice session.  Most of that time is on the chanter doing my fingering exercises from Jim McGillivray's excellent book "Rhythmic Fingerwork".  I have once again pulled out my Metronome and have been really working on my timing again, I was slacking off on the metronome and didn't realize that without it things were really starting to fall apart.

I had another Jori lesson on Tuesday.  But this time instead of jumping on the red eye boat at 6am and driving down to his teaching studio for my 11am lesson, I just sat at my kitchen counter and logged onto the Internet.  Yep, no waking up at the crack of dawn, waiting in line, on the ferry, dodging morning commuters on I-5, I didn't even have to put my pants on!

The way it works is you load up a free software called "Skype", configure your Web Cam and Microphone and at your scheduled time ring up your instructor!  I was skeptical at first but it really works, and works quite well.  Every so often I will make the trip down for an in person lesson to take care of things that you just can't do over the web, but for the most part video lessons are the way to go.

Just had my first lesson with Jori since he's been back from Scotland.  It felt great to get back into some sense of structure.  I'll be seeing him twice a month from here on out, but instead of in person we'll be doing lessons over the Internet.  This will save me a considerable amount of time since I won't have to leave the island to see him.  I'll probably set aside every 3rd or 4th lesson to meet with him in person but for now the Video chat thing will do the trick.

For this lesson we put the Kinnaird Bass reed back in my pipes and got it tweaked so it sounds really good, and the tenor's are also set too.  I suspected my top hand notes were a bit sharp with my current chanter reed and I was right, the High A and E were a bit sharp so Jori taped those notes to flatten them out.

I wasn't expecting to play the pipes on this lesson but the reed setup thing went pretty fast and before I knew it I was huffing and a puffin away, whew, what a work out!  With about 15 minutes left to my lesson we then moved on to the practice chanter and he had me go through the Jig I've been working on, nothing new there, just need to keep doing my exercises, esp GDE's (for Jigs and Reels).

One of the tasks I was given was to create a list of tunes, those I know, tunes I'm working on, and some I'd like to learn.  It should be a good mix of Airs, Marches, Strathspeys, Jigs, Reels and maybe even a hornpipe!  I have a list, its pretty long so I'm listening to those tunes over and over to whittle it down a bit to, say around 10 or 12 tunes.

I'm looking forward to getting structure back into my practicing and making some forward progress again.

Well, not exactly!  Cane reeds are said to be rich and full in sound but temperamental and require constant maintenance. 

Synthetic, or carbon fiber reeds are available for your drones, and I have EzDrone tenors and a Kinnaird Bass, which I just swapped out for my old inverted EzDrone Bass.  I switched back because I was having a bit of trouble with my tenor drones tuning high on the pins and since I didn't have a lot of time or experience to deal with that I went back to the EzDrone.

Chanter reeds however are always cane and I know with the cane chanter reed in my pipes I have been fiddling with them off and on since I started playing. I have gone through probably 3 or 4 reeds since I started on the pipes, and I just put a new reed in last week.  Each reed has different strengths and you have to either, poke, scrape or pinch them to get good sound from them.

I don't have a great deal of experience with chanter reeds but I have enough on hand to experiment, and quite likely ruin a few in the process, but that is how you learn right?   Good thing they are not terribly expensive (about $10 each) but when you have a good reed you hate to ruin it.

I have assembled a reed kit which consists of a, xacto knife, mandrel (for poking) some dental rubber bands.  That is pretty much all you need to pinch, scrape and poke a reed.  When I have time I'll post some pictures of a chanter reed and its various parts.

For the last 4 or 5 weeks I've been able to practice pretty regularly, and that has had a positive impact on the sound of my pipes, the more you play the better the pipes perform.  It has been fun to play all of the old tunes I know, and the new jigs I'm learning, although I'm playing the jigs very slowly right now, in time as my fingering improves I'll be able to bring them up to speed.

I went ahead and ordered my Kilt about a week or so ago.  The "Greene" tartan is a custom weave and will add about 6 weeks to the typical 12 to 14 weeks it takes to have a kilt made.

Good thing I'm in no great hurry for this kilt!  My sister is knitting me a pair of pipers hose, they should be really nice when finished.  My sister Jen is a very good knitter and I'm looking forward to wearing them.

Now all I need is a pair of brogues (shoes) a short sleeve oxford shirt, and a Prince Charlie jacket and I'll be ready for 2008 or 2009 piping competitions, or I could just prance around my yard in my man skirt, er, Kilt.

The kilt I'm having made is 16oz pure wool, a full 8 yards of it.  It will be woven and tailored in Scotland.  With a little luck I may have it by the end of the year!  It will cost roughly 316 pounds sterling, which is  roughly $650 US.  Yowzers!

I finally got around to putting in my new Kinnaird Bass drone reed last week.  It is much different than my inverted EzDrone, lower pitched and a bit more of a growl to it.  I still have some adjusting to do but for now it is working pretty good.  The carbon fiber reed has a few adjustments you can make, such as raising or lowering the reed in the seat, moving the bridle on the tongue, and a "pitch" screw in the "nose" of the reed.  So far I have only adjusted the bridle ring and it has made an improvement, but I know there is more I need to do.

Its good to get back on the pipes again after such a long time off.  I continue to work on my current tunes, keeping them fresh in my mind and focusing on my fingering technique.  I think the time off has given me a different perspective on things, even though I would have preferred to not have gone so long without getting a little bit of practice in here and there.  Oh well, you take what you can get right?

I just started working on a new Jig called "Cork Hill" I like this tune and it is a good beginner Jig.  Lots of GDE grace notes and a good rolling rhythm, it will be great to get the notes and fingering worked out so I can start to bring it up to speed.  Right now I'm at about 40bpm and in reality it should probably be played at 80 or 100 bpm.

I'm on my own until September it seems, Jori is busy with SFU getting ready for the worlds in Scotland and won't be giving any lessons until early September.  So I will just have to make due until then.  My Lopez instructor is only available on Thursdays and that isn't working out too well for me right now, but I'm hoping I'll be able to get back over there soon.

A friend on the Island is interested in learning to play the pipes.  He and his family have been going to the local Highland games to listen to the pipers and bands.  I lent him my poly chanter and College of Piping Tutor 1 book.  We are trying to hook up one of these weekends so I can show him the basics and then he'll need to get some lessons from a qualified instructor.  It will be great if he takes a run at it, I think it would be helpful to have someone local that is learning too, heck, it may motivate both of us to stay on top of the practice!

Well the wee lad has arrived to the Greene household! 

Friday the 22nd at 2:34pm, Aidan Patrick Greene was born.  He was 7lbs, 5oz's and 20.5" long!  He is a very apt eater and a pooping over achiever!  In just a week he has plumped up nicely and isn't nearly as wrinkly as when he first arrived.

Oh, right... this is a blog about Bagpiping... well fine, here you go then...

Tonight I got my pipes out and set them up for the first time in probably 6 weeks!  How sad is that?  Oh well thats life I guess.  Tomorrow I'll actually play them... you don't want to rush back into these things you know!

In two weeks the Skagit Highland games will be on... woo hoo! 

Well, not really.  Jeeze, has it been over a month since I last posted?  Much has been going on since my last post. Practice time has been scarce but I did manage to pick up the chanter the other night while my daughter was taking her bath.  She doesn't hold her hands over her ears anymore so I guess that means I must be getting better.  Dispite my lack of practice.

My regular weekly instructor on Lopez went out and got her self a full time job so my Friday practice schedule has been put on hold.  My monthly Jori lesson was short circuited last monday the 11th because my wife and I flew over to the mainland thinking we were going to have the latest installment of the Greene family... false alarm.  We are headed over again this week for a check up since we are getting close, only 9 days to the official "due date"!

I went up to the Bellingham Highland games on June 2nd, that was a lot of fun.  I met some great pipers up there, Jack Lee (PM of SFU) was one, there were a number of others but I can't remember their names.  I took some video of the massing of the bands, the quality is OK for my first run at it.  I'll have another opportunity this July 14th at the Mt. Vernon games.

While at the B'Ham games I picked up a Kinnaird Carbon Fiber Bass reed.  Jori Chisholm, my monthly instructor in Seattle said they sounds great in McCallum pipes with EzDrone Tenors.  I thought what the heck, might as well give it a try.  I added another tune book to my collection, "Gordon Highlanders Vol 1".  Here is a picture of a Kinnaird Bass reed.

I'm hoping that soon I'll be able to get back down to Seattle to hook up with Jori for a much needed "Pipes Setup 101" lesson.  I have a handful of brand new Ross reeds, plus my spiffy new Kinnaird, and I really want to get the pipes sounding good since at the moment they just are not sounding too good (when I do pick them up) it has been a little discouraging to say the least.

I was happy to find that I had not completely forgotten how to play the handful of tunes that I did commit to memory.  After a few runs through I was able to play them a few times through without dropping phrases here and there.  Nothing like starting to play High Road to Garloch and finishing with Welcome home Prince Charles to Lochaber!

From getting to my monthly Jori lesson in Seattle!

It seemed the universe was conspiring against me on Tuesday.  First the 8:05 boat out of FH was running late due to the intensely thick fog, then traffic was backed up from 145th street exit near Shoreline because of a fatal car accident (which damaged the overhead sign over Northbound I5) if that wasn't bad enough, a crew was painting new left turn lane stripes at 145th and Aurora Ave!

I was 15 minutes late to my lesson. Being late is a major bummer because it cuts into my lesson time with Jori. Even so, I always get a lot out of my time with him and this day was no different.  We worked through the 2/4 march I have been working on and continued to fine tune the weak spots.

Clearly my lack of practice is really starting to show and I desperately need to get back to my regular exercises so I can clean up my doublings, d-throws and, well, just about everything!  I guess it isn't that bad, but its still obvious that some effort needs to be put forth.

I was able to get on the pipes and things were just not sounding very good, particularly with my Bass drone.  Jori suggested I consider an upgrade on my Bass drone reeds since the Ez-Drones I was using are known for their weak bass drone reeds.  I commented that I had an inverted bass reed that I purchased a while back.  So we went ahead and popped that baby in there and viola!  What a difference, easier strike in, better tone, all in all, a much better sound.

I'll still spring for a new Bass reed, probably a Kinaird, or maybe a Crozier?  I don't recall exactly what Jori suggested, I know Kinaird was one of them.

I did get some new tunes to work on, two jigs and a few marches, which of course means MORE PRACTICE!  Its a vicious circle, but I love it!

Not exactly!  Whew, things have just been nuts lately.  The office scene has been particularly intense the last month or so.  We have been very, very busy!  Which is a good thing I guess since it keeps a roof over our heads, food on the table and future bagpipe lessons a reality.

It hasn't done much for my practice routine though, in fact the only time I have been practicing is on the boat ride over to Lopez for my weekly Friday lesson.  Or the night before I head to Seattle to see Jori.  Needless to say, progress has been very slow and I feel really guilty!

The last two lessons I had on Lopez were good, spent most of the time working through the 2/4 march.  Got on the pipes for a few minutes at the end of the lesson and it was very apparent how out of shape I, and my pipes were.  This last Friday was certainly no exception, I just had to stop after 10 minutes, it was that frustrating.

I tried to get some practice time in the other day with my plastic chanter, something was wrong and when I pulled the top of the chanter my reed fell out in two pieces!  I tried to get it back together, no such luck.  It was a goner.

I now have a new reed in that chanter and another stashed away in the glove box, just in case!

Yesterday I had my once a month lesson with Jori Chisholm in Seattle.  This was my second lesson with Jori and we spent more time going over the tune I'm working on right now.  Jori uses a nifty technique where he will highlight repeating phrases within the tune.  By using different color highlighters you can quickly see the tune structure.

For instance, the Welcome home Prince Charles to Lochaber tune has 4 beginning phrases that are repeated and 1 ending phrase that is repeated across all 4 parts, and a mini phrase that is repeated at the end of the 1st and 3rd lines of the tune.

This way you can individually work on these phrases and then eventually link them up to form the complete tune.  This would be especially helpful for very complex tunes.

I really like this technique and I'm going to highlight all of the common phrases in the tunes I have learned (and continue to work on) , it is so simple to do and actually kind of fun!

Next lesson Jori is going to give me some new music to learn... I wonder what he'll come up with?

Nothing new and super exciting to report on the bagpiping front.  Due to colds, work and allergies I haven't been piping much, or even practicing on my chanter these days.  I did manage to get about 30 minutes in on Wednesday on the ferry ride over to Orcas, and another 30 minutes on the ferry ride over to Lopez for my weekly Friday lesson.

Even so, I didn't suck as bad as I thought I would.  Definitely didn't make huge strides forward in my progress but I didn't really go in reverse either! 

My doublings are getting crushed, and I'm doing a funny little G gracenote when I doing a B or D grace, so it is like a GD or GB grace, which is just not right.  Sigh, time to get out my McGillivray "Rhythmic Fingerwork" book and work those into submission.

I contacted Chris Apps about the reeds I purchased a couple weeks ago, they said no problem on returning them for stronger reeds, which is great since the reeds I got were way to easy.  No sense in trying to play a super easy reed just as it doesn't make sense to play a super hard reed, it just isn't worth it!

The good weather and longer days is great!  The flip side is that the tree pollen is just a killer on my allergies, ugh.  Once the trees are done, then I get to suffer through the grasses, and then what is next?  Maybe mold spores in the fall?  Bleah.

Monday I have my 2nd lesson with Jori Chisholm, I missed last week because I came down with my daughters cold.  I'll practice a bit on my doublings tonight, work on the new tune for about 30 minutes and then head down to Seattle Monday morning to hook up with Jori.

This Friday was the start of the BC Indoor Annual Gathering or the BC AG for short.

I did not have a lesson this Friday since my instructor Helen Sanders was competing at the BC indoor.  I don't know if she was competing solo or band, or maybe both.  Probably both.

It is probably just as well I didn't have a lesson today.  Work has been totally nuts.  I mentioned in my last post I think this is the busiest we have been in the last 13 years of operation.  Not only do we have several customer projects at varying stages of completion we are also transitioning to a new accounting system, POS (point of sale) system, and have at least half a dozen internal projects running at once.

When I get home from work I 'm just dead tired, and I think my head is going to explode!  Even so I know I have to get out the pipes and play for at least 10 to 15 minutes, and then do chanter work for another 30 minutes.  I need to get some musicians ear plugs, especially when I practice indoors, the pipes are about 103 to 110 decibels.  Very loud!  Even with 12' ceilings in my shop my ears are ringing when I'm done.

This weekend I need to get some good chanter time in, next Tuesday is my 2nd lesson with Jori Chisholm and I want to make the most of it.  Getting lessons from Jori is a pretty involved process, since he lives just north of Ballard it is an all day affair, but the results are very much worth the time and expense.

This Friday's lesson was focused on the chanter and working out the kinks in the new march I'm learning.  This new march is technically easier than say, Muir of Ord, and 79ths Farewell to Gibralter.  Those other two were a bit much for me at my stage of learning.  While the 79ths I could play from memory (most of it) the timing and dot cut was still a ways off from being correct.

This new march "Prince Charles Welcome to Lochaber" is a nice musical tune, fun to play and has just the right amount of difficulty right now.  It is another dot cut tune but the arrangement is such that it doesn't play mind tricks on you like 79ths did.  At this stage of the tune I have all of the fingering down pretty good, the embellishments are good, just need to work on the timing and tempo and clean up a few spots here and there.

The last couple of months at the office has been extremely busy, probably the busiest we have been in 13 years of operation and that has put a damper on my ability to practice when I get home, I'm just dead tired!  Even so, I still have to fit some practice time in here and there.  With the weather getting better (slightly) and the days getting longer I am now able to pipe outside, which is nice since I can march back and forth in the yard.

Next week I don't have a lesson on Friday, Helen will be at the BC indoor competition up at SFU in Vancouver.  I went last year and it was held in a small high school and was very chaotic, this year having it at the SFU should be much better.  I'm bummed that I won't be able to go.  Maybe next year!

This week I received a dozen new chanter reeds from Chris Apps of "Apps Reeds".  They came in a nifty little reed case which is pretty cool all by itself.

Any how I had read that other McCallum owners were very happy with their App's reeds and I was getting low on my current supply of Ross so I thought I would give them a try too.  I ordered a dozen medium strength reeds directly from Chris and it took about a week for them to arrive.

Helen and I popped one in my chanter and gave it a whirl, the first thing we noticed was that they were very easy, much easier than I was hoping for.  We poked the reed to open it up a bit and that helped but we ended up needing to tape the chanter G and F holes to deal with other issues.

Even so, I think I am going to return half of them and ask for some stronger reeds, these are way to easy and won't last long with me.  I don't like gut busters, but I don't like way easy reeds either.

I will play with the App's reeds for a bit to get used to them, I won't give up on my Ross reeds because they too sound pretty decent.  Time will tell.

... is something most people wouldn't normally attribute to piping, or specifically what you often do to a cane chanter reed.  Some would say that you shouldn't ever lick or pinch your reeds. There are, however good reasons to do so, more on that subject later.

Today was my first lesson with Jori Chisholm in Seattle.  I didn't really know what to expect and just went in with an open mind and figured I would just go with the flow.  The first half of my lesson was more of a "get acquainted" period, we chatted about our interests, why I wanted to learn to play the pipes, how he got into piping, why I drive a big blue dodge diesel truck... stuff like that.

After we got that out of the way Jori had a look at my pipes, overall I think he was pleased with them.  There were three things I wanted to address regarding my pipes during this visit.

1) My chanter reeds

2) My Posture when playing

3) My chanter position (related to posture)

The first thing Jori looked at was the reed I had in my chanter and the 2 extra I had in my reed box.  The two in the box were pretty hard, I think he ended up working on the one I already had in my chanter.

Jori scraped the sides of the reed with a razor knife to take some of the bulk off the lower section of the reed, he then took a dental rubber band and wrapped it around the bridle of the reed to ease it up a bit.  What I really appreciated during this process is that Jori explained each thing as he did it.  What the effects of doing this or that would have in relation to how the reed operated and sounded.  I really could relate to that level of information, it made other aspects of piping and pipe setup come into focus.

Then a quick "lick and pinch" and I put the chanter back in the pipes.  Oh, the lick and pinch thing?  OK, here's the deal.

When you play the pipes your warm breath creates moisture in the bag and warms up the reed and makes it vibrate better.  If you have a dry reed to start with and just start playing, the reed will absorb enough moisture in about 20 minutes to settle the reed and start sounding good.  By "licking" and "pinching" its like you had been playing for 20 minutes already, in other words why expend the energy in getting your reed to the point it is sounding good and settling in when you can start out that way from the beginning? 

Lick and Pinch... we are not talking about slobbering all over it and squeezing the beejezus out of it, just a dainty touch to the tongue and a ever so slight squeeze.

I blew up the pipes, struck in and played a low A and High A alternately while he adjusted my drones.  The difference was very apparent, much easier to blow and the tone was sooo much better.  I was very happy!

One unfortunate side effect of my trouble with reeds lately was I was blowing way to hard, WAY to hard!  Jori explained more fundamentals on blowing and gave me some suggestions on what to look for and how to work on steady blowing on the high A.  If I recall correctly, the goal is to find your optimum blowing pressure at high A and maintain that same pressure for all of the lower notes. 

The reason you pick high A is because you can hear the differences in blowing pressure at high A much easier than you can with any other note, and it takes more blowing pressure to sound high A than any of the other notes, AND you want your blowing to be CONSISTENT all of the time across all of the notes.

Jori had a manometer which he plugged into my outside tenor drone, 30" of pressure was my sweet spot.  Playing a tune and watching that meter, and having Jori adjust my drones was a lot to keep focused on but it was fun to try!  This is my Manometer, simple to make and very sensitive to pressure.

I could have never done all that with with my reed the way it was the night before, but I was able to play High Road to Gairloch at least twice through and a few High A and Low A transitions without too much effort.

With that out of the way we addressed my posture and it would appear my blowstick is a little to long. Fortunately I had purchased an adjustable blowstick a few months ago so I will try that and see what sort of effect that has on my chanter position and posture.

With the pipes taken care of we moved onto the chanter work. There wasn't much time left so it was a short session, probably 10 minutes at most.  Jori had me sight read through the "Muir of Ord", this is a tune that I just started on with Helen about two weeks ago but as luck would have it the only time I actually worked on the tune was with Helen during my lessons.  Needless to say I picked my way through the tune stopping at each note and embellishment, it was a little nerve wracking but I made it to the end of the tune.

Jori commented that my fingering technique is good and what would really help me is to get my sight reading up to speed since when I figured out what the embellishment that was to be played, I played it well.  That was a huge confidence boost to me so I was really happy to hear it.

I commented that I thought the 79Th's Farewell to Gibraltar was harder than the Muir of Ord and Jori said it was the other way around!  After discussing this with my instructor Helen I think we both (Helen and I) agree, a measurement of difficultly is more than just the notes and embellishments, it is the arrangements of those notes and embellishments and how they link up and are played that can make a simple looking tune, actually more challenging to play.

So my new "march" for March is "Prince Charles Welcome to Lochaber", it is a tune that would fit between 79Th's and Muir in terms of difficulty.

My next lesson with Jori is in 4 weeks.  Now I know what to expect and I'm sure things will get more challenging the next time around.  I recall the comment, "I like to pile things on", Hmmm, I think I better get busy practicing!

The thing about cane reeds is that they never last as long as you wish they would.  Just about the time you get them sounding good without turning red and then blue in the face, they give up on you.

Sure, you can poke, pinch, and manipulate them but that only buys you a little bit of time, in the end they die a horrible squawking, or squealing... death.  It is always a good idea to work with a new reed well before your trusty old one dies an untimely death.  By working a reed, or two in a little bit at a time, you won't have to blow your guts out working with a new, strong, and difficult to blow reed.

Sadly, I'm not one of those "look ahead pipers", although I do try to be proactive, I'm not nearly experienced enough to poke, pinch or manipulate a reed into even barely passable shape.

Today's lesson started out working on three new reeds I had in my reed box, my current reed was well on its way out (judging from the wincing Helen was doing, it was long gone, a while ago!).  Any how Helen worked on getting the three reeds into playing shape, they are gut busters but I'm a pretty strong blower so it will take a few days for me to work them in.

I did order up a bunch of App's reeds.  I had some good feedback from several other players with setups like mine and they were all very happy with the sound.  I'm looking forward to getting my new stash of reeds.  I have been using Ross reeds up to now and I have no complaints so far, all of my reeds from Ross have been very good and I will continue to use them.  Experimenting with different things in piping is a good thing, and reeds can have the most profound affect on the sound of a set of pipes.

We'll see what the Apps reeds sound like, I'm excited to get my hands on them.  Meanwhile I have three new reeds to work in.  Time to get out there and start huffing and puffing!

Oh, I just couldn't think of anything else to write about this week.  Nothing much to report, except for a new piece of tech hardware to add to my piping addiction!

I have been lamenting that I did not have a decent way to record my lessons or practices. With my up coming sessions with Jori Chisholm I felt getting a portable recording device was going to be even more important.

I did some research and asked around to see what other pipers were using and finally settled on the Marantz PMD660 Digital Recorder.  This is a really nice piece of hardware, professional grade and all digital, even has phantom 48vdc mic inputs so I picked up a pair of matched MXL 603 stereo mic's and some XLR patch cords.  I'm all set for on site and at home recording, I can get 48kbit MP3's in stereo, very high quality PCM files as well.

Today I brought it over to Lopez to record my lesson with Helen just to get used to how it operates.  It is very easy to use but will take a little fiddling to get the input levels figured out for chanter and pipe recording.

One handy, and humorous feature is 2x audible playback.  Makes you sound like Chip and Dale, and Helen is very funny sounding at 2x speed... "ok, enough torture for today, ahem".

Well you just have to hear it to get the full effect.  Speaking of hearing things, if I get anything decent enough to listen to I'll post some sound files.  You may be in for a long wait though.

Fearing the wrath of Helen on my weekly Friday lesson I played my pipes several times during the week and kept working on my old march for the up coming WPA competition on March 3rd.  I surely thought that my pipes, and instructor would be appreciative of my getting a few piping sessions in during the week.

Instead we worked on my old march "High Road to Gairloch" smoothed out some more of the bumps, focused on the doublings and D throws more, a fair amount of metronome work to help with giving the notes their proper time value.

The funny thing about Bagpipe music, and maybe this is true for other types of music, but you don't always play it like it is written!  These little "unwritten rules" are passed down from instructor to student and so on.  In time as you progress you put your own "feeling" or "expression" into the tunes you play, but the fundamental concepts are fairly constant.

Any how, I thought for sure I would be told to get out the big pipes and I was hoping my hard work all week would have paid off, but that wasn't to be.  Instead we started working on a new tune called "Muir of Ord" and I really like it!  Now I have two new tunes to work on, a Hornpipe called "Maggie's Pancakes" and a new 2/4 March called "Muir of Ord".

What fun!

The High Road To Gairloch!  That is my next competition tune.  I wasn't really planning on playing this particular tune in competition but the other march I have been working on (since September!) is still very rough.  In fact I put that march on the back burner for the last few months in order to focus on the slow air I played at the last competition. 

The High Road to Gairloch was the second tune I learned to play on the chanter, so I have 90% of the work done already.  What I am working on now is cleaning up the sloppy doublings and D throws, which this tune has an abundance of.  For the next two weeks I will focus on my C and B doublings, and even out my D throws, the rest of the tune is really simple.

Time to drag out the metronome!  I have a little love hate relationship with my metronome, but I know how important it is and when I use it a lot of the problems I seem to have with my tunes start sorting themselves out.

I'm still working on Maggie's Pancakes which is the Hornpipe Helen started me on last week.  Today at my lesson we didn't even touch the hornpipe, just High Road all the way.  I did get on the big pipes at the end of my chanter lesson, which was the first time in about 10 days or so.

It really sucks when I don't play the pipes regularly.  Helen doesn't like it one bit because it is very time consuming to get them to tune when they haven't been played in a while, in fact I don't even think we were able to get them tuned up properly because there just wasn't enough time.  Sorry Helen!

I will play this weekend though!  And hopefully I'll get to play a few days next week, or I'll be facing the wrath of Helen on Friday, shudder!

This bagpiping thing has really taken a hold of me and I'm just hanging on for the wild ride.  I am really enjoying the challenge and rewards of learning this very complex instrument.  It has been just over a year since I had my first lesson and in that time I have graduated from the chanter to pipes, competed once and have had about 50 lessons (once per week for the last year).

When you are really passionate about something and want to do well, you practice, get lessons, go to piping schools, listen to other pipers and if your lucky to be near a high caliber piper / instructor you jump at the chance to learn from them.

Fortunately here in the Northwest we have some of the best pipers in the world, one such piper is Jori Chisholm and he lives in Seattle.  Starting in March I will be taking one lesson a week with him, in addition to my weekly lessons with Helen.  Prior to getting started with Jori my intent is to list out my piping goals, get my practice routine established, and have clear objectives in place by the time I start working with Jori.

I'm really excited about this opportunity and can't wait until March for my first lesson.  It will be challenging no doubt, but I think it will be very worth while too.

When I first started learning to play the pipes I always wondered what a hornpipe was.  I thought it was a different instrument and that bummed me out because I liked the sound of the Hornpipe tunes.  I soon discovered that it isn't a different instrument, it is a type of tune.

Hornpipes are similar to Jigs and Reels, they have a very snappy sound and feel to them.  I love Jigs and Reels, in fact my goal is to be able to play Jigs and Reels at speed with precision and control, this may take me years but I don't care, that is my ultimate piping goal. There will be many Marches, Slow Airs, Retreats and Strathspeys to learn along the way.  At some point in my piping lifetime I will need to tackle a Piobaireachd  (pronounced 'PeaBrock") that is a completely different music style.

OK, back on topic.  Friday my instructor started me on a new Hornpipe called "Maggie's Pancakes", it's great!  As far as I know it is a good beginner hornpipe, relatively simple and the only slight variations in the latter half of each line.  It sounds really cool too!  So I'm stoked about getting to learn a hornpipe, I didn't think I would be learning anything like this for a while so I'm extra happy about that!

I must say, I'm surprised by what I read, pleasantly surprised that is.  To be honest I had no idea what I was going to see from the Judge.  I was way off in my self assessment of my performance however. 

It just goes to show you that what you are hearing and what others are hearing are two completely different things.  This is at least true for me and my current playing ability.  I suspect in time as my playing and control improve, so will my confidence and at that time I will be able to be a part of the music instead of just playing from muscle memory and rote memorization.

In the comments area Micah has some suggestions and that is what every performer hopes to receive from the judge, this is why some people complete, to get honest feedback on how to improve.

The comment on the slow gracenote-strike combinations is due to my deliberate "opening up" of those embellishments, since it would appear that there is no problem with the execution of them, only the speed at which they are played I will now start to close them up and bring them up to speed.

The crossing noises from the bottom to top hand notes is something that popped up late in the practice of this tune, I know where they are happening and will continue to work on cleaning them up.  The most common crossings come from D to E, and that is exactly where they were coming from in my performance.

So, without further delay, here is the "Adjudicator's Sheet"  the first of many.

...... has come and gone.  On Friday I had my regular lesson with my instructor on Lopez and we went over the tune several times, cleaning up problem areas and doing a few practice runs with Helen playing the part of "judge".  She even offered to wear her Glengarry to give the part a more "authentic" feeling, bleah.

I played the tune cleanly, with good tempo and timing and it sounded really good.  Had my breathing under control and I was feeling very confident.

I couldn't get to sleep that night, I wasn't thinking so much about the competition as I was about work.  We have been very busy at the office and I had all this stuff running through my head.  I was trying to turn my thoughts to the competition instead, visualizing my playing, how I would prepare myself, greet the judge, play the tune, the whole thing from beginning to the end.  Instead I tossed and turned, I didn't fall asleep until 1:30am!  The alarm woke me up at 4:45am and I was a zombie.

I should have visualized the weekend ferry schedule instead, or maybe the correct exit in Redmond, or that my reed may start to act up on me, or all of the other things that did happen to me instead of the flawless performance I had so grandly envisioned for myself earlier that morning, or was that late last night?  Still with me?  OK, here is a blow by blow (pun intended) account of my "performance".

Arrive at the church at 9:28am, plenty of time to check in and warm up, even though I did miss my exit and had to back track to the church.  I get to the registration table and see that I'm again at the top of the list, jeeze I pre-registered, why am I always at the top?  I ask the question and the person tells me that they play in reverse order.  Whew, I think, I'm last and that will give me a chance to size up my competition. 

Turns out that I didn't need to worry about sizing up my competition, the nice lady behind the desk did that for me with her comment, "Oh, I was expecting someone about this high" as she gestures with her hand about 3 feet off the ground, following that comment came "most of our chanter class is between 5 and 8 years old".  What could I say?  I responded, "I'm a late bloomer" and picked up my competition number and walked away, now questioning why I was here, had I made a horrible mistake?

Due to Winter School in Seabeck there were very few people at this event, not like last month.  In a way that made it better for me, I was nervous, even though I didn't feel it.  The extent of my nervousness would be very apparent later.

There are several "tuning" rooms for competitors to warm up in, the Grade 4 and 5 piping room had people in it so I found the tenor and side drummers room, none of those folks had arrived yet. While I didn't know it at this point there were no Grade 1 or 2 pipers so I could have used their room which was farther away from the Grade 5 piping room. 

I sat down in one of the wee little chairs (this was a Sunday school like place) so the chairs were about 18" off the ground, I sat down and started warming up.  So far so good, but then the pipers in the next room started tuning up, even with the door shut it was loud.  I started blowing harder, my reed shut off, I thought "crap, water" I take the reed out and blow it dry, stick it back in, play some more, shut off again.  Oh double crap, I squeeze the reed to open it up, stick it back in, now it is buzzing two tone, panic, take the reed out, pinch it and stick it back in, better but shutting off again.  I realize that I'm over blowing to compensate for the pipers next door, I back off and things get back to normal, sort of.  I look at my watch, 10 minutes to go, better get through this tune a few more times. I'm obviously nervous because I'm making some silly mistakes, ones I've not made before.  I stop, get out my music and look at it to refresh my memory, play through cleanly, put the music away and played it off from memory.  No problem, I'm good to go.

3 minutes to go, but I'm last to play in my class so I figure I have probably 10 minutes maybe more.  I walk out to the staging area.  The steward comes up to me to let me know they are ready for me. Say what?  What happened to the other 4 players?  They didn't show up. Rotten little kids... I think to myself, well OK here goes!

I came around the corner to sit in front of the judge to play.  I don't even dare look at the people sitting in the spectators section, I don't want to know who, how many, or what, just focus on the judge.  Who by the way is Micah Babinski, a young man probably still in his teens, or very early twenties.  A top notch piper, professional grade I think.  The event coordinator announces me by name, states the tune I will play and I think something about "brave soul" and "very first competition".  Micah smiles, nods and says, "when ever you are ready"  I take a breath and start playing.

Highland Cathedral is a three part tune, but the third part is actually the first part played again.  In other words, you play the first part, second part and end with the first part.  It is a very rhythmic and chromatic tune, it has a good sound and melody to it.  Very popular with pipers and non-pipers.

The first line of the first part was good, proper tempo, timing, no fingering mistakes, breath control is good.  I get to the end of the line and take my breath... it was... you know, like after you have been bawling for 15 minutes and you take a breath only to stutter when breathing in?  Yeah, that is EXACTLY what happened to me.  I was shocked, that really rattled my cage.

I start the 2nd line of the first part, I'm a little shook up but I try to stay focused, I missed a grace note at the end of the first measure, I think "crap, keep playing, don't rush" but my mind was way behind my fingers and they were moving at light speed, I was rushing.  I try to get it under control I finish the 2nd line of the first part.  Take my breath, it was just as bad as the first one, maybe worse.  I had to breath out and take a 2nd breath.

I start the 1st line of the 2nd part, good fingering, tempo a little fast, I'm rushing again, try to regain control but I'm at the end of the line before I know it.  I don't think I was even hearing the music at this point.  Just the loud voice in the back of my head "finish the damn thing and get the heck out of here you fool!", another stuttered breath and I launch into the 2nd line of the 2nd part, good fingering (as far as I can tell) probably rushing, but again, trying to keep it under control.  At the end of the 3rd measure of the 2nd line my only remaining brain cell mis-fired and instead of playing B after the A, B, C, G-Grace I kept playing an E.  I would stop, try again from the beginning of the 3rd measure, E again.  I pause, Micah very quietly hums "A, B, C, B", I start again and the lone brain cell kicks in and I land the B, then A, G-Grace note, and a 4 count A to the end!

I finish up with a repeat of the 1st part, clean, no fingering mistakes, probably rushed it but at this point it didn't matter, and I didn't care, I just wanted it to end.

The onlookers applaud, Micah extends his hand and I shake it, he says "good job" and I respond with a "thank you".

The lady who I remember from the my first visit to the event, I don't recall her name but she seems to be the one in charge came up to me and gave me some encouragement.  She said, that those two fingers (my top hand E and bottom hand B) share the same brain cell and it is an easy mistake to make.  I responded that presently all of my fingers were sharing the same brain cell.

I walk out to the hallway and take my chanter and music to the truck in the parking lot, I consider leaving right then but I thought I would go back in and listen to the other competitors.  I go back in the church and run into two pipers and friends of my instructor, they both play for the Keith Highlanders.  Graeme and Marie were very nice and remembered meeting my wife and I on the Fourth of July at Helen's house on Lopez.  I chat with Graeme who is competing in Grade 3, Marie is helping steward the event.  I don't know what grade she plays in, probably 3 or 4, she is pretty busy rounding up competitors.

A fellow comes down the hall and walks up to me and says "good job, it takes guts to do that, you sounded good" I say thank you and introduce myself.  We chat a bit and then he heads back in to watch his son compete.  I listen to a few pipers in Grade 5, but I realize what time it is and that I need to head home.

I walk over to the registration table, I figure that the judges comments on my sheet were in and I could see them.  The nice lady behind the desk says to encourage people to stay until the end of the event that they would not give the results out until the end.  I say no problem, and leave my address so they could mail them to me.  I explained I had to leave because I needed to drive about 100 miles north to catch my boat home.  The nice lady says I should stay and listen to the other pipers, but unfortunately there are no grade 1 or 2 pipers, but it didn't matter because, "they are all better players than you at this point".

Did I just hear what I thought I did?  Yeah, exactly, wow what  a confidence boost.  I don't remember what I said, something like "oh, yeah, thanks" I then left the building to head home.

It wasn't a total loss.  I learned a few things, none of which had to do with bag piping.  It was about getting up there and performing in front of total strangers.  It is a mental and physical thing, I'll probably go back, I will be better prepared.  I will practice my breathing control as well as my tempo, timing and fingering.  It will get better, it may not get easier, but I will get used to the stress, even though it isn't apparent leading up to the actual playing.

When I get the judges comment sheet back I will post it here.  If my self critique is anywhere close to Micah's I will pleased that I was able to recognise what I did wrong and that I'm aware of what is going on when I play.  Who knows, I may be pleasantly surprised by his comments, I tend to be very critcal of myself in any thing I do.

... Before my big debut at the next WPA Mini Event.  I think I'll do OK, but anything can happen at these things.  It will be my first ever competition and I'll probably be all nervous and rush the entire tune. Well, lets hope not! 

I have been working hard on the timing, the Evil Metronome mocks me with its unwavering Tock, tock, tock.  Although as I work with the metronome more I find it getting easier with each practice session.  This is typical though, whenever I get to the stage I need to do a lot of metronome work with a tune I'm working on I really hate the thing, but within a few days I get settled into the routine and it becomes my friend again. 

Todays lesson with my instructor was a good one, we did a lot of metronome work and I was able to play my pipes for about 10 minutes at the end of the lesson.  It had been weeks since I had the pipes going and it showed, both in my stamina and the sound of the pipes, they just felt and sounded dry.  I however was drooling and all wet.

This weekend I'm going to sweep out my car port and put some masking tape on the floor so I can march back and forth. I think it would be good to start getting a little marching practice in here and there so by the time I really have to do it I should be more comfortable with the process.

Regarding the upcoming competition, I just need to keep repeating to myself, go slow, give full value to each note, put some meat on those 8th note D's and sound the Low G on the D-Strike, give the tune lots of expression, DONT RUSH, and most of all... have fun!

If you have read any of the entries up to this one you will know that for Christmas my wife got me a sterling silver kilt pin to start my Highland attire collection going.

I have since added a spiffy little "hat" called a glengarry (did a guy named Glen, or was it Garry design it?) any how it is pretty cool and made of wool.  I just received it direct from Scotland.  I love getting things from Scotland, Royal mail envelopes and all!  Here is a picture of my new topper!

Now many jokes have been made about this next little item, and I'll just let your imagination run its course.  In case you are wondering, yes it is real rabbit and no, there are no pockets in a kilt!  The item in question is in fact called a Sporran, probably Gaelic for "purse" or "family jewel protector" or whatever....

And so there you have it, my hat and purse, to go with my kilt pin.  Now all I need is the hose, flashes, shirt, brogues, tie, sgian dubh (small knife) and oh yes, a kilt.

Today was my first piping lesson in almost 4 weeks!  Yargh!  Children, colds, weather, and an ever increasing work load conspired against my previous stellar practice schedule!

But over all I didn't suck as bad as I thought I would.  I guess it is like golf, sometimes you need to take a break to get better.  My memorization of the Highland Cathedral was a little rusty so I sight read the music today, minor issues to correct but overall not to bad for 3 weeks off.

The biggest effect, besides loss of playing stamina and good fingering technique is that the hemp in my chanter and pipes dry out and leak air or get all wobbly.

My goal, before I got the cold, (from my 2 year old no less) was to practice with the metronome while sight reading, then by memory and have the tune down stone cold for today and really dazzle my instructor! Hah, the best laid plans of mice and men, eh?

Two weeks to go till the next WPA mini event, I think I'll be OK if I can just stay well and keep practicing!