Good thing I have a large heated shop to practice in.  I have 12' ceilings in my shop so playing the pipes there isn't so bad, it is still pretty loud though.

About 20" of snow has fallen on the islands this weekend, it is expected to get to the low 20's tonight and the chance for more snow this week is high.

If it continues to be really bad I may not get to my instructors this Friday for my lesson, which will be a big bummer because I missed last Friday's lesson.  I don't like to miss a lot of lessons in a row, in fact I don't like to miss any lessons!

My instructor was over last Sunday (the week before) for the Battlefield Band concert, we both needed to practice so she used my pipes.  The reed was a little sharp and to easy for her tastes so we put in a new reed for her to play, it sounded really good but this batch of Ross reeds I have are medium to hard in strength.

The following Monday I picked up my pipes to play and I thought I had really lost a lot of my stamina, I was pooped after about 10 minutes of practice.  I then realized we left the brand new reed in, so I popped my old reed in to finish off my practice time, but I was really wiped out regardless.

I now play the new reed for about 5 minutes then put my old "easy" reed back in, it won't be long before the new reed is playing similar to my current reed.  (it sounds a lot better but jeeze!).

Even though my shop is heated I keep my pipes in the house.  I am concerned that the lower temp in the shop (when I don't have the big heaters on) would damage my pipes, at the very least it would take a while for them to warm up.  I do have a nice spot though, fine rug on the floor, music stand and stool for practice chanter sessions.

Well, enough writing about it, time to get out there and start practicing!

Once a year we are fortunate to have the Battlefield Band come to our small town and put on a lively show.  This year was no exception!

Sean O'Donnell is a great addition to the group, his guitar, vocals and great humour are a delight.  Alasdair White played some tunes from his solo album "an Clar Geal" and as usual his playing was animated and entertaining.  The group played their latest album's title tune, "the Road of Tears" and Alan Reid's amazing vocals really give such depth and life to the soul of the tunes. As expected Mike Katz was on fire. The last tune of the first set his pipes were a little sharp but after the intermission they were locked right on and sounded so sweet.

At the end of the show I asked Mike Katz what he was playing (Helen guessed Hendersons) and he responded, "Henderson drones and a Sinclair chanter".

He commented on the altitude change from their last show, Arizona high and dry and was glad to be on an island and surrounded by "wet" and it was taking some time for the pipes to get acclimated.

I offered that he could just stay for a wee bit longer, say a week or two and he just laughed.

Helen got an autographed show poster from all the band members, it was really cool.  I had their new CD autographed and I picked up Alasdair's new CD and got that autographed as well.  It was a very memorable night.

Here are pictures from last nights show.. sorry for the blur on some of them, I wasn't using a flash.

http://www.hannahelizabethgreene.com/BattlefieldBand

OK, today my instructor and I sorted out what tunes I'm going to play for the 2007 competitive year.  This is just the WPA mini-gatherings held in Redmond WA, I don't think I'll be competing in any other events, at least that is the plan for now.

For my slow-air I'm going to play "Highland Cathedral", for my 2/4 March its "The 79th's Farewell to Gibraltar", 4/4 is "Lord Lovat's Lament" and the 6/8 will be "Leaving Port Askaig"

I like the melody and rhythm of all of these tunes, they are fairly basic tunes with exception to the 79th's Farewell, which I'm still grappling with the dot cut notation.

I definitely have my work cut out for me!  I really need to get my practice routine sorted out and get focused.  When I practise consistently I make great progress (what a concept eh?) but if I miss a few days it really shows in my fingering and in the case of playing the big pipes, stamina suffers when I don't play regularly.

I just returned from a trip to LA California last week.  The weather was great, a nice break from the constant rain we have been having up here but in reality I don't mind the rain nearly as much as I mind the traffic down there.

I didn't want to miss out on any practise time and I wasn't about to bring along my nice blackwood chanter, or even my poly one either.  I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to utilize my Fagerstrom Electronic Chanter.

We observed all of the TSA rules, no liquids over 3 oz, all in clear resealable plastic baggies, removed the laptop from the case, took our shoes off, PDA, Cell Phones etc...

Even our 2 year old daughter got in the spirit, although removing the jacket was a little traumatic and her outburst did elicit some "tsk tsk's" from other travellers waiting for their turn through the metal detectors.  I think that Hannah's impassioned "no, no, no... whaaa" got us the express treatment at the x-ray machine.

The return trip was a little different though LAX... 

TSA X-Ray Person:  "Sir, can you tell me what the long tube is?"...

Me: Uh, what?

TSA X-Ray Person: "its about 12" long and has wires in it"

Me: Umm, OH, that!

TSA X-Ray Person: "SIR, What IS IT?"

Me: "It is an electronic chanter"

TSA X-Ray Person: "a what?!"

Me: "I play the bag pipes, I use this to practise on when I'm travelling"

TSA X-Ray Person: "Oh", nods and the scanning proceeds.

We did have to dump out Hannah's water bottle and a 4oz lotion bottle as well. My wife asked if she could put some on her hands first but the TSA X-Ray person said she would have to leave the security area and re-enter.  Oh brother.

I did learn though that you should not leave your ear phones plugged into the chanter, even if it is off.  It will drain the batteries, and those little button batteries are not cheap. I did manage to get a little bit of practise time in.  It has been a while since I've used the fagerstrom chanter and I think I'll start using it more, probably at the office.

There are no bag pipes at Disneyland either, I looked.  However I did listen to some Pirate tunes that resembled Irish reels, the "Arrghs" gave them away though.

Today was a blustery day in the islands.  It was raining and blowing like crazy, the boat ride over to Lopez wasn't to bad, in fact it was quite mild and I was expecting it to be pretty rough.

I typically practice on the boat ride over, it takes about an hour and a half to get from Friday Harbor to Lopez, and about the same on the trip home.  Today I only practiced from Shaw to Lopez which is about 25 minutes.  I've been fighting off a cold the last couple of weeks and it really makes practicing a chore, the stuffy nose, sore throat and headaches are just amplified by trying to play a chanter, let alone the big pipes.

I did manage to get to play the pipes 3 times in the last week, which was good.  I try to play my pipes about every other day and my chanter every night except Fridays since I typically practice on the way over to Lopez, then my 1 hour lesson and on the way back.

Anyhoo, today I gave myself a break.  My instructor gave me this great little print out called "playing with control" by Bruce Gandy.  I really like the excerises in it and use them to warm up before I start practicing my tunes, so I just played this excerise for the 25 or 30 minutes before boat docked.

The tune I'm working on right now is called "The 79'ths Farewell to Gibraltar" it is a 4 parted 2/4 March and quite a challenge.  The dot cut music is new to me (well, its all pretty new) I'm making progress, albeit slowly but my practice schedule has been really sporatic the last few weeks.

Any how, I've managed to "memorize" some mistakes and now I need to fix them, I hate it when that happens but its just one of those things you have to deal with.

I don't know if this is a good thing or not. I have decided to join the Washington Pipers Association  (WPA) and compete in 2007.  Mind you its only the chanter class but even so I think I may be in for a surprise, or extreme embarrassment, or both, or maybe it won't be so bad....

There are 5 WPA "mini events", typically the first Saturday of the month starting in January.  They are held at the Redmond United Methodist Church, in... yep you guessed it, Redmond WA.

I'm a rank beginner so I will be in "chanter" class for my first foray into the competition scene.  The requirements are pretty basic for this level, Slow Air's and Marches.  Last year it was "march" "slow air", "march", "slow air", "march" for the respective events. I think I can play the same tunes in each event but I'm not entirely sure.

Hopefully I'll have the 79ths Farewell to Gibraltar committed to memory and playing proficiently without mistakes by then.  For my Slow Air I have decided to play "Highland Cathedral" I like the way it sounds and it isn't too technically complex, I think Lord Lovats Lament is going to be my 4/4 march, I haven't decided on a 6/8 March yet but should get something sorted out soon so I can start looking at the music.

I figure better to play something simple well than play something difficult poorly, as it is I'm going to need all the confidence I can muster!

I only had one lesson in August. 

In fact my instructor went to Scotland for the 2006 Worlds Bagpipe Competitions in Glasgow Scotland.  Helen is a member of the Keith Highlanders Pipe Band in Seattle.  She played at the bridge of Allen the day or two before the Worlds but unfortunately didn't get to play in the world competitions on Saturday.

The Keith were in a 3 or 4 way tie for 3rd place in their grade (Grade 4) but ultimately ended up with a solid 4th place at the end of the day.

Before Helen left she loaded me up with several tunes, a slow air, strathspey and a retreat march.  None of which I ever got to working on as August was a busy month for me and my practice suffered greatly.  I think knowing I didn't have to see my instructor each Friday played a role as well, a little voice in the back of my head said, "there is always next week", it never seems to turn out very well if you listen to that voice.

The first Friday lesson after Helen returned from Scotland when something like this:

Helen: So, how did the practicing go?

Me: Um, well, um, you see it was like this and...

Helen: Sigh, I've been hearing that all week from my students!

Me: whew, so it wasn't just me eh?

Striking in. It looks easy and it probably is, but only after you have done it about a million times, no joke.

I'm at Helens for my regular Friday lesson.  We have been working on the chanter learning new embellishments and then spend time on the pipes.  I have been able to play Scots Wha Ha'e on the pipes and it is starting to come together nicely now.

Today were are working on striking in.  Helen is pretty particular about this, well she is pretty particular about all things piping, but I digress.. the goal is to strike the bag hard enough to bring all of the drones in at the same time but not so hard to make the chanter sound off.  Oh, and DON'T LET THE DRONES ROAR, I repeat, DON'T LET THE DRONES ROAR.  Did I say Helen was pretty particular about this?

So I'm blowing up the bag, striking it and I look at Helen, she is waving me off like a flight deck crew on an air craft carrier, hmmm, no good eh?  "bass drone is roaring, try again".  I blow up the bag, strike it harder, the chanter squeals I back off, the drone roars, more wild waving... "tenor roaring, try again", sigh, I blow up the bag, strike softer this time, this time I hear the bass drone roar I stop blowing, the drones let out a withering gasp like a deflated balloon, only worse sounding. Helen narrows her eyes and says, "don't do that, always cut off your bag cleanly".

Did I mention that Helen has really strong feelings about this sort of thing?

I take a break and Helen picks up my pipes to check them out, she strikes them in perfectly several times as I watch intently, paying close attention to where she is hitting the bag, how she is holding it hoping that I can do the same when she hands them back to me.

So now I have the pipes under my arm, I lift the bag up, blow, blow, squeeze the bag slightly to get sound from drones, back off strike and bingo! the drones lock in and I'm off!  But I forget to keep blowing and the drones start to falter, I blow harder to keep them going, the chanter sounds off, I back off to the stop the chanter, the drones start wavering, I blow harder the chanter is sounding!  I feel like I'm on a tight rope trying to keep my balance see-sawing back and forth.

I look up and see Helen red in the face bent over laughing. I totally lose it and start laughing as well, the bag deflates and the drones groan as the air leaves the bag.

We are done for the day, thank goodness!

Well I'm on the pipes now and it is a blast.  At first my instructor had me plug the drones and just play the chanter, and then plug the chanter and play the drones.  This is to help build stamina and allow a beginner to focus on particular aspects of playing the pipes.

There is a lot going on for sure, blow, squeeze, blow, fingers on chanter, play the music, timing, tempo and repeat...

By plugging the drones you don't consume as much air and can focus on playing the chanter and your blowing, its still a lot to handle but at least your not blue in the face as quickly.  By plugging the chanter you can focus on keeping your drones steady which is all about blowing and squeezing the bag.

So I'm out in the back field at my in-laws playing away, I have the drones corked and I'm playing the scales on the chanter, over and over.  After a while this gets a little boring so I pop the stopper out of the outside tenor drone and it kicks in and sounds great a few minutes after that I uncork the 2nd tenor drone and now it really starts to sound like a bag pipe.  I'm actually doing pretty good in the breathing dept and I haven't lost my lip seal yet so I uncork the bass drone and continue to play the scales for another few minutes.

I'm really stoked since this is a major mile stone for me, the first few times I played the pipes I couldn't go for more than a few minutes, here I was playing the scales will all 3 drones going for the last 30 minutes.  This was like the 5 time I had picked up the pipes since the Friday Helen and I set them up.

I head back up to the barn playing the scales and cut the drones out as I get to the house, the pipes are pretty wet inside so I pull the drones out of the stocks and air the bag out. My chanter reed looks pretty good and I put the reed protector on and stick it in my pipe bag.

Today was a very good day, maybe next time I will try to play Scots Wha Ha'e on the pipes.

Sooooo, I still haven't told Helen about my pipe purchase.  I've had the pipes for a couple of weeks now.  They are still in the case, I haven't tried to play them yet.  I do take them out and touch them though.

This Friday's practice is a little different, I'm actually spending the day at Helen's house building her a chicken coop, she's lusting for chickens and I'm happy to help a friend in need (of a chicken coop that is).  I get there around 7am and Helen looks out the door with one eye half open... I guess she isn't a morning person. 

I start unloading the truck, two chop saws, saw horses, skill saw, cordless drill, extension cords, air compressor, nail gun and it goes on and on... you never know what you might need when building a chicken coop ya know.

The day is going well, we have the floor, walls and roof up and the siding on.  Helen runs to town for food and beer and I continue with the roof sheathing.  The coop is nearly finished save for a door and plexiglass windows, which I will take home to my shop and build there... because I didn't bring my table saw! Oh well, its getting late and I still have a piping lesson before I head back to the ferry.  I pack all of the tools back in the truck and grab my pipe case and head for the house.

We sit down at the table to start the lesson. I'm grinning like a cheshire cat and Helen looks at me (probably thinks I had too many beers at lunch) and I blurt out. "I'm sorry but I bought my pipes already!"

"Well lets see them!" Helen says, not even batting an eye.  "Why didn't you tell me you had your pipes earlier! I could have been setting them up you knuckle head!" Whew! She wasn't mad.

So we set about taking off all the nasty yellow unwaxed hemp and re-hemping everything with sinue.  What a chore, but the deed has been done.  Helen trys them out for me, it takes a little adjusting, the bass drone reed didn't want to come in but after some fiddling it finally gets going.

We cork the drones and Helen hands them over to me and says, "here you try" and so I give it a go and what a hoot, I start puffing away and play low G and make it up to E and I'm out of breath.  But what a rush it was!

I try again and play the scale up and down very slowly, not bad for the first time.

Helen tells me now that I have my pipes I have to play them, FREQUENTLY. Oh boy.

UPS arrives with a box. Its not a very big box and I start to wonder if there has been some sort of horrible mistake.   I slowly open the box and find a very well packed bundle of bubble wrapped bagpipe parts.

Slowly I remove each wrapped piece one by one, until everything was in front of me on the table.  I look for instructions. There are none. Not to worry I think to myself,  I've watched the "Pipes Ready" and "Pipes Up" DVD's so many times I can do this in my sleep.

So I start to assembling the parts.  Fortunately my pipes had been setup and tested prior to being shipped to me so all I had to do was assemble the tenor and base drones in their stocks, and plug the blow stick and chanter in.

I laid the assembled pipes on the table a took a step back. Wow what a thing of beauty.  I then disassembled them and put them in the pipe case I had purchased a few weeks earlier.  The drone reeds and chanter reeds still in their shipping boxes.  I hadn't told my instructor yet that I had ordered the pipes, as far as she knows I'm still looking.  I did however get my 3rd tune committed to memory and I was due to play it for her on the chanter this coming friday.

How am I going to pull this one off, she knows how long it takes to get pipes, I need to come up with a story, yeah, a good story....

For now, the pipes will stay in the case.

I'm doing pretty good now, I have Scots Wha Ha'e memorized and playing with proper timing and tempo without mistakes.  I have my 2nd tune, "High Road to Gairloch" commited to memory and playing pretty cleanly as well.

I've been really good about practicing, at least 30 to 40 minutes a night and I generally take the weekends off, the work is paying off.  I've been making great progress and at this pace I'll have my 3rd tune behind me and I'll get Helen's blessing to order my pipes.

Now I'm not exactly the most patient person in the world and I have a tendancy to get ahead of myself some times, this certainly wasn't the exception.

I figure since "my" pipes will take about 3 monthes to be built and shipped from the time I order them I could probably risk it and order them before Helen gives me the thumbs up... I mean, I'm almost there, I have 2 tunes committed to memory now and I'm 3/4 the way through my third tune.  By the time I get that committed to memory my pipes will be nearly done, yeah, good plan....

So I'm at my favorite online bagpipe supply (I love the Internet, 24 hour shopping!). I must have done this a dozen times over the last few months but it goes something like this:

I find the pipes I want, McCallum AB4 Deluxe, I select the bag size (medium) the drone reeds (EzDrones), Ross Medium chanter reed, white cords, Bannatine bag with hide cover, black bag cover.... add it to the shopping cart. I'm now staring at the shopping cart, my mouse is hovering over the "purchase" button, should I do it, should I, well?  I close the browser and check my email, then surf the net then go back to the bagpipe supply website and repeat the above.  Silly stuff but it is fun.

Tonight is different though, I don't know if I slipped or my finger just went spastic but this time I clicked that "Purchase" button, what a rush, then panic, what is Helen going to say? I didn't wait!  Oh crap.

I'm lusting for a set of full pipes, but my instructor wants me to be at a certain stage before I commit to the expense of a set of pipes.  I have been shopping though and I know what I want when I'm given the go ahead.

Helen has given me a list of "stages" that I must accomplish, things like:

Playing tune in tempo and time on chanter

Playing tune from memory

Playing with another person without mistakes

The above must be accomplished with 3 tunes.

I'm a goal oriented person, so I like this and put a lot of energy and time into learning my tunes, fingering excerises and all that.  It is paying off and I have one tune committed and well on my way with the second.  I can see that new set of pipes in my future, yes I can even "hear them"....

So I'm having my usual Friday lesson and I've been doing really good. 

I had been practicing Scots Wha Hae for many weeks, every night for 30 to 45 minutes over and over and over. I was doing really good, I had the right tempo, the timing was right on (with my Metronome) I was sight reading the music.

I was looking forward to "dazzling my instructor" on Friday, I even wrote in an email, "prepare to be dazzled".  A word of advice, never say this to your instructor, it sets up all sorts of expectations and rarely turns out how you expect.

Any how, Helen says to me, can you play Scots Wha Hae?  I look at her with an air of great confidence and say "sure thing, check this out".   Just as I'm about to start to play she takes my sheet music and flips it over.

I stare at her and say, "uh, are you kidding?" (I'm thinking, what the ...!) she just looks at me and says, "you know more than you think, now play." GULP, ok, and I start to play the tune.

I was totaly blown away.  I had no idea my fingers had the memory of the music. I was on cloud nine.  That was a very memorable moment for me.

Apparently it is. However with a good instructor and years (ok maybe months) of practice you can actually get to the point where people stop running away or covering their ears when you strike up the pipes. 

I have always loved scottish and irish music, celtic, folk and anything with fiddle, tin whistle, pipes you name it.

What really got me fired up was seeing the Battle Field Band in Friday Harbor back around May or April of 2001.  Hearing Mike Katz play those pipes, the band playing their music the joking and stories really got my blood pumping, I decided right then and there I was going to learn to play the pipes!

That week I purchased a practice chanter and the green tutor book from the Colledge of Piping (COP Tutor 1) on line.  I waited about a week and my little package arrived from UPS, I was so excited!  I took the chanter out of its packing read enough of the instructions to get the reed inserted in the chanter and then put it up to my mouth to make beautiful music.....

Well, something must have been wrong with my chanter because this one only squealed and squawked.  Hmmm, I thought picking up the instructions again, maybe I missed something.  Nope, reed is in right, all fingers on the the holes, blow... squeal, squawk... now I'm seeing light and dark spots in front of my face.  I stop blowing. 

Hmm, lets take a look at this tutor book and CD.  I pop the CD in the player and a fellow with a dandy scottish accent starts off with the lessons, as the scotsman drones on (no pun intended) in the background I open the tutor book and start looking at the pictures and music.

I pick up the chanter and try again, voila, music!  Well, OK a low G and it even sounds like the fella on the CD. I try the next note, Low A. Hey, I'm getting the hang of this, B, then C, then D and then E, I'm on a roll, F then G and high A and whew, I'm out of breath and my heart is pounding.

I put the chanter away in the night stand and say to myself, "I will start again tomorrow and before long I will be a guest piper next time the Batties come to town!"

4 years later I'm reading the Islands Weekly, the local Lopez newspaper.  There is an article about a piper and her new band.  I read on with great interest because I knew I had a chanter somewhere in the house but I hadn't seen it in many years.  I have been to several Battle Field Band performances since that first experience, needless to say I wasn't a guest piper, but I have a lot of their CDs!

Anyhoo, I'm reading this story about the lopez piper and her new pipe band and I think to myself... "Self, this is your lucky day" and I see she has an email address and I figure what the heck, I'll email her and see if she will take on a student.

Now mind you this was around Christmas time of 2005 and my wife was bugging me about what I wanted for Christmas. I'm hard to shop for because I pretty much already have a lot of stuff and anything I don't have I'll get eventually. My wife gets wind of what I'm up to and very sneaky like gets a hold of the piper lady on Lopez and tells her, "if my husband calls you about lessons blow him off, I want to buy him lessons for Christmas" and that was that, I got 6 lessons for Christmas.

So I start lessons with Helen Sanders on Lopez Island next week, I wonder if she has a scottish accent?