A Competition Strathspey: “The Blue Heron” (Score & Sound File)
March 16, 2008 on 4:30 pm by mike | In Music, Tips, Solo Piping, Score & Sound File | No CommentsThis tune comes from my third collection of tunes, “Old & New Tunes” (1995). The Blue Heron is a competition-style strathspey. Continue reading A Competition Strathspey: “The Blue Heron” (Score & Sound File)…
The Golden Rule of Good Practice
March 10, 2008 on 10:02 pm by mike | In Technique, Tips | 6 Comments“Practice what you can’t do”.
That’s it.
M.
A Gaelic Proverb
February 28, 2008 on 8:38 pm by mike | In Stories, Tips | 4 Comments When I was hard at it learning Scottish Gaelic I used to get right into the old proverbs - songs, too, thanks to my teacher, Isabel MacDonald. But, I have to say, I loved the proverbs and poems (especially Duncan Ban MacIntyre).
Continue reading A Gaelic Proverb…
Overcoming Real Challenges (John Wilson)
February 25, 2008 on 9:49 pm by mike | In Stories, Tips, Photographs, Solo Piping | 4 Comments One of my prized “piping possessions” is a signed copy of John Wilson’s autobiography, “A Professional Piper in Peace and War“: the front page, inscribed in broad strokes, “With all good wishes, Michael, from the author, John Wilson, 13th, January, 1979″. Sweet.
Continue reading Overcoming Real Challenges (John Wilson)…
Old Judging Tips Still Fresh
February 23, 2008 on 11:11 am by mike | In Tips, Solo Piping | 5 CommentsPipers are some of the most competitive-minded people on the planet. Gather a few pipers, throw a shoe box up for grabs (a functional, if not stylish, trophy), find a judge and, voila, you’ve got the makings of a grand solo piping event.
Italy Redux: Italian Pipes (& Fellini)
October 13, 2007 on 6:50 pm by mike | In Stories, Music, Video, Tips | No Comments I found my recent encounter with the pipes of Italy hugely interesting. Until recently the piping shepherd figure that I’d seen in a lot of Christmas nativity displays was about the beginning and end of my zampogna knowledge.
Continue reading Italy Redux: Italian Pipes (& Fellini)…
Technical Style
July 25, 2007 on 8:30 pm by mike | In Technique, Tips, Solo Piping | 1 Comment When it comes to technique there’s no one single, absolute and correct way to make things happen. By “things“, I mean the effective movement of fingers. ”Technique”, simply stated, is the way we move our fingers to allow just the right amount of air to flow out of our melody-making chanter, the right amount of air to make gracenotes sound and appropriately place rhythmic flourishes (also known as embellishments). To me, that’s technique. Dead simple.
Continue reading Technical Style…
Tempo
June 24, 2007 on 7:17 pm by mike | In Music, Tips | 2 CommentsThe other morning I received a note from a 16 year old piper. He was looking for advice about a couple of bagpipe “issues” with his main challenge revolving around tempo. No matter how hard he tried his march playing was always “hurky jerky”. That’s a new phrase for me but I picked up straight away what he meant - I think.
Continue reading Tempo…
Building Medleys: 7 Principles
June 18, 2007 on 7:29 pm by mike | In Music, Tips, Pipe Bands | 2 Comments So before we begin this musical adventure - this virtual attempt at creating an interesting competitive selection of music - it might be a good idea to establish a few principles to help move us along.
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Pipe Bands: How to Breakthrough
June 5, 2007 on 8:17 pm by mike | In Tips, Pipe Bands | No Comments The original subject was “breakthrough to win”. I thought that a bit crass, knowing that in making music it’s all about the performance, right?
Continue reading Pipe Bands: How to Breakthrough…
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