I just had a fantastic weekend at the Pipers Gathering meeting with some amazingly talented pipers and wonderful people. I caught four of them here for a Tidy Cottage smallpipe reunion photo.
The folks at the Sunday session at Jack of the Wood Pub were nice enough to let me put their music on youtube. I play a lot of flute at the sessions but when there’s a new smallpipe about to leave the workshop I try to go out and play it in public as much as possible. These pipes are the ones in the last two posts made of mopane, key of A. The fiddle player in the video is named Beanie, that’s Vincent on the bouzouki, and Quinto on the Uilleann pipes. There’s another bouzouki player off to the side but I don’t know his name, and a bodrhan player named Kila just out of the frame. Beanie and Vincent have a band called “The Red Wellies” that put out a great CD a couple of years ago and they play in the area from time to time. Usually there’s a fantastic guitar player named Sean (on his honeymoon) and an lovely adept tenor banjo player named Jeanne. Maybe they’ll be in town next time. Thanks everybody at the session including Leanne for taking this video! Next stop: Piper’s Gathering in Vermont.
Here’s the latest set before I go to the Piper’s Gathering next weekend. They’re made of mopane with blackwood mounts.
Again, the set below being played before sending them out to Colorado. The A chanter this time and a tune I wrote back in May the day after a very beautiful wedding in Big Spring Tx. The wedding party and I were staying in this luxurious cabin with a view of miles of beautiful Texas. Everyone left that morning and I was all alone to write tunes in the cabin. It’s called “Awakening Big Spring”.
Just before sending the set below I went to the Asheville session and heard these two tunes played by the Uilleann piper. They make nice D chanter tunes for the SSP’s.
I try to do a lot of playing on every set of smallpipes and tonight this tune was coming off the fingers so I turned off all the lights and hit record. It’s one of the tunes for the Winter Storm contest in Kansas City in January.
