The long post below lists a lot of the folks I met at the Gathering but there were a few more I wanted to mention just to paint the picture of what a Piper’s Amsterdam is kind of was. There were a couple of whistle and flute makers with booths and instruments you could try out. I picked up a little D fife from Sweetheart Co and a brilliant inexpensive whistle from Jerry Freeman. Here in Asheville we have the amazing Abel Flute Co which truly makes the finest whistles I’ve ever laid ears on but for the player on a budget the Freemans are a great value. There was a Medieval bagpipe booth in addition to piper Goodacre in the name of T. Sonada which had some truly crazy instruments straight out of the pages of the Cantigas de Santa Maria.
Another very interesting person I had met once before but got to know more this year was the Wee Piper Michael MacHarg. He is a brilliant turner and makes pipe bags of every sort including Highland, Uilleann, and Scottish smallpipe bags. I’ve always admired his turning and his booth had a variety of chanters, recordings, baskets, and of course pipe bags of different styles and colors. His son Ian is the piper in an excellent group called Prydein and I heard Ian was going to compete in the Festival Interceltique de Lorient next year as a soloist and piper in Bagad Kemper. The last time an American went to this solo contest as far as I know was my first teacher Mike Cusack who won in 2000. ESPN should really cover this stuff.