Uilleann Pipes
One of my vices
is playing, teaching and performing on the Uilleann (Irish) bagpipe. I have been at it since 1999, and serve as
the chief scribe and bottle washer for our regional piping club --
Capitol
Region Uilleann Dilettantes
(CRUD)
No dues, No
stupid by-laws – there is too much bureaucratic crap here in
We meet during
the afternoon of the third or fourth Sunday of each month at various locations
here in the greater Washington D.C. area.
Simply contact me for
directions to our next meeting:
Some sample
clips (.wma) of my piping
A Planxty
(450k) An Air
(490k) Gander in the Pratie Hole (360k)
I am available to teach
lessons on evenings and on weekends. One
of the most significant hurdles to learning the Irish pipes is finding a
serviceable instrument! To remedy that
sad state of affairs, I maintain several practice sets to loan to active students
until they are able to procure their own instrument (pictured at left).
‘Tis a joy to teach students
that practice diligently and are honing new skills. Trying to teach a student who fails to
practice regularly is an exercise in frustration for both of us. I hate
frittering away precious time, so I strictly enforce a sliding scale for piping
lessons:
|
$20/hour for students that have
practiced five or more days in the previous week |
$35/hour for students that have practiced
two to four days in the previous week |
$50/hour for students that will
only practice with the instructor |
There are two
other instructors and several accomplished pipers in the greater
What are lessons like?
After undergoing
the stern curriculum practiced by
I prefer to
teach aurally, but will willingly teach students to “read the dots” off the
written page if that is their desire. I
loan CD’s from my library to students and encourage them to actively listen to
a broad range of pipers and to identify tunes that they would like to
learn. I urge students to visit local
sessions or take advantage of summer camps and Tionols where they can learn at
the knees of world class pipers.
Buying a practice
set with a wooden chanter from a reputable maker costs $1,200-2,000 and the
expectant piper will need to wait 12 months to several years for his
instrument. I use the David Daye Penny
Chanter for my loaner sets and I have helped several beginning pipers build
their practice sets using the Penny Chanter.
This is a quick, cost effective way for the student to have a nice,
playable practice set for as little as $300 in 8-12 weeks. I have found the Penny chanters are well
behaved – better than about 2/3rds of the “real” wooden chanters I have
played.
If you have read
this far, then you must really be afflicted with by Uilleannis Morbus.1 To get started:
Basic background on
the Uilleann Pipes
Visit the Irish Piper's club, Na Píobairí Uilleann
Subscribe to the US journal
on Uilleann Piping, The Piper’s Review
Read the archives of a
Uilleann Pipe Discussion Group
Find a set of
pipes and get some basic instruction:
David Daye’s Penny Chanter - David and Beth sell chanters, sets,
kits, and components. I played for my
first two years on a Penny chanter and use them for the loaner practice sets
Seth Gallagher (East Coast Pipe Maker)
Bruce Childress (East Coast Pipe Maker)
You can learn an
awful lot by listening closely to other pipers. I collected piping recordings and identified
the pipers I wanted to emulate. Thee Amazing Slower-Downer software
is an invaluable tool which allows any piper to slow tunes down and adjust
their pitch so they can precisely replicate different piper’s ornamentation and
style.
____________________
CRUD making reeds and some
mischief at Mark Hillman’s old shop
1 Uilleannis Morbus; The peculiar affliction of wanting to play or learn about the Irish bagpipe to the exclusion of other normal activities, a specialized strain of OCD, see DSM-IV.
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