Droning on

Here’s a tip for
indoor solo piping competition organizers: make sure that
temperature is the same throughout the venue. Take the time to
assess tuning rooms and the final stage. If there’s a difference in
heating or cooling, fix it. If it can’t be fixed, find a new
venue.

Here’s a tip for solo piping competitors: if you can’t get your
pipes in tune and settled after four minutes, just start anyway.
They won’t stay in tune, so your might as well just get it over
with and lessen the suffering of people watching your screwing at
the drones.

And if your drones are fine and you keep stalling before starting
you’re just putting out a huge flag that says you’re not really
prepared to play.

I would say that the biggest hindrance to solo piping being
appreciated by more people is the incessant and habitual tuning
that pipers must think is some sort of learned tradition. In an age
of moisture control systems and synthetic bags and reeds there’s
really no excuse.