Basic in-sync

One of my favourite channels is PBS High Definition. When Joan Kroc, widow of McDonald’s (Big Macs, etc.) founder, Ray Kroc, died a few years back she left $225 million to PBS. They had the foresight to invest heavily in HD right away, and some of their programming is sensational.

There are a number of documentaries on obscure topics that have interested me. There’s a series called, The Pursuit of Excellence. There was one on ferrets and another on hairdressing (honest) that were excellent. I’m usually fascinated by “world championships” for anything off the beaten-path . . . like pipe bands.

A “Pursuit of Excellence” show that also got my attention was one on synchronized-swimming. It showed the nearly all-female participants (there was one poor male swimmer who was supremely talented but not allowed to compete due to rules preventing men from taking part in contests) being really obsessive about it. The documentary made me appreciate this unusual sport, its artistry and the desire and commitment that top-level participants have to it. Some families even move thousands of miles to be closer to the best synchronized-swimming clubs, like one in Santa Cruz, California, with this dictatorial director barking at the poor people on the team.

Sound familiar?

But what really caught my eye was synchro-swimming’s similarity with modern tenor-drumming. I mean, some of the moves are close, especially the ones where arms go up in a robotic fashion, and then the drummers suddenly go into that slow-motion thing. I wonder if the two camps ever compare techniques. If they don’t, they should, since tenor-drummers’ arms and sticks rise above the band, as if the other drummers and pipers were at water-level.

I’m sure those moves have names in both synchronized-swimming and tenor-drumming, and I apologize for not knowing the specifics of either. I completely respect both idioms, but when judging I’m only concerned with what the tenor-drummers play, not how they look. At other times I enjoy watching them and admire the diligence and commitment to excellence that they give to their craft.

There’s a famous Saturday Night Live sketch from the 1980s that parodies synchronized swimming. I’m sure that it rubbed the swimmers who commit their lives to the sport the wrong way, but it made me laugh.

And there were a few silly videos strung together by pipe band people that took the piss out of Scottish country dancing. It sort of missed the mark with some because Scottish country dance aficionados probably think what pipe band people do is daft, too. Of all people to ridicule an obscure art, piping and drumming zealots might want to be the last. Then again, screw ’em if they can’t laugh at themselves.

I’m hoping that PBS will do a “Pursuit of Excellence” documentary on pipe bands. Part of the reason why the BBC has decided to make TV shows out of the World’s must be because they discovered that the obsessive event is quirky and amusing to outsiders. I’m certain that there are many non-pipers and drummers who get a good laugh out of the whole thing.

My all-time favourite author, Vladimir Nabokov, once wrote something to the effect that the definition of truth is the pursuit of knowing all that can be known about one specific thing. While I can’t help but shake my head at the absurdity of synchronized swimming, of piping, of Scottish country dancing, of drumming, I have a lot of time for anyone who strives to understand completely and excel entirely at anything.

Sunday AM P-M

The Sunday morning pipe-majors are analyzing the results today, putting together their “what if?” scenarios, and trying to find non-performance reasons for why things happened as they did at yesterday’s World’s.

I have friends in just about every Grade 1 band that competed, and my only hope was that the best band would win, that the rest of the results would be fair, and that everyone would have a good time.

Some things come immediately to mind, though, so let’s discuss.

The rain: The World’s has enjoyed uncharacteristically good weather for most of the last decade. A steady dreich was bound to happen. Meanwhile, Toronto was partly cloudy and mid-20s. I’d have still rather been there.

The drumming results. SFU must be dazed and confused with the marks they received in drumming. The seventh and ninth they received from Jim Hutton and Harry Russell, respectively, effectively ended any hope of the band winning. In that light, finishing second overall was a massive achievement. Whether SFU’s corps deserved these marks or not, these judges must have been aware when they handed in their sheet that the band would not be able to recover. SFU’s won it four times, but they have been second an astonishing eight times, meaning they have been first or second a remarkable 12 times in 22 years. The cliché that second is the hardest prize is no more true than with SFU.

Mistakes. With the testing conditions, the error-quotient seemed to be high, with an unusual number of early chanters, squeals, trailing drones, and all-out blunders coming through. It seemed like judges may have been turning a deaf-ear to these, understanding the cold, wet circumstances, and concentrating on tone, content and unison. As a competitor, it is extremely difficult to keep the head and not let the appalling weather be an excuse for slack playing. Listening to the BBC Pipeline broadcast, it’s impressive to think these top bands are producing such quality under such duress. Since you rarely hear big clangers at the top of Grade 1 these days, the recordings should have a big weather disclaimer on them

Gridlock: I and many others thought that 2007 would be the year in which the “Big Three” stranglehold on the World’s might be broken. This is the ninth straight year that the same bands – FMM, SFU, and Shotts – have taken the first three prizes. Even the 78th Frasers’ overall drumming win, Strathclyde Police’s copping of several other majors, and Boghall’s top-three success earlier in 2007 couldn’t change this.

Pipeline: To Gary West and Iain MacInnes: awesome, awesome job as always pulling this show together in minutes. I’ve seen this crew in frenetic action at an otherwise almost-empty Queen Margaret Drive in Glasgow, and it has to be seen to be believed how tight getting this show to air in so short a time actually is. We are all indebted.

“International” judges, wherefore hath thou been forsaken? So much for the RSPBA’s 2005 move to bring more non-UK judges to their panel. A grand total of one non-UK judge (drumming adjudicator Greg Dinsdale in the Grade 1 Qualifier and Grade 2 Final) had a clipboard out of the 36 working at Glasgow Green. McGillivray, Eller, Worrall, Neigh, Troy and Russell were nowhere to be seen. Oh, wait, many of them will be on at Cowal, where few UK judges want to judge, and after all the “overseas bands” (as the RSPBA pejoratively calls them) have gone home.

Medley re-runs: Yes, the goal of competing is to win, but shouldn’t originality play a role in that? Several Grade 1 bands, including FMM and SFU, played essentially the same thing as last year. With repetition, a band runs the risk of becoming a parody of itself. But, then again, look at the MSR situation where some bands – not unlike many soloists – have been playing the same thing for a quarter-century.

Optics: For the first time in memory, there wasn’t a judge in the Grade 1 final who was a brother, a chanter-maker, a bagpipe- or drum-dealer. Of course, people can invent other connections, but the RSPBA is to be congratulated on this. But let’s not mention the Grade 1 Qualifier.

Those are a few of my thoughts, and I wasn’t even there. Others are welcomed to add theirs.

Butterflies

This will be a funny time for a lot of bands now staring the 2007 World Championships in the face. Reality will start to sink in, as bands realize that where they are right now in terms of tone and playing is as good as it will get before the contest.

I think a lot of members of UK bands still see the event as just another Major, but bigger and with more competition at the top. Many of them don’t seem to have the edginess that the “overseas” (how I dislike that pejorative) pipers and drummers possess. After all, it’s back to their own beds and families and pubs after the contest, and there’s security in that.

I remember 1988. The year before, the band I was with had won the World’s. For some bizarre reason, we stayed in a little village called Kinross, which seemed near Orkney we were so far off the beaten path to Glasgow. Isolated and bored, the band started to eat away at itself with way too much introspection and worry, and not enough distractions and fun.

The night before the big contest where the band was to defend its title, we all sat in this weird morose manner in a little wood-panelled room at the wee country hotel (that continually ran out of hot water and had to put five of the tallest pipers in an attic room with feet draped over the end of lumpy mattresses) dreading the next day. When morning came and the bus pulled out with windscreen wipers on full, someone had the bright idea of putting on a special mix tape of really sad Gaelic songs. We wouldn’t admit it then, but, in hindsight, we were doomed.

That said, when I was doing the World’s thing, there was usually this prevailing preposterous Pollyanna attitude that’s required of anyone on a team. Even if the band had about as much chance of actually winning the contest as the RSPBA has of actually responding to a pipes|drums inquiry, bandsmen – including me – would inevitably pick it to finish first when it came to making their first prediction in the annual pool.

I used to coordinate that pool, similar to the one currently going on the site, where each entry cost £1, and people could enter as often as they liked, and the winner took the entire pot, which could approach £200. People would start off with a “my band first” pick, and as the week went on, they’d start to sneak in their true predictions, once they realized the kind of money that was building up.

Most band-members’ ultimate objective is to win the blessed World’s. But, for those 15-odd bands that this year have nae chance, every one of their pipers and drummers will have different goals. Some will be devastated with a fifth-place; others will be ecstatic. Some may just want to get through the Qualifier. Some will aim to improve over last year. Others will simply want to play as well as they can personally and let the chips fall where they may. Many just want to have a good day out and get to the beer tent as quickly as possible.

A few years ago at a sweltering Piping Centre, Bob Shepherd and Alistair Aitken presented a seminar on the evolution of pipe bands as part of Piping Live! It was very interesting, with some outstanding archival recordings. I’ll never forget that, at one point, Shepherd – who of course is a prominent judge on the RSPBA panel – made the alarming comment: “Only three bands have a chance of winning tomorrow. That’s a fact.” He added that if someone quoted him, he would deny he made the statement.

Shepherd wasn’t judging the next day, but his saying such a thing showed a lot of courage, if not dubious tact. He was right, of course, and it showed up in the 2005 World’s results.

Passion can often cloud reality. This stuff means so much to us that we sometimes think that if we just believe in it strongly enough, it just might come true. Everyone has their reasons for doing what they do, and cheers to dreams becoming truth.

Maxville musings

Another Maxville’s in the books, and I thought a few recollections might be worth highlighting. These are the things that will stand out in my mind for a while to come:

Triumph Street: A number of people have asked me since the contest finished, “Are they a Grade 1 band?” My answer is a solidly waffling Maybe. TSPB is definitely a top-of-the-heap Grade 2 band, but I noted the lack of punch to their pipe section sound. It was well in tune, and the drones were very good, but it was one of the softer sounds in the MSR, the contest I heard. It begs the question of what comprises a good sound? I always look for an impressive presence. It’s not a “loud” contest, but there is a requirement for a band in Grade 1 to leave a strong tonal impression.

Ben McClamrock: This American piper easily won the Grade 1 Amateur March section that I judged. He played the seldom-submitted Peter MacLeod 2/4, “Willie MacLean,” and executed a flawless, swinging rendition of this great, difficult tune. Watch this name.

Lightning storm: On Friday morning a thunder-storm rolled across the Glengarry County sky, and when I saw fingers of lightning bolts coming near the games field, I decided that was enough. Considering the piobaireachd event I was judging was under one of the biggest trees around, I reluctantly decided to stop Lyle Davidson’s tune (still in the ground) to run for cover before we both become newspaper headlines. Fortunately, Lyle agreed it was the right thing to do, and he of course was allowed to start again after a half-hour delay, and he played impressively well.

Toronto Police: The 2006 North American Champions competed with the minimum eight pipers but produced an excellent sound and a thrilling, error-free medley with excellent unison and tight drones. One of the few top bands still to play Sinclair chanters, when these chanters are well-set with lively reeds they produce a sound that attracts me.

Peel Regional Police: Piping-wise, Peel’s medley was as good as I have heard from them in years. Another band that suffered personnel losses, it is definitely on the up-swing. Impressive unison. John Elliott is a master at pulling the maximum out of his pipers.

Cramped space: With the 78th Frasers competing with 30 or so pipers, I often had little choice but to be virtually in the middle of two pipers. There was little room between the crowd and the band. Being able to hear the overall effect of the pipe section, particularly when it was playing complex harmonies and counter-point, was difficult. If bands continue to get bigger, the solution will have to be to spread out the chalk contest circles and move the crowd back. But is that fair to listeners when relatively smaller bands come on? One thing I know, trying to assess a pipe section of eight and one of 30, while within the rules, was not easy.

Windsor Police: No one can blame this band for opting to miss Maxville to do a performance in Ohio to raise money to get to the World’s, but I couldn’t help but wonder how they might have done had they competed. It’s a shame that such choices need to be made, and that “overseas” bands have to go to such lengths to get to Glasgow. I hope they – not to mention SFU, Alberta, LA Scots, and the 78th Halifax – decide next year to try to make their mark at the North American Championships. And isn’t it about time a UK Grade 1 band made the trip?

I’m sure other thoughts will come to mind, but these are the facets of Maxville ’07 that leap up today. Here’s to a great 2008 event.

Favourite 401

Off to Maxville this afternoon for Friday and Saturday at the North American Championships, piping and drumming Mecca for many North Americans. Ontario, like many other parts of Canada, is having a heat-wave, and it’s 36 degrees and humid in Toronto today.

I’ve often joked about a Seumas MacNeill report about a summer school in Ontario that appeared in a Piping Times in the 1970s. Seumas described the motorway that cuts across most of Ontario as “John MacFadyen’s favourite 401 highway.” It’s funny because, to most people who live in Toronto, “the 401” is this clogged, stinking mess of a road that’s nobody’s favourite.

But thousands of pipers and drummers, including me, will be driving the 401, resisting stopping along the way at The Big Apple.

Provided there’s a decent signal, I should be able to connect from the field without much trouble, and plan, as usual, to post results as I get them.

Beautiful new railway bridge . . .

I was reading about “Scotland’s worst poet,” William Topaz McGonagall (not sure if he’s a relation of Joe), who a Scottish organization is trying to promote, saying that there should be a national day for him, along the lines of Robert Burns’ Day. This is brilliant tongue-in-cheek stuff.

A few years ago when I was still running the print magazine, I set out to try to figure out what the worst tunes of all time are. Of course, there are tens of thousands of horrible tunes written by pipers from hack to Silver Star-winner, but, like the poet above, I wanted to poll established pipers for their opinions of what the worst played tunes are – the ones that for some reason gained at least reasonable popularity.

A tune that came up a lot was a reel that slipped in to a Strathclyde Police medley in the 1990s called “A Pigeon Called Neil.” I think it was written by the band’s pipe-major at the time, which may explain why it ever actually got out. This tune is so shockingly bad that it’s guaranteed to raise a smile.

But the winner by a good margin was “Itchy Fingers,” which actually started as not a bad little reel, first played in 1984 by Polkemmet Colliery, a band I was in. The tune is so easy that every single band on earth was playing it the next year, and the sing-song pattern of the reel after a few seasons started to grate.

So by the late 1980s and through the ’90s, every time you turned around there was some dismal piper playing “Itchy Fingers” at 490 at about 50 BPM. Eardrums would bleed.

It’s interesting that some tunes that made that list a few years ago seem to be making a comeback of sorts. I’ve heard a few bands playing “Cullen Bay” and “J.K. Cairns” this summer and, you know, they don’t sound half bad. If it weren’t for the fact that Grade 1 bands pressure themselves to produce new medley content, I think our popular tunes would, like the fashion and pop music industries, run in 20-year cycles, where stuff that was cool two decades ago is popular again, simply because it’s all new to today’s 20-year-olds.

In 1990, the RSPBA’s 60th anniversary year, the association required bands to play through driving rain some dreadful 6/8 march (that must have been conjured by an RSPBA insider) in a Jubilee competition on the Sunday after the World’s. The tune hasn’t been played since. Bands then had to march out in a strict formation playing to “Scotland The Brave.” It was all very retro and actually quite funny. Competitors were having a hard time not laughing.

Along those lines, it would be great to hold a band contest where each band would have to reprise an entire medley from 20 or 30 or 40 years earlier.

Beautiful new pipe band medley . . .

Soul asylum

No competitor likes to play in the rain. Subjecting four reeds to the outside wet and playing through a slippery chanter and blowpipe are tests of one’s resolve and concentration. Snare drums with pools of rainwater on them can sound like soggy newspapers. Hard rain diminishes quality, and a band or soloist who is subjected to a cloudburst is really unlucky.

At the Antigonish Games this past Saturday – which by the way celebrated its 144th year, or a “gross” of games, as one person astutely pointed out – it bucketed rain for about four straight hours. All bands were subject to it, and a few bands really got the worst of the deluge. Lots of very long faces.

Competitors always come first, but it’s also no fun for the judges. Three or four hours of it can be soul-destroying, and I was reminded of a time going around the Inner-Hebrides, which comprise the isles of Muck, Eigg, Rhum and, the sublimest of all, Canna. Unless you own a helicopter, you take a small ship from Mallaig to get there. Only Canna has a pier where the ship can dock, so at the other three islands a small motorboat comes out to collect and drop off visitors, supplies and mail.

This one time we went to Canna for a week. It’s the last stop going out and first stop coming back, so you get to stop in at the other three isles. On the way, cheery hikers got off at Rhum, the largest and most treed of the four islands.

The air was warm, the wind was calm and the midges were out. But on Rhum they were like thick swarms of evil incarnate. After our week, we were on the boat back to Mallaig and, when the motorboat from Rhum came out to let passengers on to our ship, many of the same enthusiastic hikers who we saw going out were returning. They were shells of their original selves. They looked like they had just barely survived a tour of the Mekong Delta in 1968.

The deckhands were having a bit of a laugh at the dozen-odd English and German hikers, saying that they looked like “changed people,” knowing full well what the wrath of nature can do to the psyche.

And that’s what judging through that rain was like. The challenge of listening to three hours of bands through driving rain and concentrating on not only providing the right result, but keeping the score sheets from becoming mush and pencil-written comments from being incoherent, was maybe, I dare say, harder than competing through it.

There’s no good alternative to holding a larger pipe band contest outside. Unless it’s a concert stage, bands sound terrible and there’s nowhere to tune. If only there were a volume control on pipes and drums, but there isn’t so band events generally just carry on through the worst conditions Maw Nature can throw at them.

As I mentioned, there’s a small fortune to be made in a reduced-size Piobaireachd Society Collection, but if anyone can come up with a way to keep paper dry and a pen flowing through the rain, please share your technique.

A free open-ended subscription to pipes|drums awaits the person with the best solution!

Issue: no solo competition system in Scotland

The Comments system on pipes|drums works well, and sometimes really interesting threads on really serious issues occur.

There’s a good one branching from the Lochearnhead results story. Click here.

Because articles get pushed down automatically when newer stories are posted, I thought I’d give a heads-up to readers who might be interested in contributing their thoughts. I’d love to read opinions on this, I think, extremely important issue from more people.

Pio-bricks

Anyone who has traveled by air to judge piobaireachd at a competition looks forward to the contest, but dreads one thing: lugging the hulking collections of music to the event. I swear I’m going to be charged for excess baggage one of these days.

My Piobaireachd Society Collection (all 15 books of it), is littered with personal notes on the tunes I’ve been through. I like to have those notes with me, and using someone else’s book wouldn’t serve the competitors as well.

Joking with some pipers at the excellent Antigonish Games this past weekend, with my 20-pound satchel of music crushing my shoulder, I suggested two things:

A small fortune could be gained by someone who converts the entire mess to pdf format, so that tunes and notes could be accessed from one’s PDA or mobile phone. That’s great as long as it doesn’t rain, which it did on the Saturday like naebody’s business. A wet gizmo is a dead gizmo.

Or, what about the Piobaireachd Society publishing a “Greatest Hits” collection? Ditch the dozens of crap tunes that have never been played, much less set, and just produce a version – in A4, please – that people might actually submit. If some crackpot puts in something like “The Two-Faced Englishman,” well, they should just come with the music in hand.

And while they’re at it, they can get rid of or consolidate all that canntaireachd and all those officious notes.

Build a better Collection and the world’s piobaireachd players and judges will flock to your door!

Hello to Nova Scotia

I’ve been on vacation in remote Cape Breton this week with little access (or inclination to access) the net, so that’s why pipes|drums is relatively less active this week. I’m making a piping trip into a family vacation, which is something I’ve tried to do as much as possible (see Poll).

Have managed to post a few stories just to keep things current, but will be back to full strength next week. Hope you’re enjoying your summer!

Kinkydink

More jottings from Kincardine . . . a few years ago I wrote an editorial about the event, and how it integrates the town with the contest. It’s a great idea, pipers walking the side streets of the town, and people giving up their front lawns for the myriad (way too many, actually) solo piping and drumming contests.

I was stationed on the front lawn (garden) of a lovely brick Victorian home, and it seemed like the owners had made a great effort to have the grass cut and the plants tended to so that the conveyor-belt of competitors, the steward (the venerable Betty MacLeod), and I could appreciate all there is to appreciate about their place. What’s more, they and many of the townspeople left their doors open to kilted folk to – get this – use their bathroom / washroom / toilet if needed.

Between events I partook of the facilities in one historic-looking house that when I entered was like a Beatrix Potter museum, full of antiques, frilly lace and nick-knacks. Seemingly, no one was home, and they simply trusted people to respect their place.

And I’m told they have done this every year since the festival started, so every year it would appear that we lot have indeed respected the townspeople’s property. Next to Maxville, Kincardine may be the most popular contest on the Ontario circuit. To control quality, the games organizers limit the band entry to 25.

There is an overwhelming sense of community at the Kincardine games, and it really reminds me again that their formula is an inspiration for how to run a great piping and drumming contest: extend goodwill and good faith to competitors and they will return it. It also recalls how, like the many 100-year-old small Highland games in Scotland, less can be more.

Like a Polaroid picture

When I watch basketball and boxing, two particularly sweaty, skin-exposed sports that I have never really participated in, I’ve often thought about how slippery it all must be when fighters rub up against each other or a power-forward presses to the basket amid a bunch of giant players glossy with perspiration. I guess they just get used to it.

It’s something of a tradition for a pipe band ensemble judge to greet the pipe-major of a band when it comes to the starting line: some small-talk, a good luck and, of course, a handshake to start things off.

At least in North America, pipe band competitions can be held on very warm days. Combine summer heat with the pressure of competition and 20 pounds of heavy wool designed for Aberdeenshire dreich, and pipers and drummers tend to get a little sweaty. It often seems to pour out of their hands.

I remember once having to perform with a band at Mosspark Armoury on a 100 degree day. By the end of the first set I was sure that all that was left of me was a pool of goo, something like that great St. Louisan Margaret Hamilton in the “I’m melting! . . . Melting!” scene in The Wizard of Oz.

And so it was at Kincardine. One does not want to deviate from tradition or have bands think that one’s snubbing them, so every pipe-major as usual got a handshake. And, I must say, some of those hands were not a little warm and wet. The actual band contest was in the cool of the shade, so the judges were pretty comfortable and, um, dry.

I’m no germaphobe, but all of those wet-ones handshakes could not have been terribly sanitary. By the Grade 1 event my right hand must have been a virtual Petri dish of piping microbes, with each score sheet passing along millions of wee beasties from the 20-odd slippery-palms.

I mentioned the super-soaker-hands thing to one of the piping judges, who suggested that a jar of that alcohol hand-sanitizer might be a good idea. But what sort of message would that send out?

There’s a lot of talk these days about the handshake custom and how it can spread disease. Donald Trump reportedly avoids it altogether. And who knows what Michael Jackson, with his surgical-mask-wearing and all, does?

Maybe that ensemble judge handshake tradition should be changed. A slight bow? A wink? The snapping of fresh latex gloves? A faddish knocking of fists? A Japanese-esque exchange of business cards? A reciprocal tug of sporran tassels?

Your own backyard

I made the 45-minute drive up to Aurora last night to listen to the week-two instructors’ recital at the Ontario School of Piping, whose cast of teachers must be unrivalled in terms of competitive stature: Stuart Liddell, Jack Lee, Jim McGillivray, James MacHattie, Angus MacColl, Bruce Gandy . . .

I am always amazed that audiences at events like this aren’t packed to the rafters with young pipers. Maybe some people didn’t know about it but, with the Toronto area being the world’s second-largest centre of pipers in the world, you would think that the chance to hear Stuart, Jack and Jim for $10 would not be missed. Oh, well.

After an unexpected traffic delay, I arrived a little late, and heard only those three. Each was in brilliant form. What Stuart conjures from his hands is nothing short of awesome, especially his reel playing. His “Mason’s Apron” (which he described as “a tune that started as a two-parted reel and which is now a 10,000-part hornpipe”) always drops the jaw. He would disagree, but it certainly looks effortless.

With people travelling hundreds, even thousands, of miles and spending a good chunk of money to attend the school to gain from these great players, you would think more than a handful of locals would make the drive and spend the tenner for a night of genius.

. . . set about ye

According to our poll, almost 10 per cent of pipes|drums readers who expect to travel to or from Scotland this year are “reconsidering” their plans after the terrorist attack on Glasgow Airport. How many will actually cancel their plans is to be seen, but I would guess it won’t be many, if things return to normal with no more problems.

Unfortunately, that’s a big if, not only for the UK, but for the United States, Canada and anywhere else in the world where extremists have a hate-on. That’s pretty much everywhere.

Anyone who has spent any time in Glasgow will recognize the character of John Smeaton, who was interviewed by the BBC, CNN and others. He works at Glasgow Airport and “set about” the terrorists in the Jeep. Glaswegians don’t mess around; the toughness of its citizens is the stuff of legend.

I would think the city’s about the worst target a terrorist could choose for a planned attack (no city’s a good target), given that your average Weegie doesn’t have a lot of time for anyone who messes them around.

This is not to say that people shouldn’t travel to Scotland with caution – or anywhere in the world, for that matter. But, really, if there were a place where I could trust the citizenry to be on the vigilant lookout, ready to “set about” anyone who threatens their country’s way of life, it is Glasgow.

Papadum preach

At the PPBSO Judges Seminar in April for some reason someone was talking about the cut C-doubling-C to an E-gracenoted dotted low-A (that’s a mouthful). It comes up frequently in strathspeys, as in the fifth part of “Blair Drummond.” The person at the meeting referred to the combination as a “papadum,” and most people seemed to know what he meant.

Papadums are the fast-fried cracker things made from chickpea flour that you get in Indian restaurants. (Sadly, the waiter never can bring enough.)

I was later reminded at the meeting that it was a sidebar I wrote in a 1990s issue of the now defunct Piper & Drummer print magazine that coined the term, since the movement was just begging for a descriptive name. I had completely forgotten that, but was amused to hear that the little column registered and is part of the piping lexicon of some.

Piobaireachd has canntaireachd, of course, with all the gibberish terminology for notes and embellishments, all hippity hoppity taree tarah. Light music benefited from being written down as it was being invented, so it never needed to be taught via a mouth music system. And most pipers use their own form of hick-um-bro light music canntaireachd, making it up as they go along.

But, thinking about it, Indian food could really serve as the basis for light music canntaireachd. Papadum works, but what about “pakora”? That could be an all-purpose term for a triplet in strathspeys, as in “The Caledonian Society of London ” or “The Islay Ball,” i.e., pakora, pakora, pakora, pakora, pakora, pakora, daal.

Or what about “samosa”? Perfect for GDEs of all varieties, as in “The Judges’ Dilemma”: samosa-samosa-samosa-naan, samosa-samosa-samosa-samosa-samosa-samosa-naan, etc. Try “tika” for any cut-dot combination. Kind of like a tachum, but for the top-hand.

The possibilities are endless: “vindaloo,” “rogan josh,” “chutney” . . . and of course “baji” really works well for more top hand work, as in the start of “Lord Alexander Kennedy” – “baji naan vindaloo . . . tika daal baji naaaan . . .”

Sushi is also chock-a-block with potential light music canntaireachd, although I challenge anyone to use “California roll.” In fact, here’s a call for someone to write a complete light music language based on ethnic foods. Next time you find yourself at the Shish Mahal in Glasgow, just use the menu to transpose your entire MSR and get rid of all of those tedious written scores. You can thank me later.

Gmrf!

Last week I went to a conference called ideaCity. It’s an event that’s been going on in Toronto since 2001, and puts together accomplished people with great ideas from various walks of life, from a Nobel-prize-winning physicist to a Cape Breton fiddler to an “eco-warrior” to an evangelical street-preacher, and just about everything in between. It’s highfaluting and somewhat elitist, but it’s primarily a great way to think and learn about things you’d hardly ever think and learn about.

Each speaker has only 20 minutes to discuss whatever they want, as long as it’s with passion. When they hit the 20-minute mark the organizer, Moses Znaimer, very nicely gives them the hook.

As I settled into my seat on the first day awaiting the first speaker, Dr. Lawrence Krauss, a preternaturally smart professor of physics and astronomy. Within minutes I knew that the person right behind me had some mental issues. She was restless and occasionally very quietly muttering to herself, but, being the tolerant person I am, didn’t think much of it. After all, this is a conference for the open-minded, full of surprises and new experiences, and the lady was probably very smart and, for all I know, a Nobel laureate herself.

Krauss was a few minutes into his spiel, waxing on about quantum this and theoretical that, when the afflicted lady got increasingly animated. She gradually went from benign “grmf” mutters to full-scale blurts of obscenities.

“And so you see, Rutherford’s theory of . . .”

“^&*$ing Rutherford! Stupid @#!&”

“Ahem, as I was saying, Rutherf-“

“Bastard! Idiot science!”

Krauss and the audience’s agitation got commensurately bigger as the lady’s own Tourette-induced agitation grew. Krauss actually had to stop, and the whole crowd turned to see where the commotion was coming from.

“Crap! Zombies! Rotten teeth!”

It was a strange moment, this conference on being tolerant of those in complete control of their thoughts becoming increasingly intolerant of someone with little control of her actions.

Now, Tourette syndrome is a serious thing. I feel sorry for people with the condition, and I hope they find a cure for what must be a living hell. That said, during the conference I kept thinking about what it would be like for a piping or drumming judge to have the variety of Tourette syndrome that makes people blurt out things that are just under the psyche: the things you’re thinking but not saying or writing.

“D’s sagging! Need a bra!”

“Chainsaw!”

“Eff off!”

“Sausages!”

It would be a shame for the competitor but maybe a much clearer way to judge. You could say what’s really on your mind, always with a great excuse, chalking it up to the old Tourette’s.

“Stop!”

Dust up

I didn’t attend the Sarnia Games this past weekend, but I was told that it was hot, dry and dusty, but, with an excellent beer tent and a large crowd, it was a great success. That’s good to hear, since this contest had to cancel last year due to bad weather and crowd-attendance in 2005.

It’s remarkable how the little Scottish Highland games keep going year after year, some for well more than a century. I suppose the Scots hope for sunshine but expect rain, so venture out in whatever to uphold the local tradition. North American contests are impacted far more severely, since only piping and drumming zealots will stand around in the rain waiting to compete.

I do wonder, though, which is more difficult: for North American competitors used to dry and hot conditions to adjust to a damp and relatively cold Scottish climate, or for Scots to make the journey here and deal with the reverse.

Perhaps North American bands have become so experienced at adjusting that the change hardly impacts their performance. If UK bands came here more we could more easily draw conclusions. I do know that the few Scottish bands that have competed in Ontario in hot, dry and dusty conditions have rarely played to their potential, seemingly melting in the heat.

Personal experience was always that the pipes would take on a better, more vibrant sound in Scotland in August. The instrument, at least with sheepskin and cane, was built for that “close” climate. Personally, I’d be interested to hear from any UK pipers and drummers who have come across to North America in the middle of a hot summer to compete.

Good show

Listening to lower-grade bands at Georgetown on Saturday, I can draw a few fairly well informed conclusions:

1. Bands are playing music that they can actually play. Only a few years ago I was constantly thinking “This material is too hard for this pipe section.” Now, this is infrequent. Rather than trying to wow judges with over-ambitious content, Grade 4 and Grade 5 bands are choosing music that’s within their reach. Whether this is a function of MAP or judges constantly writing “This material is too hard for this pipe section,” it’s a good development.
2. Some lower-grade bands are coming out with top-grade ensemble presentations. The influence of trends in mid-section accompaniment over the last 10 years is being felt all around. A few Grade 4 bands were really working to provide well-scored and choreographed bass and tenors, but scaled back in a style that’s manageable for the grade. A few Grade 4 bands are producing an ensemble sound better than what you would have heard 20 years ago in Grade 2.
3. Grade 1 and Grade 2 is not necessarily the most interesting listening experience on the day. The lower grades are becoming very inventive and entertaining in a wide sense. Obviously, tuning, technique and unison are far better at the top, but there is great variety in Grade 4. And it’s always fun to see really young players do their stuff.

The trends of the top grades continue to filter to the lower ones, as they have always done. But it seems like suddenly Grade 4 and Grade 5 bands are remembering to keep it simple, and play within themselves, while at the same time putting on a good show.

Busk stop

For a long time I’ve held the belief that busking is the most honourable form of work there is. If people like what you’re doing, they’ll pay you what they think it was worth to them. If they don’t like it, they can just keep walking.

I busked on Princes Street for the better part of two years. By day I’d essentially practice for three hours or so often at an unused British Home Stores’ door, usually tag-teaming with another piper. Scotland’s weather being so temperate, like golf, you can reasonably busk year-round. I’d often play golf in the morning, busk in the afternoon, and, when there wasn’t a band practice, wait tables at Mama’s in the Grassmarket at night. What a life.

You hear a lot of pipers busking in Toronto whenever the weather’s good, which it is now. During the summer weekdays, I often hear pipes all day long, since I work in a building right at the corner of Yonge and Bloor streets, one of the most well known intersections in Canada. One of the two or three regular piper-buskers will play on any given day.

They’re not great players, but they’re not bad either. Regardless, what they’re doing is making an honest buck. People pay them what they think their 20 seconds of entertainment was worth. And I think they do quite well.

Much better, I would guess, than what we would make on Princes Street. The money was okay there then, but there were a lot of old wifeys who would pass by sneering, with their fingers in their ears. We were pretty good players then, but many Scots seemed to hate the pipes. The tourists of course lapped it up, and I’m sure that I, an American, am in thousands of photo albums as some authentic Scottish piper.
After almost 20 years in Canada, I have never actually heard anyone say that they dislike, much less hate, the pipes. You hear Highland pipes everywhere in Canada, and without fail when I tell people that I play the pipes they say how they “love” the sound, and usually talk about how much it moved them when the piper played at their sister’s wedding or their grandfather’s funeral.

But back to busking: I think most former-waiters leave bigger tips. They understand the difficulty of that job. As a former-busker, I always give buskers who have entertained me, even if it’s just for a few seconds, some money. It’s the honest thing to do.

Crazy training

I’ve been cycling to work now for more than three years. I average probably more than four days a week, doing the 11 km journey, each way, year-round. I generally choose between three bikes. When it’s snowy or the roads are salty, I have a beater with an aluminum frame, which is just about dead after last winter. That Old Grey Mare ain’t what she used to be. When I’m lazy, I ride a very lightweight hybrid-type thing.

But the bike I normally ride is a very simple single-speed rig configured especially for urban journeys. This past weekend I took the plunge and converted it to fixed-gear, which means you have to pedal all the time, and you use your leg muscles to control your speed, something like an extra pair of brakes.

It’s a really efficient way to travel, but it is indeed a workout. Hills are no problem, but there’s one stretch along Bloor coming home that involves going down a fairly good hill for maybe a half-kilometre. This is the fastest part of my journey, and I have gotten it up to 67 km.

The thing is, on a fixed-gear bike, you have to keep pedalling. So going down this hill like I’m used to means that ones legs are flailing away like Michael Flatley on crystal-meth. But once you get going, there’s not much you can do but keep up.

Which reminded me yesterday of a mini-band event in Vancouver I traveled to in 1991 or so with the band I played with at the time. Those who heard this performance still speak of it, and I believe it may be legendary now.

The medley we played was probably the fastest in the history of pipe banddom. Six sets of fingers, 54 in all, were doing everything they could to stay on this crazy train to ignominy. If someone timed it, I’m sure the usually six-minutes 30-seconds selection was shorter than five. It was the weirdest sensation, something I had never been able to capture again until flying down that hill yesterday with no choice but to keep up.

In rotation

1. Sky Blue Sky – Wilco – standout track: “You Are My Face”
2. What’s The Time, Mr. Wolf? – Noisettes – standout track: “Bridge To Canada”
3. Reecho – The Finlay MacDonald Band – standout track: “Bulgarian”
4. 
   Inveroran
   – Stuart Liddell – standout track: the one with the hornpipe version of “The Sheepwife”
5. The Reminder – Feist – standout track: “Brandy Alexander”

A shot of teachers

As I mentioned in the last post, I was in Alma this weekend past. Bob Worrall and I drove down together (well, Bob actually drove the whole way and back. I offered. Honest.), and over the course of the 10-plus hours of Michigan and Ontario there was, as you might expect, a lot of enlightening conversation. Bob is always great for really well considered opinion. He’s one of the smartest people I know in piping.

At one point we got to talking about the whole judging thing. Bob’s been judging regularly for some 25 years now, and does a lot more of it than me. He’s somewhere judging and/or conducting workshops and recitals probably three-quarters of the weekends every year. Other people who commit similar amounts of time, like Ken Eller, Ed Neigh and Reay Mackay, always have intrigued me. Sure, you’re paid, but the time commitment is massive, especially when you have a job and family.

Bob noted that, as a long-time high school teacher, judging might come more naturally to him. He’s professionally trained to provide constructive criticism to students, so applying that skill to piping and pipe band contests is almost second-nature.

And then came a realization: the common denominator with many really good judges is their ability to teach. The aforementioned folks are all professional teachers. The more skilled the teacher, the more skilled the judge. Those who can impart their knowledge in a critically constructive way are usually more effective at judging, which today goes far beyond – at least in North America – simply determining a prize-list. Accounting for that list, and ensuring that competitors know exactly how you arrived at the decision, is essential to a competition in which competitors leave knowing exactly where they stand, and what they need to work on to improve.

There are some judges who still feel that they are not there to give lessons. But the reality is that teaching, by providing constructive and informed criticism, is an important skill for every judge to have.

Alma matters

I’m heading to the Alma Highland Games this weekend, an event in central Michigan held on the grounds of one of several small liberal arts colleges in the US that tout their Scottishness. Monmouth College in Illinois, Lyon College in Arkansas and, where I went to school, Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, have similar Scottish set-ups.

I was last at Alma 11 years ago with a competing band. It was a fun trip, with a few events that were memorable and not a little weird. I won’t go into those.

But, as a kid from St. Louis, Alma used to be the event of the year. We’d drive 12 hours to get to it, because there were real Grade 1 bands competing. Back then the likes of McNish, Toronto & District, Erskine, Guelph and the dominating Clan MacFarlane would often attend. (Interestingly, none of those top-level bands are around now.) But as a 15-year-old from the Paris of the Prairies, it was a whole nuther level. Alma very much made me want to be a part of that, whatever that was.

I also remember one time competing there in the Grade 2 Piobaireachd or something. Major Archie Cairns was the judge. I was to play “Lament for Donald of Laggan.” I got to the end of the first line of the ground and played the second ending to the line, lost the plot and stopped. Not to miss an opportunity to learn, I nonetheless asked Major Cairns, in all seriousness, how the first line was. I remember him finding that humourous, so I of course laughed along, as if I were kidding the whole time.

Anyway, it’s always fun to return to a place like Alma where little seems to change except the perspective from which you’re now seeing it.

Spread em again

Ah, another UK championship, and another round of piping judges with ranking spreads stretching far and wide.

Thanks to the RSPBA’s exhaustive and timely online results spreadsheet, the punters can analyze and over-analyze every microcosm of soggy score sheet detail.

To be sure, credit goes to the Grade 1 piping judges, who were never more than three placings apart.

But in Grade 2, Torphichen & Bathgate must be wondering what’s in store for their season, with an alarming first and seventh in piping. And a second and a seventh to Glasgow-Skye must have that band shaking its collective head.

But the most intriguing must be Grade 3A, where some of the spreads are Grand Canyonesque. Take Kintyre Schools: a second and a thirteenth.

And then there’s most glaring one of the day, Pride of Murray with their eighteenth and second. That’s 15 places separating the judges in an 18-band contest. Is the pipe section pushing Grade 2 standard or are they looking at relegation? One has to wonder what the bus ride back to England was like.

Obviously, discrepancies arise in a subjective event. One judge’s fancy can be another’s pet peeve. But, really, what’s wrong with judges getting together to hear each other out and perhaps find some common ground? The benches at the world’s most important solo piping events have been doing that for centuries.

Going Home, Going Home

Poor Melinda. She sings circles around everyone for three months and gets sent home by the discerning American public.

And how often do we see this in piping competitions? Quite a lot. Bands and soloists are clear winners to everyone but the judges. The winners are happy, of course, and it’s not their fault that they were awarded the prize. Meanwhile the runner-up who deserved the award has to regroup and fight another day.

Subjective competition can be a tough, sometimes soul-destroying effort. Competitive pipers and drummers are a very strange lot: they keep coming back for more hoping that their next performance will get the benefit of the doubt and the top prize.

They say that hack golfers will have at least one shot per round that is as good as any golfer on earth can make. No matter how pish they are, they will keep coming back for more based on that little thrilling bit of hope that says, Yes, I can play this game.

Pipers and drummers cling to that one part, or even that perfectly-played phrase that compels them strap on the kilt again the next weekend, bound for personal glory.