“Also, considering the high levels of playing accuracy and timing we are witnessing today, would the old pipers have tried to keep up, railed against evolution, or just slipped grumbling into the background?”<<djm
One thing that is quite apparent from my fairly extensive trawl of old commercial and field recordings is the wealth of astonishing piping technique that is simply not present in today’s playing styles. Is this really wholly consistent with ‘an evolution’? There seems to be a slew of interesting style, ornament and variation that almost exclusively has not been picked up on, brought forward, interpreted or whatever.
In our rush to bring piping more in line with modern tastes and ideas are we leaving anything behind? Is it evolving or are we trying too hastily to ‘evolve it’? Playing God sometimes has to be tempered by a bit of grounding.
Nothing exists if it isn’t brought forward into the light of day. If the recording isn’t readily available, make it so. If there are specific techniques you think are worthy of resurrection, describe them in detail and publish them (I have a great deal of respect for Pat Mitchell, even though I have never heard him play, for his publishing the many books he’s done for NPU).
What I know is what I hear from commercially available recordings. My lack of exposure to what is available in dusty old archives in Ireland does not mean I am averse to learning something new.
evolution is driven by what survives. if something about piping doesn’t survive the test of modern tastes it is much the same as a trait being “selected out” in natural selection.
you don’t hear many harpists bemoaning the loss of bronze age techniques in favor of modern ones.
We pipers live in a state of liminality. On one hand we insist we have a viable, living musical art. On the other I think sometimes we try to make ourselves live in a museum. You can’t do both. You can preserve the sounds through recordings and written music, but doing things like fighting against say the modern A440 standard or insisting on drone/key combinations that don’t click with the modern ear serve only to marginalize us by limiting our audience and catch us in the trap of few players so no standarization so we are even less attractive to new players et cetera.
But I’m rambling. I don’t know if “lost” is the right word.
Quite a few times in the past few days here I’ve seen people talk about how even some of the early 20th century greats had ways of playing or tuning that they found offensive to listen to. Things change and evolve and I think that’s good. It shows we have a future as well as a past…
I was thinking of some influential players there who would be quite aware of this material, where to get it etc…
It would be interesting though if someone could list just what is available commercially at this time ( Are you out there Philippe?) The reissued stuff comes and goes out of print a bit. Certainly exponants of what many consider to be something to do with travellers playing have a great resorce in the NPU Doran reissue… I hope somebody starts revising that out of it’s rut.
A reissue dedicated to archive and early commercial piping from different players would be great. I’ll enquire…hmmmmm…
I’ve plenty of old recordings of piping myself; what is of interest in many of these players is as much what they leave out as what they play; the pipers recorded in America, for instance, never take the chanter off the knee except for the bottom D, of course. No yelping, wailing, etc. What they did in compensation is documented very well in the Patsy Touhey book: Lots of multiple gracings of notes, very intricate staccato, and the like.
R.L. O’Meally played the regulators (middle, bass, double bass) like Rowsome, but a note at a time, a very different and unique style of playing. This would be another piper who had a standout style a player of today could emulate if they so chose, but modern players seem content to spend their lives perfecting very distinct styles of their own, which I don’t think is a bad thing. In 1972 could you have predicted playing like Mick O’Brien’s, or Robbie Hannon’s? There are a few pipers who are resolutely old fashioned in various ways, John Rooney, Jimmy O’Brian-Moran, Denis Brooks. After a while you don’t have much choice in the way you play, anyway. At least I don’t!
I was told once that reissues of the very earliest cylinder recordings would be impossible due to copyright restriction. They are supremely noisy, anyway, I doubt many would ever play such stuff. I’ve heard a couple of rumours of a dedicated CD of piping 78s, but the parties involved lost interest. It’s not a very profitable endeavour, unless you feel like doing it for the sake of the thing, which is why I might dive in my own self…hence my recent posting asking if anyone wanted more 78s of Tom Ennis, Rowsome, Reck, F. Doran. I’d crank 'em out at home if anyone was game, and I didn’t piss off various powers that be; and if I could get better copies of some of them.
The recordings I’m talking about were made at the Feis Ceol in Dublin over a hundred years ago. The cylinders themselves are the property of the University of Cork, as are various cylinders of Patsy Touhey, Barney Delaney, James Early, and the fiddler John McFadden, which were sent by Chief O’Neill to Dr. Richard Henebry of Waterford around 1912. In a letter O’Neill sent Dublin Pipers’ Club member Seamus O’Cassady O’Neill complains about Henebry not thanking him! I very much doubt the UCC would go for the commercial release of these. I was also told certain tapes of Willie Clancy probably won’t be released because they were recorded on the UCC’s reel to reel machine…
Patsy Touhey’s 78s are on the NPU tape, of course; a couple are also on the Wheels of the World CD, which also has bad (too fast, thin mixes) cuts of Mike Carney, solo playing the Jolly Tinker, and in duet with James Morrison. The same duet is on The Professor, a release of Morrison’s music, which also has one of Morrison’s duets with Tom Ennis. Ennis is on Wheels of the World, too, a reel with piano backup; those CDs also have a couple of Eddie Mullaney’s duets with Paddy Stack. The new Topic releases, Irish Dance Music, Past Masters of Irish Dance Music, Past Masters of Irish fiddle Music, all have a different cut of Ennis/Morrison. There used to be a Topic LP of them. Topic had the release of Liam Walsh and Billy Andrews, some stores still have the Ossian cassette rerelease. There’s the Globestyle “Gentleman Pipers” CD, which is a sampling of various Topic LP’s pipers, Andrews, Walsh, Rowsome, Ennis. Rounder’s From Galway to Dublin has Reck, Walsh, Rowsome. There are some Folkways records with 78s.
Nothing in the way of a dedicated old time pipers CD, with detailed liner notes or anything. It’s a bit too much of a niche market…
There is quite a wealth of material circulating amongs pipers/musicians it can be useful to tap into that.
On the Irtrad list Harry was looking for Seamus Ennis’ version of Peter Street as it appeared in Ceol Rinnce vol 2. Honestly, if you haven’t heard Ennis playing it on the recording from which it was transcribed made by Breandan Breathnach in Queally’s in Miltown Malbay in 1958 and more recorded on the same occasion, you haven’t lived. It’s out there, find it.
While you’re at it try to listen to the acetate recordings made by Rich Nevins of Ennis playing in 1948.
As for lost technique and approaches, who these days plays like Mici ‘Cumba’, Dinny Delaney or even Jem Byrne [well, Mitchell obviously but him aside?], it’s powerful stuff all.
Two recordings currently available on CD offer an interesting selection of piping styles - I’m thinking of the “Drones & chanter vol. 1”, and “Pipers rock (vol. 1)” Pipers rock was issued in 1977, a not so old recording of young pipers, yet even so there is an interesting diversity - compare Davy Spillanes piping with Marie Na Ghrada’s piping for example, or with that of the young Robbie Hannan’s.
As regards today’s uilleann pipers there is no need for despair that interesting piping techniques/styles of playing are on the wane, just listen to the piping of Pat Mitchell, Joe McKenna, David Power, Peter Laban, Mickie Smyth, Lucy DeLoz, Marie Na Ghrada, Brian Gallagher, Mick O’Brien, Ronan Browne, Mick Coyne, John Rooney, Paddy Keenan, Kevin Rowsome, Robbie Hannan to name but a few “well known” pipers.
I have many of the recordings Kevin mentioned. I guess part of the problem here is too much use of broad, nebulous references to old time pipers without naming who one is thinking of, or saying that there are wondrous techniques, but never defining what these are, or how they’re played.
What a great opportunity to highlight these players/techniques. On this side of the pond, they could be published in the Pipers’ Review. In Ireland they could be published in An Píobairi (God knows, NPU needs to put something worth reading into it). Either way, we would all know what was being referred to. After all, its easy to be too mysterious without intending to.
I eventually found an Ennis recording of “Peter Street”, “Thomond Bridge” and “The Cukoo” etc… really top notch stuff. Of particular interest on the same tape (although not from the same session by the sounds of it) is “Ceo na gCnoc” the A minor reel. Great bit of playing there as well.
As Kevin demonstrates, a lot of this older stuff exists in private collections in the states, so someone over there has every bit the access that I have in Ireland through swapping, bartering, begging, threatening etc… I am regularly posting and receiving tapes. As Peter says a lot of it needs finding.
The Mici ‘Cumba’ Cylinder exists on a copy in the NPU archive. The playing is barely audible, but a close listen reveals every note played.
Ceo na gCnoic and the Silver Spear I presume, that’s one of the Rich Nevins acetate discs.
Sending out and swapping tapes is the way to go about it, I have hundreds of tapes aquired over the past twenty years or so and there’s still new and wondeful stuff turning up all the time. I think I have most of the cylinder recordings on tape, including the Carney, recently a whole new batch of Touheys, Dinny Delaney, Mici Cumba [a few more than just the ‘piece’] it’s all essential listenign I think, I am not big into Touhey but that recent tape was very interesting, in repertoire and some of his approaches to tunes.
Again, it’s scattered around among pipers but it’s all there to be found, the taped tradition if you like. Learnign it away from where the music was played I found all that stuff essential, those Breandan Breathnach recordings of Ennis’ playing as well as the RTE acetates that were later ‘re-discovered’ and realeased as the Return from Fingal, when I fist got them in 1982 it was mind altering, I spent most of the 80s taking that sort of stuff in. Made me see the recording pipers in quite a different light. Brilliant, you can’t be without it.
Okay, Peter and Harry, let’s start with you. I don’t know anyone locally who has access to these recordings. What recordings can you make available that aren’t currently available on commercial CD? If they can be put on CD it would halt the continuous degradation from copying tape to tape to tape. I have two tapes from Ireland that are both so many times removed from the originals that they are 99% noise.
Anyone else want to make their private hoard available? If the recordings are still recognizable, why not put them on CD? It would only be right for the recipient to help defray costs, without getting into what anyone might feel were infringements on copyright or stealing someone’s royalties.
You can PM me if you are concerned with being unduly litigated.
I too am a bit of an isolate (sort of like a derivative of Einsteinium, but lots less smart and not nearly as radioactive) and I don’t have access to the material both Harry and Peter are talking about. I’d love to hear a lot of it, and I’m with djm on the ‘I’ll happily defray costs’ front.
This reminds me of that Monty Python sketch with the Professor demonstrating sexual techniques - and he responds to the kid who answers the question about how do you get her aroused. John Cleese says, “What about a kiss, boy? There’s no need to go jumping right to the clitoris!”
I think if someone were to do you a grand favour of rifling through 1000’s of hours worth of archives then you may consider being a little more specific? What piques your interest? Is there a particular recording you’re dying to hear? and so on…
