What do you think would be a good future for Liam’s Rowsome set. Should they put in a museum , or should they (be) bequeathed to some worthy piper ?
RORY
Putting a set of pipes (or any instrument) in a museum is like having a favourite pet stuffed…
I would imagine that Liam covered this in his will?
The set was present at NPU’s 50th anniversary tionol in Dublin last month, with many great pipers taking turns playing them.
I vote that Rory be given the set. 
In a way I’m glad I wasn’t there , I dont know how I’d feel about listening to other pipers taking turns on Liams pipes. This is of course a purely personal view but for some reason, no matter how good they were they would not be good enough .
RORY
I think I get what you are saying. That makes sense.
I don’t believe the way Liam sounded was tied that tightly to the set he played, and I suspect you don’t either. If you had allowed him to play your set, I think you would have felt, even more, appreciation for his talent and style. Conversely, hearing his set played by others would have reinforced appreciation, again, of his talent and style. Was it Ennis’ or Clancy’s set Liam played on the Planxty reunion concert DVD? He mentioned which, but all I could hear was him coming through the pipes.
I’d rather Liam still be among us, in good health, showing us one of the ways music can be well played, but all of those occasions are recorded, or living in memories.
dave boling
No actually I dont agree. There are recording out there of Liam playing before he acquired the Rowsome set and his sound was different. It would be my hypothesis that his style developed with the Rowsome set not independently of it. As his style developed and matured that style would of course transfer through other sets,but his playing was nurtured on the Rowsome set and for me at least that puts it on a very special place, emotionally speaking on the altar of Uilleann piping. But in reality I know the set should be played, I just hope it goes to someone who can do it justice and again from a purely personal viewpoint I cant see who that would be.
RORY
I don’t disagree his playing was informed by the pipes he played, most good players’ playing is formed by what their instrument allows them. But:
By coincidence, I was going through some tapes, looking for a few Tommy Reck clips that had come up in conversation last (Willie) week, when I stumbled on recordings of LOF made by Ciarán MacMathúna during the late sixties. While there is still an obvious residue of Rowsome (and perhaps Clancy) in the regulator playing, the sound is already unmistakably that of LOF, perhaps not yet fully formed but well on the way.
From 1967.
https://comhaltas.ie/music/detail/the_boy_in_the_gap_the_mistress_of_the_house_the_cup_of_tea/
It’s probably interesting too, to listen to Clancy play the same set on the tapes he made for John Joe Tuttle. Wild stuff. And probably a good example of someone taking the instrument in another direction than we have heard it being taken since the seventies.
Mr. Gumby–
Can you post the recording you mention for those of us who do not have it? I am amazed at the Clancy-isms in Liam’s playing. I would love to hear the comparison.
Mr Clancy playing the Rowsome set.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5q-9XQbGyc
RORY
PS Irish people are totally bonkers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nl5WJW5VtjE
Some folks might look at this another way:- I’ve heard of people who couldn’t bear sitting in their grandpa’s (RIP) favourite chair (or anyone else sitting there for that matter) for some considerable time after they passed away. Sentimental maybe, but what are we about if we’re not that?
Really nice playing and the set sounds great. Is this the piper that now has charge of the set and if so I hope he has as much success with them as Liam did .
RORY
Pretty obviously filmed at NPU; guessing that the pipes reside there.
Lovely.
Anyone know the titles to the reels?