Has anyone heard this chap. I’d love to know what he’s like on GHB. Not conventional I would guess?
Search Google for him, you’ll find some stuff.
Looks like he had 15 minutes of fame in the 1960s. Jazz. Taught John Coltrane to play the GHPs. I haven’t heard him, but i always get a kick from the pictures.
Here’s a good article:
http://citypaper.net/articles/011801/mus.rufus.shtml
I’m pretty sure he’s still alive and gigging, mostly in the Philly area. There used to be a Web site, but i can’t find it anymore.
If this information is correct:
http://www.23cafe.com/rufus_harley.htm
you can find him tuesday nights in the 23rd Street Cafe in Philly.
WOW 
Rufus Harley LPs turn up on eBAY all the time:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=306&item=4042128434&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW
I think Royce has a sample: http://home.comcast.net/~pmlerwick/wsb/media/95395/site1008.ra
djm
That link (http://home.comcast.net/~pmlerwick/wsb/media/95395/site1008.ra) uses an older, unsupported codec on my Linux box.
I love Rufus Harley! They play him every once in a while on our local jazz station, KCSM. Obviously, he doesn’t have the range that most jazz players have available, but amazingly enough, it does sound like jazz.
Apparently he is quite an interesting character, too…someone showed me an interview with him once, in which he talks about the spiritual aspect of playing the bagpipes. I don’t know about that, though. :roll:
Justine
Look at the international history of bagpipes. They are the chosen instrument for war, dancing, cleansing (of bad house spirits), they are used in rituals of life (including death) they’ve been persecuted, ridiculed, etc., etc., Theys about the mooost spiritual instrument out there. You can make people crazy, you can make em happy, you can evoke atmospheres, make people weep.. Hell you can even rock n roll.. I’m with Rufus.
Alan
Does he always play with the bag under his right arm?
Rufus has little to no street cred among the general GHB community. I don’t know how he is viewed among his jazz peers. I’m not much of a fan of any jazz after Coltrane so between that and being a post Willie Ross GHB piper I’m in no real position to comment.
Though Rufus’ posture isn’t that great there are plenty of fine pipers who play right-armed.
Cheers,
Aaron
…
Why? Because he doesn’t play dress-up and march in a straight line with the rest of the “GHB community” ?
I’m sure he’s lying awake at night with worry over this.
:roll:
That sounds an awful lot like someone playing UPs…
To be honest, I just find RH’s playing silly - I got sat down with an LP not so long ago, and listened to the whole thing through a 6.0% strength filter. If I want to listen to jazz on the GHB, I’ll listen to Fraser Fifield, who can actually (a) pull it off and (b) tune his pipes.
Brian, I see your point, but if any uilleann piper said to you that they were going to play the uilleann pipes, but they weren’t gonna learn any of those crans or cuts or rolls or any of that stuff, because ‘it just gets in the way of the music, man’ or whatever, I imagine you’d have about as much time to listen to their playing as I do to listen to Rufus. And I’ve given him a lot more than most would.
The evening concluded with a ceremonial destruction of the offending LP.
Cheers,
Calum
Wow, Brian. That was a really ignorant and uninformed statement you just made. Congratulations on your troll of the day award. 
james
I found a CD in Amazon.com which has sound samples in Windoze and Realbadaudio formats: [Click]
Obviously the guy doesn’t have correct technique. Just someone who picked up a GHP set in a pawn shop and taught himself to play. But if nothing else, it’s a quirky tribute to the instrument, that after being neglected for a long time, it surfaces in such unexpected places.
One wonders what he could have done with a set of UPs.
I don’t actually like the tracks i heard, but still, more power to him.
The POINT is - I doubt very seriously that Rufus gives a flip about whether or not he’s got “street cred” with the “GHB community” (whatever that is).
He’s doing what he enjoys - that much is obvious. I’m sure that a certain segment of classical pianists were aghast when Jerry Lee Lewis began playing his music on the 88’s - - even, on some occasions, with the cheeks of his arse. Do you suppose that Lewis cared what they thought?
Same thing applies here. Don’t like it? Don’t listen to it.
Thanks for the link, Glauber.
I listened to “Kerry Dancers” - hey, it isn’t for everyone, but give the guy some credit - how many GH pipers can play staccato like that?
I was thinking the same thing. How the heck he does that?
Glauber, - Probably a fairly soft reed, I’d think. It seems to be fairly quiet in tone compared to a couple of the other tracks.