I was listening to bits of the piping recital on RTE’s “Lan na Mhala” and came across some piping I found interesting. However I couldn’t tell who the piper(s) was/were because the show was in gaellic. It starts with a flashy showpiece with lots of tight crans in it, played in Bb. The programme followed it up seamlessly with another set of tunes on a concert pitch set, starting with a Scottish/Donegal-ish strathspey then some Donegal-ish tunes. Not sure if its the same piper though.
Here’s is a link to an mp3 of the radio programme (abt 4MB and the link disappears after 7 days from today) http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=9E24DE247446C442
I left a bit of the gaellic commentary in, just in case someone who understands gaellic can identify the piper from the commentary.
The piper in question was indeed Tiarnán Ó Duinnchinn. Very impressive playing…I think I heard the announcer say that the strathspey was called Hughie Gillespie’s, although I’m pretty sure I’ve heard it called something else as well…Can’t remember now. The reel doesn’t have a name. Apparently, not even Breandán Breathnach could find a name for it. Scottish pipers generally call it “Matt Molloy’s Reel.” The group Cran christened it “The Errigal Reel.” Great tune, whatever you call it.
The reel played on the flat set was a version of “The Glen Road to Carrick,” one of my all-time favorite tunes. I didn’t particularly like this version of it, although the technique was fantastic.
Tiarnán also played a strathspey and a great version of “Brenda Stubbert’s Reel” a few minutes before the tunes mentioned above and he can very clearly be heard putting some nice, crisp birls in the strathspey…Oh man, that’s going to drive me crazy until I can do it…Figuring out how to do them on Scottish pipes gave me enough grief, now I gotta figure it out on uilleann pipes too!!! And on the top hand, no less…Yeesh…
Anybody know who made his pipes? They sounded pretty nice.
Thanks guys, that was quick. I especially liked the way he played the strathspey and the reels that followed. Hopefully the late session will put up more stuff from the lunchtime recital.
I was about to guess that the pipes were either a Forment or a Rogge hehe..
Tiarnán Ó Duinnchinn’s played a Dave Williams D full set, and the reeds in the set were made by Dave Williams. Very nice mellow sound in spite of the echoey sounding local. At first I though he was playing a C set. The Bb chanter is by Robbie Hughes. Very impressive piping and not the usual reportoire. Tiarnán coupled the Bb chanter to his set and such was his technique on the chanter that you didn’t think about the lack of drones and regs when he played. although in one tune he complemented with certain regulator keys giving a drone effect. Very accomplished regulator playing too. We also enjoyed the piping of Mickey Dunne, very nice piping and also Mick O’Bren’s recital
Not directly. That’s why RTÉ is using Real proprietary formats, to prevent copying. There are two ways to go around this. One is to play the file through LINE OUT ports on your sound card to LINE IN ports, if you have these (both sides must be LINE level to avoid impedence mismatch). The other way is to use software that allows you to grab and convert the signal. I saw someone mention a couple of apps in another thread. I will have to go looking for these.
The .smil file in this case is just a container/wrapper for a .rm file.
The only way to convert it is to ‘capture’ it from your sound card while playing it - the technique for this depends on your platform/OS etc.
Strathspeys with birls on the UP? I look forward to having a listen. That would surely ruffle some purist feathers. So, I take it he was playing the birls on A. I’ll have to tinker about with that… that would be an E birl on Scottish pipes though maybe I should master my birl on the High A thumb first.
Éamonn or, without the accent, Eamonn. Unless his parents were devotees of Eamon de Valera, in which case the second “n” is dropped. And Curran may be Ó Corráin if he prefers the Irish form.
The strathspey is one of the more commonly played Donegal highlands. I’ve heard it called Johnny Doherty’s and Con Cassidy’s, for what that’s worth. I think there are actually two reels following it - the first was the first of a pair that Molloy and Peoples recorded as “Matt Peoples”, named after Tommy’s uncle. After playing that three times he goes into something else - just possibly a variation on the first reel but I don’t think so.
Now, now, an tUasal Ruairí Ó Caoimh, don’t be too hard on him…
I had forgotten that Molloy and Peoples played that reel. The second reel does sound like a second tune and not just a particularly wild variation of the first one. I wasn’t listening very carefully to what the announcer said and can’t remember if he gave names for those two tunes…I’ll have to go back and have another listen. Then again, I’m a mere foghlaimeoir and my Irish is pretty crap (actually very limited knowledge of Irish filtered through slightly better knowledge of Scottish Gaelic…A bit like someone who knows some Spanish listening to stuff in Portuguese…). Any of our resident Gaeilgeoirí had a listen to this program yet? Ruairí? Er, I mean Roger…
Ah, he didn’t tell me the chanter was by Eamonn, thanks Andy, but he said all the reeds were by Dave Williams.
Regarding the Real Audio file, another easy way to capture the file is just to connect a minidisc player (with recording capacity) to your headphone output socket on your computor and simply record it onto the minidisc, then connect to the microphone or line in socket and transfer back to the computor, then save it and burn it or whatever you want to do
I picked up a copy of the Armagh Pipers’ Club cd of the William Kennedy festival, and he is on it. I haven’t have a chance to listen to it yet, though, since I have SO many new cds from Willie Week and I am not through them all yet.
I was over in ireland right before Willie Week (believe me, i would have been there if i had picked the dates) and i picked up so many CD’s. I felt like a kid in a candy store. But i have listened five new albums into the ground. Like any addiction i must feed it more!
