GREY’S NOTES by Michael Grey. Piping Today #82, 2016. There was a time when I thought that one of the hardest things I’d ever done in my life was to play Peter MacLeod’s tune Donald MacLean, twice through in the jig final at the Northern Meeting. John Burgess, ever the […]
Tag: Peter MacLeod
Famous pipers: Donald MacLean
On Monday we kicked off the first of an occasional series on the stories behind some of our more famous tunes. There’s been a great response to this, with suggestions of further tunes to look at. Today, we kick off what will be another occasional series, that of famous pipers. […]
Creating new bagpipe music and explaining the inexplicable
By Dr. Bruce Thomson The only way of fulfilling the mission described in our headline is to literally develop a new tune from scratch. I can only show you how I set about it, not having had the privilege of looking over another composer’s shoulder. As previously, this is being […]
The image of an unchanging art form
Part 2 of Iain MacInnes’s 2000 John MacFadyen Lecture Competition is very much part and parcel of the piping culture here in Scotland, and its shaped not just the music, but also the style of performance. It all goes back to 1781, when the Highland Society of London started the […]
Bob McFie: a life of piping and teaching
Asked about his early days in piping, Bob McFie leans back in his chair in a teaching room in The National Piping Centre Otago Street and raises his eyes to the sky. “I was six when my father gave me my first practice chanter and about nine or ten when […]