So I broke the smallpipes out for the first time since early September. I usually only get them out to play with the local Irish musicians but the kid went to sleep so I figured I would play something that was quieter. The slow air is a tune I wrote called Calista Anne McLaurin (the kid who was asleep) and the hornpipe/reel was a tune I wrote called Rascal’s Runabout. The sheet music for both can be found here:

www.patrickmclaurin.com/audio/audio.html

airhornreel <- Listen Here

Patrick

I loan out my smallpipes to students, at least I have recently, so they can get used to the mechanics before playing the big pipes. I got a set back a few days ago and stuck a drone in (tenor) but it tuned to E not A. So I went with it! Here is me playing Hector the Hero, Sleep Dearie Sleep, and Humours of Ballyloughlin (sp?). Note: you have to sharpen the high G for it to sound good (I think, so I did, though I didn’t have an A drone to compare it to). Needless to say, my smallpipes are ‘composites’ of components from a couple of sets of Ray Hughes smallpipes…clickhere.mp3

Peace, Patrick McLaurin

Bagpipe Setup = Ray Hughes Smallpipe in A – Ray Hughes Drone Reed – Ray Hughes Chanter with Walsh D Reed with lots of tape because I should have bought an A Reed!