A New March: “The Valley Train” (Score & Sound File)

Here’s a very simple 3/4 march you may find interesting, “The Valley Train”, another tune from my fifth book. I should really have called it “The Dundas Valley Train”. That might’ve made the title a little more specific, a little more accurate, a little more meaningful – you know, the markers of good composition!
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Plato Knew Music

I came across this quote recently; it comes from Book III of Benjamin Jowett’s translation of Plato’s Republic.  It speaks to the fraternity of musicians, and, of course, the fraternity of pipers.  It makes a person feel good about a lifetime study of music.  Like a perfectly tuned low A against a vintage set of sonorous MacDougalls: it resonates: 
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A New Jig: “Well Away” (Score & Sound File)

I knew I’d been away too long from these pages when it took me 20 minutes to track down the once-memorized dunaber login and password. Thanks to the notes on my trusty Blackberry: found. Continue reading A New Jig: “Well Away” (Score & Sound File)…

Italy Redux: Italian Pipes (& Fellini)

I found my recent encounter with the pipes of Italy hugely interesting. Until recently the piping shepherd figure that I’d seen in a lot of Christmas nativity displays was about the beginning and end of my zampogna knowledge.
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Tempo

The other morning I received note from 16 year old piper. He was looking for advice about couple of bagpipe “issues” with his main challenge revolving around tempo. No matter how hard he tried his march playing was always “hurky jerky”. That’s a new phrase for me but I picked up straight away what he meant – I think.
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Building Medleys: 7 Principles

So before we begin this musical adventure – this virtual attempt at creating an interesting competitive selection of music – it might be a good idea to establish a few principles to help move us along.

Consultants and David Letterman love lists: “3 reasons for this” and “top ten” for that; so let’s keep it simple and try a list.
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ayePod

Money for Nothing & Yer Music for Free

The longer I’m in this game the more I’m convinced sheet music should be free (I’m not 100% convinced … but thinking seriously about the prospect). Hell, it’s all over the internet anyway, free as a church.

In June Jim McGillivray will be launching what sounds like an outstanding project: a repository of bagpipe music and associated mp3s all online – all for sale. I’m supporting this.

In the meantime, I will be posting gratis pages from my books. Here’s the first few: at the bottom of the Goodies page.

I’m sure this subject will come up again (and again).