vfranklyn

Well, I won the piobaireachd contest, which was great! I played well against a tough competitor. I didn’t win the MSR or the HJ, though. I’m disappointed that I didn’t win because I played well, but I guess my competitor had the edge. Overall I’m satisfied with my performances. There are a few things I’d do differently, but that gives me something to work for if and when I decide to compete again.

It’s 2 days until my piobaireachd contest. I’ve prepared fairly well, but I think I could have done better. I don’t have a good recording of one of my tunes so I’m not that confident with my interpretation of it. I’ll be really plugging piobaireachd tonight and tomorrow night.

The light music contest is on Sunday and, believe it or not, I’m playing those tunes better than I ever have. Maybe it’s still not good enough to win, but I’m pretty satisfied. I’m making it through without note mistakes and with it sounding more musical. I just have to have confidence, focus, and try to enjoy the music.

I agreed to play the bagpipes for a production of Brigadoon. Little did I realize they wanted me to learn new tunes for this. So some of my time has been taken up with this extra commitment. However, I’m still practicing my contest tunes. My piobaireachd is rustier than I’d like it to be so here is my schedule for this week:

Wednesday: Brigadoon rehearsal, use warm-up time to play piobs.

Thursday: Work on breaks in light music and play 4th parts of both Jigs and Willie Cummings reel. If time permits, practice Donald McLellan with a metronome.

Friday: Before lesson, play all piobaireachds and light music through.