Christmas Santa parades 25th and 26th

Two Santa parades

The short Henderson Santa Parade on Saturday then the big Farmers Santa Parade through Queen Street on Sunday. Both were with City Of Sails Pipeband.

I could only find photos from the Farmers Parade

Taiaha update 21st November 2017

Surface carving patterns drawn on the tounge

Auckland Highland Games 2017

It was a busy day arriving at 7:30am to help put up the Clan Cameron Tent

Solos was ok, weather and tuning made the 2/4 March challenging although according to the Judge it sounded ok - "a pleasure to listen to".  The March might have been better than the Strathspey and Reel although I felt more comfortable with the Strathspey and Reel.  

I did learn a bit about tuning, I did have problems before both performances but will endevour to get these sorted by Waipu on new years day.

I got 2nd out of 3 for the March and 2nd out of 2 for the Strathspey and Reel.

The afternoon had the band competition which started with the march past at 1:00pm.  This was very short only getting through the first tune.  The grade 4 band was first off for the street march and lead the way for the other bands.

I was also temporarily promoted to the grade 3 band for their march past, shown in the below photo.

Competition was the set and medley during the afternoon.  The weather did not make this easy but I think we did ok overall as a band and have improved significantly since last year. 

4:30 was the massed bands which marched past the front of the stands and back again to 100 pipers.  

Pretty knackered by this stage and welcomed a nice cold beer from the Ellerslie Event Centre Bar.

Taiaha Update 14th November 2017

 A few photos to show the progress so far.

New Nail Chanter

I purchased a Naill blackwood chanter for solos with the hopes of using it next weekend at the Auckland Highland Games.  With some help from Michel had the chanter tuned and now seems quite nice to play.

This was also a lesson in chanter tuning as this will need to be monitored over the next few days and weeks.

This chanter seems to sit about 472 htz once warmed up. It looks like it takes a little while to get into warmed up position and can be sensitive when not being played.  The B is slightly flat but hopefully shouldn't be to bad. 

Also got a new bag cover, hoping to get a Stark theme going here, I want to put a Stark House Sigil over the fern and put a white (imitation ivory or close to) wolf head around the chanter stock like the pommel of the Valerian Steel Sword Long Claw

Armistice Day Parade Manurewa 11th November 2017

I was able to help out the City of Manukau Pipes and Drums for the Armistice Parade in Manurewa.  It was short parade, fast pace but had to keep the steps close to make sure we were not going to fast for the veterans.  The rain held off which is also good

City of Auckland Practice 9th November 2017

Taiaha update 7th November 2017

The head is now starting to take shape, still a bit of work to go, still got to carve a lot of it down before it starts to look good.

Pipe Maintenance - Moisture Control

For the last few weeks I have been finding that my base drone gets wet after about an hour and a half of playing.  This usually causes the base drone to change pitch requiring the pipes to be re-tuned, lately it has been causing the base to cut off completely.

I checked the Ross Canister system for leaks but it all looked pretty good, I added the split stock tube which is supposed to take 60% of the moisture before it reaches the bag. I also air dried the granules, all with no improvement.

I have been advised by a few people not to dry the granules in the microwave, however I thought that I would give this a go, and it worked.  So the the air drying method does not appear to work and seems like it has been a waist of time.  Maybe this is just because the air has been quite moist through the winter.

Another thing I noticed is that the canister was quite warm after playing for about an hour and a half, This could be a problem and I have been advised to add some moisture back to the granules before trying to play with the chanter.

I have also been advised that to avoid dust causing issues with the chanter reed, use pantyhose between the chanter tube and the canister to capture most of the dust.  This will stop a small grain from going between the blades of the reed and causing problems.

Forrest Hill Presbyterian church fundraiser performance

Saturday was a busy day for the pipes, starting off with a performance at Oranga School with Jane Murray for their Scottish Culture Performance.  We tuned up at my house in overcast weather, went to the school where it promptly started to rain.  We weren't able to re-tune in time for the performance but I don't think the crowd minded.  Zero minutes preparation on this one as we lead the children onto the stage.  The piping stopped and the children did some folk dancing.  We played again when the children had a segment for Tossing the Caber (foam tubes), then we lead the children out all the way back to their class room (in mild rain).

After drying my uniform the second performance was in the evening at the Forrest Hill Presbyterian church.  Organised by Jenny Cussins, and joined by Tom Bretherton and Alina Hancox, we ran through Scotland the Brave, the competition medley with harmonies, Amazing Grace (also with harmonies) and off with Greenhills of Tyrol.

This went reasonably error free, and was well received by the crowd. The other pipers were relaxed and performed well.