pancelticpiper wrote:
The player serves the music, not the other way round.
Amen to that.
There
is some craic to ramping it up and up like that; got the kids all twirly, at any rate. We did the same thing at a session once, launching the Dingle Regatta to race faster and ever faster, but it was for ourselves; we were simply feeling ridiculous - rumor has it that drink might have been involved - and wanted to see how far we could go before the inevitable trainwreck happened, and we got further with it than I would have thought, probably because of it being a slide. Needless to say the end result could only be called bizarre, but that was the whole point of the exercise, and that's the last time we ever pulled that one out of our butts. Some things are worth doing only once, IMHO.
But back to the vid: Try as I want to, I find myself unable to mince words. My ears found the whole thing very hard to enjoy chiefly because the players weren't in tune, which gave the backup even less lift than it already didn't have, and because the speeds arrived at took away from the music rather than adding something good to it. The whistler's ability to play Soldier's Joy at such speeds speaks for itself well enough - I'm sure she put a lot of practice into it for the purpose - but all things considered, at what price? Mere brute speed is not enough for congratulation.
That said, there's always the legitimate tension between the options of which side to butter your bread: serving the music, or serving the audience as an entertainer first. Depending on your talents and propensities, it's not always easy to balance the two. If the ramped-up Soldier's Joy is a steady part of the act, then there you have it: Entertainment, pure and simple, and nothing more. But fercryinoutloud, then at least show your audience enough respect to tune up, please. It is not an option.
I suppose I should put on my flameproof undies, now.