kitchen/fireside pipes in Irish music/sessions

[SutorS]

Anyone seen kitchen/fireside pipes used in Irish music small groups or sessions? Any recordings?
-Sean

[elbowmusic]

I've seen plenty of smallpipes in sessions. D cuts through nicely. Also border pipes are great for sessions. In fact, I've heard border pipes and uilleann pipes together and they should fantastic together. I believe there is a youtube of uilleann pipes and smallpipes. Look up Gordon Duncan Memorial concert and you'll get Jarlath Henderson (Uilleann Pipes) and Ross Ainsley (smallpipes).

[AaronMalcomb]

I believe there is a youtube of uilleann pipes and smallpipes. Look up Gordon Duncan Memorial concert and you'll get Jarlath Henderson (Uilleann Pipes) and Ross Ainsley (smallpipes).

It's this one-- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsLxhv2vaZE

It looks/sounds like Ross is playing border pipes though.

You might be able to play a few sets of tunes with either D smallpipes or A border pipes to blend in better. It really depends on the other sessioneers repertoire and patience/tolerance. If you know your tunes and have your instrument in order it should be fine.

There are several traditional Irish tunes that mostly fit the pipe scale. The Silver Spear and Dinky's are two that come to mind. But sometimes the way they are played on fiddle, flute etc have different notes here and there. Just make sure you don't play a discordant one. One example is The Silver Spear which, as played on other instruments, has an F one octave below the F on the Scottish pipe scale. Most players of Scottish pipes will play a Low G there but since it is discordant it's better to play F even though it's an octave above what the other instruments play.

It's also common for tunes to be up or down in scale. We play The Kesh Jig in A but it's played in G in Irish music. So unless you wander into an Eb session with Bb pipes you won't be able to play.

So your best bet is to go for a listen a few times. Find out what tunes you have in common, figure out if a tune would work best on D or A pipes, and make sure any note variations at least harmonize if they are beyond the scale.

With border pipes I can usually get some mileage out of Jig Of Slurs and The Atholl Highlanders. Since you can get a C natural on the border pipes I can play Brenda Stubbert. Plus there are the two reels I mentioned as well as Rip The Calico, In And Out The Harbor, and Woman Of The House to name some more.

[elbowmusic]

The title said he was playing smallpipes, but I do believe ross is playing border pipes. I stand corrected.

For other good irish tunes on border pipes:

Slieve russel
Ten penny bit
Condon's frolics

makes a nice set.

Also o'rourke's is nice for another reel.

Nate

[CHasR]

throw in 'Drops of Brandy' too
yum

[pancelticpiper]

... kitchen/fireside pipes...

Note that "fireside pipes" is the American pipemaker Gibson's trademark name for his smallpipes. It is NOT a type of bagpipe. I think "kitchen pipes" is another's maker's trademark name, but at the moment I can't recall which maker.
The type of bagpipes you're talking about are generally called "Scottish smallpipes" or SSP for short.
(Sorry for all that hassle, it just annoys me the way that Gibson's marketing has succeeded in getting many Americans to think that he invented Scottish smallpipes or something.)
Anyhow I played my Scottish smallpipes for quite a while at the session I attended yesterday.
As for tunes, you can play anything from the vast Scottish Highland piping repertoire.
A couple tunes which seemed to have crossed over from the Highland piping scene into the Irish session scene are The Atholl Highlanders and The Clumsy Lover (composed in the 80's by the then-young Canadian piper Neil Dickie).
Highland pipers are very fond nowadays of adapting Irish tunes, with varying success. To hear what's current in the Highland piping world, get the latest World Pipe Band Championships recording, available in CD and DVD. All the top pipe bands, whether from Ireland, Scotland, Canada, New Zealand, or wherever, are playing Irish tunes. Listen to bands like Saint Lawrence O Toole (Eire), Field Marshal Montgomery (Northern Ireland), Simon Fraser University (Canada), etc.
Tunes I played yesterday included:
Nelson Mandela's Welcome To The City Of Glasgow
Itchy Fingers
The Crooked Bridge
Banjo Breakdown
Stevie's Drooping Hose
Cook In The Kitchen
Donald, Willie, And His Dog
I play a 100-year-old set of "miniature Highland pipes or chamber pipes" (as the 19th century makers called them) with a John Walsh chanter, in the key of A. I bought the pipes, fully mounted in real ivory, off Ebay for $200.