The PrayingPiper Events Highlights

When Dwane contacted me and asked if I wanted to do this I was nervous
but I agreed. He told me that we would be expected to play for about 15
minutes or so, and me, being a fairly new piper was nervous at this
requirement, so my practices started becoming like piobaireachd, playing
with my MEDIUM strength reed for as long as I could, well, it paid off, as
you can read for yourself, we were a big success.

At this point I must confess, in the choir room, where we tuned up and
practiced a bit before we went out to the field, Dwane & I prayed and asked
God to bless us and help us do our best, and Dwane asked a special
prayer on behalf of the graduating class itself. I just want to be sure that I
publicly say "Thank you God for your blessings on Dwane & I that day...."

I was overwelmed because there were so many pipers there of all walks of life,
kids, grannys, you name it, they were there, and each at different levels of skill. It
was totally cool being amoung so many pipers, each night would yeild a
twiddling of practice chanters that boggled the mind!
I thought I would be in an intermediate class, but I was placed with the
beginners, the class where we learned where 'A' was and 'B' was on the practice
chanter, I was a little unhappy with that because I was already playing 4 or 5
tunes. Oh well.

This is me and my pipe instructor,
Dugald MacNiel, he is the former
Chairman of the Collage of Piping. This
man loves pipe music like I do, and
being in his class was fun for that reason.
He can pick out a 'E' verses an 'F' grace
note error on a dime, it was funny to hear
him call out while one student was
playing "It's 'E'... You played an 'F'...."

This guy was funny, and odd. Here he was
pretending to squish my hand just before the
snap was taken, thus my wince.
During one class with him he described a tune
he wrote called "The Seal Reel", and explained
that he called it that because when doing the
GRIP from high 'A' on the chanter it sounded
like "Seals barking, you know 'Ore.. Ore.. Ore!!'
(barking like a seal)Seals... Barking...." the
class went silent, someone said "... Cool..."

Hey Steve,

This is Aaron Creighton from the Scottish Society.
Would you and your band partners be willing to pipe and drum for us in the
Crestline Jamboree Days Parade?

We have signed up and paid the fee already and would love some pipers and
drummers to march with us. It would be good exposure for you and would help
us out a lot.

Aaron & I met at a Robert Burns Supper back
in January 2007, we were both there to support
Camron Tillery, the keeper of the Redlands
California based Scottish store, R. P.
Blandford & Sons. He was the bagpiper for the
evening's events. But little did I know we were
to meet again on different grounds! Little did I
know, Aaron lives in VOE, another town in
Crestline area, and on a sunny Fall day, the
24th of November 2007, Aaron, who was at a
function for his business, the "Jyak Piper
Agency" came out and greeted me in FULL
HIGHLAND attire! I was shocked! I origninally
thought when he came rushing out to meet me
that I had been playing my pipes so BAD that
he came out to shut me up, but on contryary,
he came to invite me in to play for his
gathering, Santa Clause was even there! What
a good time.

Arron can be seen, if you follow the "D" in the word "INLAND" straight up to a man standing humbly
behind, with a cranberry colored tie.
The Scottsh Society is sort of a club, made up of Scottish men and their familys who are interested
in their heritage and culture and want to contribute back to society by the doing of good deeds and
cultural events.
I really like what I've seen sofar!

I love telling this story! We were to
gather at 8:30 am (2 hours before we
actually started to march!) We wern't
sure why until we were handed a
trophy for best music, the pipers all
looked at each other (?) but... we didn
't even play yet! I guess it was
because we were the only "LIVE"
band in the parade so we won by
default! Imagine that!

The Pipers Tag Team:
Because Piper, Jeff Frazier was an OLD TYME piper,
his pipe chanter was closer to the key of "A" than "B
flat" and couldn't play with Dwane & I, so when
Dwane & I played a couple tunes, Jeff would come
right in after, it worked out great!

The Scottish Society had organized a special day of piping
and presence on Saterday, the 9th of August 2008, for the
purpose of collecting food for the Crestline Food Bank. This
is a common activity for the Scottish Society, to do good
deeds for the community.

I had no idea wether or not I would be able to last for the
entire day, we were to show up at 10 am and to endevour to
4 pm, 6 hours of piping! I brought my small pipes too, so I
could switch back and forth and I was able to keep music
going for pretty much most of the time. Very challenging.

Apparently we took away alot of food, over 6 truck loads, to
the Crestline Food Bank in Top Town.

Next challenge is to play at the Women's Club on next
Saturday, the 16th of August.

I was amazed that in these tough times there were so many
kind hearted generous people, giving both money and food.