I was invited by Clones Community Forum to play my Scottish Smallpipes at their A.G.M. and launch of their ‘Looking Back to Move Forward’ project in May past.

The proposal from the organisers was that I would play time about with renowned Monaghan Uilleann piper Tiarnan Dinkin and if possible we would finish the evening with a duet.

Firstly I will give a brief insight to both instruments. The Scottish Smallpipe in its modern form is a bellows-blown bagpipe playable according to the Great Highland Bagpipe fingering system. They are much quieter than the Great Highland Bagpipe and therefore more compatible to playing with other folk type instruments given that they come in the keys of A, C or D. They date back to the mid seventeenth century and are sometimes referred to as ‘Lowland Pipes’ due to their origins in the lowland region of Scotland.

Uilleann pipes are derived from the word ‘uille’ being the Irish word for elbow as like the Scottish Smallpipes the elbow operates the bellows to power the instrument. Uilleann pipes originated in the eighteenth century in the form that they now take although there were earlier Uilleann pipes dating back to the sixteenth century. The advantage that the Uilleann pipes have over the Scottish Smallpipes is that they can play in various musical keys using the one chanter whereas the Scottish Smallpipes are constrained to one key.

The venue was the Cuil Darach lounge bar and restaurant on Fermanagh Street in Clones. I met Tiaran just before the meeting started in the function room and we hastily beat a retreat into the bar to discuss tunes and musical arrangements. It was amazing the repertoire of Scottish and Irish jigs and reels we had in common which goes to prove just how much of both traditions pipers learn and play. Tiaran suggested a few modern compositions by the Great Highland Bagpiper Gordon Duncan and I suggested a few Irish jigs! From these suggestions we put together a set list. What started out as us playing time about had now changed into each of us doing one solo and the rest of the set would be a duet.

We then went in to play for the audience and the compatibility of the two pipes was amazing; I could gauge the appreciation of the crowd by the feet tapping that was going on. Tiarnan is a master piper; he has won numerous awards and played with most of the top Irish Folk groups. Uilleann pipes have regulators which when operated by the pipers wrist add an organ like accompaniment, Tiarnan knew exactly when to use the regulators and he used them to great effect.

The music was lauded with praise from the audience at the end of our performance; one audience member dubbed them ‘the pipes of peace’ hence the title of this article. I had a fantastic musical experience dueting with Tiaran and courteous emails were exchanged between the two of us the next morning. Tiaran ended his email with ‘until the next time,’ I certainly hope there will be a ‘next time’ as these two instruments have to be heard playing together again.