International Vision Expo

Had a piping job at the Javits Center, New York City's convention center.  It seems the International Vision Expo was looking for bagpipers to march through their exhibition halls to announce the beginning of the Expo.

Eyeglasses and a pipe band.

Proof that bagpipes are suitable for any occasion.   I want to encourage this thought as I promote www.bagpipesnyc.com  

If you are having a small dinner party at your home, get bagpipes
If you are picking up your kid coming in on the train from college, get bagpipes
If you are a politician and want to announce that you are leaving office because you cheated on your wife, say it with bagpipes.

Say It with Bagpipes.

Throggs Neck

Playing in a pipe band takes you many places. Not all of them glamourous.  But Throggs Neck sounded glamourous to me. I had heard of it, but had no idea where or what and where it was.  It is in the Bronx.  That didn't sound so glamourous. Sorry, Bronx.

It was a wildly wet day that reduced itself to a constant damp and cold drizzle when we marched down the main street. Bagpipes and drizzle seem to be bedmates often. But this was my first time out with my new band, The Metro New York Pipe Band  (lousy acronym potential) and it was a good feeling.

A good day out.  And then, of course, it was to the pub.  One of the guys in the band plays in a trad band and they were performing there and were excellent. 

In the old days I wanted to stay for hours. Now I want home to get me shoes off.

The Chieftains and Special Guest, Me

The St. Pat's bagpiping season kicked off today.  The Chieftains called and needed myself and a few other pipers to play with them in concert at the Kimmel Center.  Philadelphia here we come!  

We drove in the driving rain from New York to Philadelphia and made it in time of rehearsal and sound check. (I just using those musician terms, makes me feel like a real one...)

The Chiefains are pros and brill musicians. They put on that show that leaves you feeling like you got it all: you laughed, you cried, you wanted to dance.

The pipes went great and it was a ball being with the Chieftains on such a beautiful stage.  I am ready for U2 now. When will they call?

Bagpipes NYC

I started a new business.  I am playing bagpipes for hire in New York City. What a great way to do what I love - meet people and see New York, while making some money.

The website is www.bagpipesnyc.com

Spread the word for all your bagpipes needs!

Mitch's First Bagpipe Lesson

My sister Eileen is guestblogging today about my nephew Mitch's first bagpipe lesson. I am SO proud. Take it away, Eileen:

Today a dream came true. My son, Mitchell, will learn to play the bagpipes, as did his grandmother, mother, and uncle before him. When my son was a baby and went to his first Scottish Games sponsored by the Caledonian Club in Pleasanton, my mother made him a wee kilt. He wore this kilt not realizing the unspoken destiny we would all hope he would pursue. I am not terribly subtle, but somehow I managed not to spoil the idea with any overbearing Mamma Rose coercion. I guess I can credit Mitch’s interest in the pipes to our regular visits to the Scottish Games where pipers and drummers march and strut in head to toe Scottish regalia. Most of all I credit Mitch’s uncles, Pat and Sean, for sharing their expertise at the pipes and drums. Example is contagious. During Uncle Pat’s visits, he would help Mitch to put his fingers on my old child size chanter and blow. He even bought him a set of miniature pipes from one of his trips to Scotland.

Mitch turned nine in September and is ready as ever to learn to play an instrument. Some boys at school started to talk about guitar and Mitch began to ask. Unnerved, I jumped into action and made the call to the Prince Charles Pipe Band. I wanted Mitch on the high road to pipes because anyone can take the low road to guitar. Sorry, but that’s my take. And I should know because after four years of chanter playing, I became a guitar girl for masses at my grammar school parish. My guitar instructor was my best friend, Mary Pat. Guitar chords were a breeze compared to the pipes’ reed, bag, chanter, and drones.

The Caledonian Club Hall is in South San Francisco near Colma. Pictures of our relatives and family friends cover the walls. Past Chief Henderson is Mitch’s great grandfather. Past Chief Uncle Tommy Fraser is on display in every room. Mitch’s lessons will be every Sunday morning at 9:00am. After a great start of practicing the scale on the chanter with his teacher Mr. Merriman (our former teacher) we got some practice assignments and headed out.

That morning, Mitch asked if we were near where grandpa and grandma are buried. Very nearby I responded. Would he like to visit? He would. We picked up some fall colored roses at the Costco ¼ of a mile away and made our way across a soaking wet lawn under a sunny fall sky. Mitch brought his chanter at my request. I used my Peet’s coffee mug to transport fresh water. After he “tuned” his chanter during my flower preparations, I introduced the young piper and Mitch tooted and tweeted his first chanter performance for his grandparents. We said the Our Father and some private prayers.

I prayed that grandma would help Mitch stick with the pipes and enjoy his new adventure. As Mr. Merriman told him this morning, he will be part of a group of young kids who will progress together through the band and become good friends. His uncles can attest that being part of a pipe band means that he will have friends for life.

My own "fashion" shoot

The day after Sean and I saw "The September Issue" we went out on our own photo shoot with Sean as producer, photographer, creative director, and fashion editor. I was the talent, the model. The way it should be.

I am putting together a website to get some piping gigs here in New York and we thought it would be fun to shoot with some iconic NYC backgrounds to promote this idea on the blog. Today was our first day out and Sean thought it would be good to shoot at the Brooklyn Bridge. Being dumb and beautiful, I just went along. It was a good idea and a lot of fun.

A few shots and some outtakes:








People were DANCING on the bridge!!
Fiddler meets Brigadoon! This cute kid's mom wanted him to take this photo.

The Case of the Broken Bagpipe - A Love Story

I was on my way to bagpipe band practice at Kelly Ryan's Pub in the Bronx when the strap on my case broke and my pipes dropped in the street.


As a result, the ivory mount on my pre-World War I Henderson bagpipes broke. (They had been through TWO World Wars and I broke them walking up the street to to a pub?!!)

This is where the tail takes a turn. The traditional answer to this problem is to bring my pipes to a bagpipe mender, but I remembered overhearing this really nice French woman, Isabelle, who is in my Afro Jazz dance class mention that she works in restoration at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.


I told her my plight and asked her if she knew anybody who might be able to help me. She did. I gave her my card and she connected me to Beth Edelstein who is an Assistant Conservator at the Met and works in 3-D object restoration. (Meaning: NOT paintings, but everything else.) I wrote to her and she wrote a lovely e-mail back to me.

In the movie version of this it would have a "84 Charing Cross Road" vibe.

Okay this is the thing I LOVE about New York City. I know it can happen other places, but just not on this scale to me.

Let's recap: This poor broken down on his luck bagpiper trudging to practice one night drops the only thing of value in his life and it breaks. But meanwhile he takes an Afro Jazz dance class where he meets the exotic French dancer and former travelling performer to the great houses of Europe who happens to work in restoration at the world famous Met and she hooks him up with an expert in 3d restoration.

So I went through and met the superb Beth Edelstein. She is currently working on the reinstallation of the Islamic collection's Nur al-Din room, a Damascene period room dating to the early 18th century. (This is lifted from her website which I will plug on these very pages.)

She met me and took me BEHIND THE SCENES AT THE MET. (It reminded me of going to the off-limits places in Disneyland when I was a kid and the bagpipe band was playing there.) Or, better yet, "From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler."

OFF LIMITS DOORS. (the doors themselves date back to the early 1980s I am guessing)

She showed me the project she was working on and it is amazing! The Islamic section has been shut for about 3 years and will not open until 2011. Wow.

We discussed my piece and she told me about the research she did on my bagpipes (Impressive!!) and what kinds of adhesives she thought to use and about how ivory works. I was blown away at the detail and attention to it she had. My pipes were in good hands.


And if there is ever a movie version you could NOT cast a prettier, nicer restoration expert. Let's just hope they put her opposite someone younger than Tom Hanks.

Beth e-mailed me after the weekend and I came in today and picked it up. It was better than I could have imagined. She did a brilliant job.

She and a partner operate a side business of doing expert restoration. If anyone has anything they need fixed with expert care I recommend Beth highly. I think she also has the skill to talk you through emotionally! Her company is SBE Conservation. Check out the site. It is cool.


Beth with the finished piece.

And THIS story is another example of the magic of possibility in New York City. A bagpiper meets a Met conservator through a French woman in a dance class and his ivory is restored as well as his faith that he is living in the right city.

Ahhhhhh....

And...if I were twenty years younger and straight and Beth were single and interested we would fall in love and get married and I would come to realize that this seeming tragedy of me breaking the ivory piece on my pipes was the best thing that every happened to me.

...and this would be the story of how we MET.