Interview with Alan Forbes (Part 2)

Continuation of our interview of Alan Forbes (for previous post, see here).

AF - It would be nice to hear pibroch played in some of these more speculative styles in different circumstances than the competition system.

And within the competitions system, for example, in the McArthur-McGregor style, they’re going to say to themselves, “Well, I already play these tunes. Most of these tunes are already playEd in the modern style and I’m perfectly happy with that. Why do I have to go and find some other way of expressing it?”

JDH - I think there are two reasons for that. 1) You as a musician extend your musicianship into unfamiliar terrirtory and may learn and grow from it. 2) You as a performer begin to understand and view the music within a new dimensional perspective of history and time.

The result is, as a performer you are not only better informed, but learn to grow.

As a prescriptive enterprise, to my mind, it counteract the tendency toward caution and limitation. If you require the musician to encounter and perform new interpretations, they will grow.

That’s what I found happen to me. Comparing the multiple settings of Too Long in This Condition, what was once a single, flat piece of music is now a terrain of musical performances, and with them, interpretive possibilities. We see the life of a song, and as a musician I can bring all of that together into my own interpretation

So, the proposal I wish to submit to the PS Music Committee comes from that experience and perspective. And the proposal is this:

When the Music Committee works through its decision and decides upon its tunes, list every source where that tune is available. And state, we will accept any of these settings.

AF - We do say in the accouncements, which you have probably seen, that any setting is acceptable. The only constraint we put on that is that people say what the setting is going to be.

I think that’s one of the issues with it: you’ve got to know what you are judging, of what someone is trying to play. People occasionally do that, and frequently when they do, they present a score and play something that’s not quite the same. And judges find that quite difficult.

The other thing that we do is, we produce notes from the Judges Seminar, and they frequently refer to Donald MacDonald and other settings, which are frequently being discussed at the Seminar and are obviously acceptable.

The one thing we’ve not done, and is what you are suggesting, is listing all the sources when we set the tunes. Which I will take to the Committee and we will consider.

But we frequently refer to other settings of the tunes and are virtually never taken out…

JDH - This is going to be a thankless task, I realize.

AF - “Too Long in This Condition” is one where people do frequently play other settings. When I learned that tune, I learned it basically as it is in the Piobaireachd Society, but my teacher taught me to insert the doubling of the Donald MacDonald variation, just that alone. Nothing else. And that is how I got used to the tune. And I love it like that!

But if you play that in a competition, the judges would say, “What’s going on here? What’s this guy thinking about inserting a chunk of a setting there?!”

We’ve even specified in the judges notes in the Clasp (I don’t remember exactly when; a few years ago) that different parts from different settings would be acceptable provided people tell you what you are doing.

So, we’ve tried that up to a point, but haven’t gotten perhaps quite as far as you are suggesting, though.

But we try to be as open to different interpretations as possible.

JDH - There is a sea change happening. There is a level of openness in the Piobaireachd Society today that wasn’t there even as recently as a decade ago. When talking with some of the pipers of the generation that grew up and competed in the middle of the 20th century, it becomes apparent that they carry with them to this day the pain of scars they got when coming up against a rigid orthodoxy at that time. That time has gone.

AF - It has gone. And there are lots of people around nowadays who are very open-minded about change. And it’s a shame that it didn’t happen sooner, I suppose. But it’s great that it has happened, and is wonderful, actually.

JDH - You guys are far ahead of the competitors as far as openeds is concerned. Part of what we’re trying to do at the site is to get the word out.

AF - We discuss this quite often at Judges Seminars. And there’s one judge in particular who keeps coming back and saying, “Yes, but…what the competitors want is to be told exactly what to do! You tell them what to do, and they will do it.”

But what we’re saying here is, “We don’t want to tell them what to do. We want quite the opposite. We want people to encourage people to play creatively and play things differently.”

An interesting example is Donald MacPherson. Donald MacPherson did not play everything in the way that was expected. I don’t think Donald belonged to any specific school. He was taught by his father and others, but he was mainly self-taught (I think) and interpreted pibroch himself. And, if you listen to the way he plays a lot of the standard tunes, he takes liberties with them. He takes liberties with the timing and expression of the tunes. And yet, he won all the prizes that were to be going. Even these dyed-in-the-wool judges from 20 years ago appreciated real musicianship.

You know, I think maybe that’s another thing that doesn’t happen so much as you’d like it to happen: Really, there are only a very few top players who you would say are genuinely outstanding musicians. Jack Lee is one, for example, because he interprets things. He looks at things and interprets and plays it the way it should be played. Which is not always the way other people play it.

But within any musical community there seems to be a relatively small percentage that get to that level of genuinely understanding everything about the music and genuinely want to experiment with it and do things in even slightly different ways.

JDH - The thing that I find is that the real musicians not only transform the art, but they have no chips on their shoulders. In the teacher-disciple dynamic, many disciples only rise to a certain level where all they can do and want to do is maintain the tradition of their teacher. But some few discipline can move beyond that. They create and transform the tradition. And THOSE disciples become the teachers who are not reactionaries.

AF - Another small but interesting contribution the Piobaireachd Society is making is a sixteenth book of tunes, which will be comprised mostly of 19th century tunes coming from John Smith’s manuscripts and some from William Ross’ settings of tunes. Also from Ceol Mor, which has disappeared from view to some extent (because of the notation system, I suppose). So, the twenty tunes will appear, many of which people will not have heard before, and therefore will become available for pipers themselves to interpret. There will be no baggage involved, because most of them have not been heard before.

JDH - This is an opportunity, isn’t it?

AF - It is an opportunity! And of course, there are a lot more tunes out there which the same could be done with.

JDH - I am convinced the PIobaireachd Society is at the forefront of this stuff, whereas for a while the reputation was that they weren’t: they were the guardians of tradition. But so much has changed recently, and it is important to get the word out.