This is an article I wrote for my brother Johns 70th birthday festival about my use of fruitwood woods for my pipe making that grew in the village of Ashby Parva, Leicestershire, which is where all our family was born.
I have five sisters and brothers. We were all born in The White House- a large red brick farm house in the small village of Ashby Parva, Leicestershire, which lies in the centre of England. My brother John now lives in this house with his piping wife Stephanie and their 13 year old piping son. John celebrated his 70th birthday this July with a large festival which included morris dancing, fire dancing, lots of bagpiping and much much more. I wrote this article to let the people who came to this festival know about the connections between my pipes and Ashby Parva.
I only use British hardwoods for my bagpipe making and nearly all the pipes that I play on this CD are made by me from trees that grew in Ashby Parva. I have photos of all these trees. Most of the trees on this CD grew at the other end of the village, near the church.
My Leicestershire smallpipes are made from a flowering cherry that grew in the churchyard and died about 8 years ago. This tree grew 10 feet away from where, 65 years ago my Aunt Alice was buried. This set of pipes are part of my family tree. It is on the CD front cover and I play it on tracks 5 & 9.
My G English Great pipe is made from a fallen apple tree from my grandfather's garden, which is across the road from the church. Before cutting the tree, I scrumped enough apples to make 49 bottles of wine from it. One day I plan to have a ceilidh where we will drink this wine whilst dancing to these pipes. I play these pipes on track 16 for my tune Pat's Fancy.
In the orchard on my Dad's farm, beyond the churchyard, grew the pear tree from which I made my D Great Pipe. (The low D chanter is made of gorgeous plum wood from the grounds of the Peebles Hotel Hydro, in the town where I now live.) I play these pipes on 8 different tracks, including my tune The Leicestershire Lowlanders.
The pipes on this CD that grew nearest to The White House are my Cornish pipes . They are made from a cherry tree that grew across the road, about 400 yards away, near the Ashby Garden centre.
The White House orchard has been an ongoing source of small quantities wood for me over the past 25 years of pipemaking. In 1969 we gave a mulberry tree to Mum & Dad for their ruby wedding present. It is right behind the big marquee. This tree has an alarming tendency to spilt and shed its branches. From one large branch I made a gorgeous set of Scottish 'Montgomery' smallpipes. Sadly the main trunk looks as though it may split right down the middle within the next decade. Happily when it does, you can be sure I will be making more 'home grown' pipes from it. Mulberry is lovely golden wood.
The wood that I use for the bellows on my Scottish smallpipes and Border pipes are made from walnut trees that Dad planted in the 1940's. There was a little grove of them between the Wendy house and the orchard. They were a bit close together, so we cut down two of them about 12 years ago. The wood is gorgeous. Right now you can see fungi growing on the remains of the sawn off trunk, between the 3 remaining trees. Nothing in the universe is lost- it just changes. Brother John's English Great Pipes are made from field maple that grows in profusion in the hedge at the same end of the orchard. There is large trunk of Bramley applewood at my workshop that John gave me a couple of years ago, which grew about 10 feet away from the row of portaloos that are currently placed at the other end.
Seasoning wood is a slow business and I never try and to hurry the process. In May I had three dead flowering cherries in the churchyard cut down. Last Thursday I painted the end of the logs to reduce its tendency to crack. I am leaving them in a cool place until my next visit. Then I will take them back to Peebles in Scotland where I live. The next stage is to cut the logs into planks and leave them in a cool shed under trees in my sister Myrtle's garden . After a minimum of three years I will take the planks to my workshop to cut them into billets, bore them and rough turn them. Then they go in a warm cupboard for a few more months before I begin to turn them into their final shapes. It takes years. Maybe we will be able to dance to these cherry trees at the next White House Festival. Insha Allah!
What a special thing it is to be down in Ashby Parva at my brother John's festival in the garden of the family house where we were all born and brought up. It seems a very appropriate place to be publicising my new CD- even more so, because four of my friends who play on the CD are also here. And my brother John has just published his new tune book in time for his festival. It is full of his wonderful pipe tunes and with the highly appropriate title PIPING IN THE VILLAGE. The entire book is written out in his distinctive handwriting. I cannot read music, but even so I really enjoy his tune books, because they are such lovely productions. The are a delight to own.
I sometimes like to confuse people in Scotland by making the wild claim that Leicestershire is 'the heart of the piping country'.This may not be true, but the village of Ashby Parva is currently productive when it comes to pipes and piping. New potential pipes are constantly growing in the form of trees. New pipes are being designed and made by me from this wood. Admittedly I do this in Scotland, but I was born and brought up here in Ashby. John is still making new tunes. He and Stephanie are both piping for their morris sides. And now there is a new home grown piper in the village; their son, John Francis Goodacre.
Julian. July 2009.