Tuesday, January 29, 2019

Northern carmine bee-eater: Robbie Burns' Night after the Scottish Country Dancing, Piping in the Haggis, Nice to play my harmonious and mellifluous Scottish small pipes, Scottish_smallpipes_and_borderpipes (check out the wiki 'World University and School Links' in these pages too) - https://wiki.worlduniversityandschool.org/wiki/Scotland (Beginnings of best STEM CC-4 OCW-centric Scotland World University and School online), Delightful, also a tiny bit Scots' American dystopic, Seeking to pipe some today (and how to grow this online interactively? ... eg I could and may record the Green College of Piping Green Tutor's tunes to Youtube playing them on the small pipes in A, so that other pipers could play with them digitally when learning, "Southern carmine bee-eater: Robbie Burns' "To a Mouse" ..."



Hi M, 

Nice to hear from Marilyn & Bill Stocker about Burns' Night last night. Marilyn repaired my kilt a few years ago, and did an excellent job. She's originally from Canada, and Bill is a retired anesthesiologist: 

Dear Friends,
Thank you very much for the great Robert Burns’ party last night. We had such a good time. Marianna, the haggis was delicious as was all the food. Jamie( with Star’s  helpful humorous translation) gave a great dramatic recitation. Juliet, you made Tam O’Shanter come alive. Scott, your piping added just the right touch of atmosphere. Kathy, thanks to you and all the band for the music during the dance and for Auld Lang Syne too. Star, your “ Afton Water” was beautifully sung. Dilip, thanks for the very enjoyable dances and excellent teaching.
It was a delightful evening.
Marilyn and Bill

Not so clear how to seek, circulate and then connect with a partner ... 

How was your day? 

L, Scott



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Thank you


Inbox
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Scott MacLeod sgkmacleod@gmail.com

3:30 PM (3 hours ago)
to lln.lvll, James, Kathryn, Bill, Marianna, Juliet, jennifer.seward@sbcglobal.net, dilip.sequeira@gmail.com
Thanks so much, Jamie, (Robbie Burns' himself!) and All, 

Besides thanking all of you for a wonderful evening (you're a sketch, Juliet!:), I wanted to thank too the guardians of the haggis (Alan & ...), sword bearers' extraordinaire in our wee figure 8 procession around the chairs, and the other musicians (whose emails I don't have)!

Very delightful evening,
Scott
Collection of Tweets here with a video and some pictures - https://twitter.com/scottmacleod/status/1090370780393684992 :)

-- 
- Scott MacLeod 
- https://wiki.worlduniversityandschool.org/wiki/Scottish_smallpipes_and_borderpipes (check out the wiki 'World University and School Links' in these pages too)
- https://wiki.worlduniversityandschool.org/wiki/Scotland (Beginnings of MIT OCW-centric Scotland World University and School online)


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Hi M,

How best to describe last night's Burns' Wow celebration? ... a woman from the far north of Scotland recited Burns' Tam O'Shanter enacting it with the audience with big cards on sticks identifying characters from the poem like "Alloway Church" "Tam O' " (the main character of the poem) "The River Doon" which people held becoming part of the play. A parlor play. It was a hoot ("Everyone knows in Scotland that witches can't cross rivers or flowing bodies of water":), very Scots'/British audience interactive, and fascinating somehow ethnologically (Folklore-wise - Scots' in this case) in a small wooden American Legion hall that the Scottish Country Dance group uses in San Jose, California. What a transplant - and time transport/travel. Cosy, humorous, almost too 'old,' yet good identity/ community-wise, bawdy in parts as Burns' can be - amazing in its British drama evocation of an old way of life ...  (The Scots' woman has lived in the US for decades). Took video of the end of Tam O'Shanter, which I hope to post. People sang other songs too from the podium (which could have been 'nicked' from a church, or procured at a second hand yard sale:), and the master of ceremonies' process was good/creative. Jamie Tanner was MC and wears beautiful and creative Scottish clothes. 

Piping went pretty well. Piping in the Haggis around two sets of chairs, echoes of church pews, or a far north Grange Hall ... a big figure or eight in a little parade with Alan and another "dead head" - very California long hair, hippy-even, regular Scottish Country Dancer in Mountain View and San Jose SCDs whom I like, but emotively is a a bit dead head. They carried large swords behind me in this wee procession. Later Jamie's wife, Star (who sang a song) - Jamie went some to UC Santa Cruz, I think, but after the 1970s, and so while kind of California-'out there' aren't all that hippy, and are good Scottish Country Dancing folks, not too bent out of shape by California's curiosities-culturally. :) When I asked her about what she thought about Jamie's swords in the food line, after everybody got their haggis, she said she got them for him. Apparently he has a sword room at home ... the full nine yards. He's ruddy-cheeked, and looks the part of a Scot as well, and I think I saw somewhere that his family has been in California for many many generations.

Glad Ellen Lovell was there, and too bad Jonathan Lovell wasn't. Glad Alan Thwigg was there too. These three are all pretty smart, and California-wise too. Alan went to Stanford as an undergrad in the'70s, with a medievalist study focus, and the culture of the post-Stanford SF Bay Area hasn't wigged him out too much in intervening decades. :) And Jonathan is pretty cheery as a now emeritus Professor of English at San Jose State University (with high achieving degrees from both Williams & Oxford, as well as Ph.D. from Yale). He's a great reader, and also a grandfather. Ellen has some roots on the Isle of Skye.

Learned a bit from this mind-turning Burns' night ... all a bit unexpected ... Am thinking through too why Burns is kind of beloved. (He wrote To a Mouse and To a Louse in 1785 & '86). I think he gives a voice to the people of Scotland for one - and in a language that is theirs, writing in the Scots' language (bog perhaps:) - and even possibly offers a vision of freedom/happiness out of that wee fen of history/culture. (All the above gave new meaning to the word 'sincerity' for me - which takes on new meanings in a California world that sometimes culturally somehow 'burns' this away - and which also leads me to seek to head up to Harbin ... to get away from it all.

Heard and tuned into a lot more Burns' poems this whole weekend than ever before ... e.g. blogged about Friday's Burns' celebration here - https://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2019/01/southern-carmine-bee-eater-robbie-burns.html ... 

Calling NSF's FastLane this morning per NSF's E.C.'s suggestion yesterday ... the vetting process for this WUaS grant has been long and involved indeed. 

What are you up to for the rest of the week. And has the deep freeze begun to settle on Pgh? Stay warm! :)


Seeking to play pipes more and more ...

L, Scott 


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Wore the beautiful kilt hose, too, which you had knitted for me in NZ in 1993! They're a bit thinner, and have holes, but they work well in my fairly new (somewhat discount) Nordstroms' Rack 'kilt shoes' which are working out alright (replacing the quite used pair of 'wing tip' kilt shoes I bought brown in Pgh around 2007 from a thrift store because they fit well, and then died black). Haven't found the Gore Tex water proof, very well fitting, pair of Ghillie Brogue kilt shoes yet, but thank you for the gift of 'piping' and Scottish garb ... which can be beautiful. 

While I appreciate the envisioning from the 1960s and '70s to make the world a better place, as well as Dad's modeling of this ... am seeking to explore spaces of 'loving bliss" generation more fulsomely as well ... some of the older patterns I observed last night were also (believe it or not) a tiny bit Scots' American dystopic (as have SF Q processes been for me as well) ... 'realism' re Lacan and George A has merit here ... with ongoing seeking to begin a family, and to begin to grow World Univ & Sch financially as well. 

Appreciative of the Desiderata here too (re George) ... http://mwkworks.com/desiderata.html ... 

Also appreciative of last night's Burns' celebration because the women there were all pretty feminine ... but I also appreciate the egalitarian vision of feminism ... and have found this lacking in Scots' culture at times and in some ways :) ... in Burns' poetry as well. The future is ahead! :)

And I think I was also somehow 'received' into this SCD community, (this troop of people who dance and identify Scottish) because I piped in the Haggis on Burns' night there ... interesting culturally. Now how to change the world for the better? :)

Nice to play my harmonious and mellifluous Scottish small pipes last night (- And as I said something like this to everyone, just as I was beginning to play, I 'apologized' if people were going to miss the skirl of the GHB ... :) But I don't miss playing the GHB very much, am glad I play this SSP now and would like to take it further ... and Youtube video recording-wise ...

More later ... hope you have a good day, and stay warm, Ma! 


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Hi M, 

Burns' night continued ... re piping

I learned from Juliet I think her name is - the Scot who recited Tam O"Shanter which mentions the word cuttysark, in the poem, that 'cutty' means 'short' and 'sark' means 'skirt' ... makes me wonder too further about other origins for Cuttyhunk Island (beyond as a derivative from the Wampanoag word for lands' end, or point of departure, something like Poocuohhunkkunnah - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuttyhunk_Island - meaning ) ...

Here's the video and some photos:

video of the end of Tam O’Shanter:

Jamie Tanner, the MC: 2nd from right:
Jamie and his wife have a creative eye / minds with regard to Scots' garb ... 


Ellen Lovell, standing taking photos

Got home late, woke up early ... seeking to pipe some today (and how to grow this online interactively? ... eg I could and may record the College of Piping Green Tutor's tunes to Youtube playing them on the small pipes in A, so that other pipers could play with them digitally when learning, and then build from there to playing other tunes I enjoy a lot ... and then build interactively from there ... sun's shining, why not now? ... out on the porch, with the nice ridge in the background? ... may do so ... :) ... 

How's your day going? And how are you?

Scott


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Played the 6/8 'Seamus MacNeill' in the wee figure 8 with procession around the chairs. May record another version of this, and just keep the pictures:

Scott playing “Honey in the Bag” on Scottish small pipes at the San Jose Scottish Country Dance class … and Robbie Burns' Night celebration:

https://www.facebook.com/jamie.tanner.92/videos/3049357145079865/?t=21


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Sun. FEB 3, 2019


Catherine S. Vodrey: I wanna see it but it won’t let me!

Scott MacLeod (https://www.facebook.com/macleod): Thanks for the heads' up (& re a loss of openness on web platforms too) ... may re-record eventually outside of FB and re-post here - https://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2019/01/northern-carmine-bee-eater-glad-to-have.html - (accessible via https://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/search/label/bagpiping )

Scott Gordon K MacLeod (https://www.facebook.com/bagpiper): Would like to re-post too the photo above to my https://www.facebook.com/bagpiper page, but it won't let me, Catherine! :)


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Wed. JAN 31, 2019
Scott playing “Honey in the Bag” on Scottish small pipes …
https://www.facebook.com/jamie.tanner.92/videos/3049357145079865/?t=21 …
> https://wiki.worlduniversityandschool.org/wiki/Scottish_smallpipes_and_borderpipes … - https://wiki.worlduniversityandschool.org/wiki/World_University_Music_School … - @WorldUnivAndSch - @TheOpenBand - @scottmacleod - @sgkmacleod ~

- https://twitter.com/scottmacleod/status/1090445143495200768
- https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090445242342330368


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Piped in haggis at Robbie Burns'
Vid of Tam O’Shanter:
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090322435604238336
Jamie Tanner, the MC: 2nd from R:
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090321023382126592
https://twitter.com/scottmacleod/status/1090325142926852096
E.L @jlovellsjawp, standing taking photos
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090324576645505024
https://twitter.com/HarbinBook/status/1090321244266713088
@scottmacleod @HarbinBook ~

https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090371112343457793


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Again, here's the video and some photos:

video of the end of Tam O’Shanter:
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090322435604238336

Jamie Tanner, the MC: 2nd from right:
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090321023382126592
https://twitter.com/scottmacleod/status/1090325142926852096

Ellen Lovell, standing taking photos
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090324576645505024
https://twitter.com/HarbinBook/status/1090321244266713088


Piped in haggis at Robbie Burns'
Vid: Tam O’Shanter:
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090322435604238336
Jamie Tanner, the MC: 2nd from right:
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090321023382126592
https://twitter.com/scottmacleod/status/1090325142926852096
E.L @jlovellsjawp, standing taking photos
https://twitter.com/TheOpenBand/status/1090324576645505024
https://twitter.com/HarbinBook/status/1090321244266713088
@TheOpenBand @HarbinBook ~

https://twitter.com/scottmacleod/status/1090370780393684992


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Southern carmine bee-eater: Robbie Burns' "To a Mouse" could be about a young woman: Gone too far (in this interpretation:), Hope the hew & cry re this possible blaspheme doesn't deafen! :) * * * Stanford 2019 State of Latino Entrepreneurship Forum #StanfordSOLE Spanish language business * * * Grateful Dead https://youtu.be/rpgqRZNx_fk "Grateful Dead - 3/1/70 - Soundboard - Complete show" gets me there a bit, No great shakes & thanks for tuning us in to Mouse & Louse by Burns, Ants!

- https://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2019/01/southern-carmine-bee-eater-robbie-burns.html -


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