I'm going to have a while mess of Irish tunes to take to Houston with me for the session at St. Patrick's day. Problem is, they're all polkas, and no one plays polkas anymore (except people from the regions where the tunes were written). So I might be playing my polka set all by myself.

I broke the tenor drone reed on my smallpipes. It and the bass drone reed were catching and clamping shut. I removed a little material from the base drone reed tongue, and that fixed it, but I overdid it on the tenor drone, and it just hisses air now. I had EJ send me some cane so I can make a replacement. Otherwise, the smallpipes sound really good.

I've been doing some research into guitterns/citterns/English guitars. I'd love to get one and use it as an alternate to an octave mandolin or mandola. The Portuguese guittarra seems to be the direct decendant of this instrument, and Lark in the Morning offers one for $900, but I'm wondering if I should get that or hold off for a true reproduction period instrument. Or if I should be even spending the money at all until I'm gigging and am bringing in income from the music.

It's strange that neither Pipe Sergeant nor Major has made any comments to me about auditioning yet. It's clear that I'm ready, at least from a repertoire standpoint, if not the drill. You'd think they'd be at least putting a timetable on it or something, if for no other reason than to know when to order me a tunic and uniform parts. Oh well, I'm content to just go to practice, since it's the ensemble playing that I'm trying to iron out. I can worry about performance later.