CAPE BRETON CAPE BRETON ‘Old days’ of dance and diversity BARRY SHEARS’ ‘DANCE TO THE PIPER’

APE BRETON piper and scholar Barry Shears’ new book, Dance to the Piper: The Highland Bagpipe in Nova Scotia BARRY SHEARS… (Cape Breton University Press), gives his three previously “If we’d had someone like an Angus MacKay, a C Donald MacDonald or a David Glen collecting in published books of collected tunes a more detailed socio-historical Cape Breton in the 19th century we might have had a written record of a wonderful tradition but context and presents new evidence towards a better understanding we didn’t and I feel we have lost so much.” of the development of Highland piping over the past two and a half centuries. Barry Shears is a scholar and piper who performs in the distinctive Cape Breton style at concerts and for dances, judges piping competi- tions, and teaches and lectures on Cape Breton dance music, at home and abroad. Dance to the Piper: The Highland Bagpipe in Nova Scotia is based on his 2005 Masters dissertation for Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, Nova Scotia: a well-illustrated drawing together of more than 25 years of research in the scattered communities of his native Cape Breton, and of time spent with the last aging representatives of a unique tradition that originated among the many pipers who, from the late 18th century onwards, left to settle in Nova Scotia. It complements and extends the work of Dr John Gibson, whose books Traditional Gaelic Bagpiping 1745-1945 and Old and New World Highland Bagpiping were published in 1998 and 2002. What these players — including some distinguished players of their day — offered to the musical heritage of Cape Breton never coalesced into a generally prescribed set of performance conventions as in Scotland, but accepted technical diversity as the music took on a vigorous role as the inspiration for step dancers. Barry Shears’ new book comes with a CD that gives a sampling of this music from 1923 to 2007, and illustrates the shifting and varied performance styles of Nova Scotia pipers. Some of the tracks are from well-worn old 78rpm recordings and “in the field” tape recordings, and so are of variable quality, and most of the performers were in their 60s, 70s and 80s when the recordings were made, and well past their prime. But the selection achieves the intention of illustrating the old piping styles of northeastern Nova Scotia and Cape Breton. The CD also includes performances by three well-known Cape Breton fiddlers play- ing bagpipe tunes to highlight the relationship between Cape Breton’s bagpipe and traditions. Players include Pipe Major MacKenzie Baillie, Pipe Major Rod Nicholson, Pipe Major Duncan MacIntyre, Joe Hughie MacIntyre, Jimmy MacArthur, Alex Currie, Rory MacKinnon, Buddy MacMaster, John Willie Campbell and others. “If you can get past the standardised competitive modern way of thinking about ‘correctness’, it is very interesting to hear some of these pipers,” said Barry Shears. “A project of this type could only have been conducted here because I know of nowhere else in the world where some of these older archaic forms of piping remained in play for so long.” Barry Shears was 12 years old when he began taking piping lessons

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with Angus MacIntyre, a retired coal miner. He went on to gain the Canadian Armed Forces (Reserve) Pipe Major’s Certificate at 24, and BIG JIM the Senior and Teacher’s Certificates from the Institute of Piping (now the Piping and Drumming Qualifications Board) in Scotland. SHEARS - 3 A successful solo competitor, he was a six times CAPTION winner of the Champion Supreme trophy for professional piping in Nova Scotia. “I work for the local telephone company and, in 1983, I fell off a telephone pole and injured my shoulder. It left me with a nerve impingement in the bottom hand that’s kept me out of competitive piping. Piping was such a big part of my life so, inspired by people like Helen Creighton, I began to do research instead.” Helen Creighton was a Nova Scotian broad- caster who began collecting folklore in 1928 and, over the next half century compiled 13 books of folk songs, ballads and stories and an extensive collection of photographs, sound recordings, documents and cinematography in English, French, Gaelic, Mi’kmaq (the aborigi- nal language of eastern Canada) and German. “She came to Cape Breton to record stories in the 1960s but there was one piper, Rory MacKinnon, who refused to tell her any stories until she recorded him playing the . The recording is only a couple of minutes in duration but it’s great and reflects an older form of bagpipe performance” said Barry Shears. “I’ve found that, in a lot of these old record- ings of the ear players (pipers trained solely by ALEX CURRIE… “He had over 600 tunes; he never really read music and had learned most of his repertoire from his mother and grandmother singing the tunes. That’s a lot of . Alex said that during the Depression he’d play the ear and example), each region had its own style pipes for social dancing sometimes five nights a week. People wanted to dance to the pipes because you could hear them of playing. I’m not about to say that, because over the sound of the dancers.” these people were from Skye and Raasay, for ex- ample, as was the case with Rory MacKinnon’s much like pipers here in the 1820s. Scotland “For all that,” he said, “it came as quite a family, that this is the way they used to play in went through a series of changes and so did we. shock to me when, during my pipe major’s Skye and Raasay in the 19th century. We can’t Here though, the big changes — like musical course in Ottawa in 1980, Archie Cairns, senior be sure. But it is interesting that they played the literacy and military piping — came in at a piper with the Canadian Armed Forces at the way that they did, given that they were only two much later date and a lot of the traditional time, told me strathspeys and reels were not and three generations removed from the immi- practices, like bagpipe making and traditional meant to be danced to. The only exception was grant pipers and fairly knowledgeable in what step dance music, lingered here until well into playing for Highland dancers.” they’d picked up in their own communities, the 20th century. Barry Shears said that at the workshops he often from extended family members. “When he was teaching me, Angus Mc- gives around North America, the first ques- Intyre, a descendant of the MacIntyre pipers tion people usually ask is what the difference “IN Scotland, piping developed into a form of to Clanranald from Smerclate in South Uist, is between Cape Breton piping and music,” said Barry Shears. “It’s very techni- would say, ‘this is how they played it,’ and he’d piping. cal and beautiful to listen to but it doesn’t serve show me variations of the way the old timers “I tell them Cape Breton piping is largely a community function in the same way that fingered certain embellishments. But I never dance music,” he said, “whereas in Scotland, it dance music did in Nova Scotia. paid much attention to that then because, became art music and the playing of strathpeys “What I’m trying to say with this book is when I was 15 and went into the Militia, and and reels in the old country is unsuitable for that we had our own tradition here until com- was taking courses in Ottawa and at summer step-dancing.” paratively recently. It is very likely that pipers Army camps, they played pretty much in the Barry Shears said there was, early in the 20th in Scotland in the 1820s were playing very standard competition style. century, a step dance piper in Cape Breton

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had different names and different settings for many of the tunes, said Barry Shears. “I sat down with Alex Currie (1910-1997), one of the last ear-trained pipers in Cape Breton, one evening with a copy of William Gunn’s Caledonian Repository of Music, first published around 1848. In the case of some of the tunes he recognised, he had better settings than those published in Scotland. He had over 600 tunes; he never really read music and had learned most of his repertoire from his mother and grandmother singing the tunes. That’s a lot of puirt à beul. Alex said that during the Depression he’d play the pipes for social dancing sometimes five nights a week. People wanted to dance to the pipes because you could hear them over the sound of the dancers. “On the CD, I have included a few minutes of a recording I made sitting with Alex Currie ‘BIG’ JIM MacINTYRE, whose father, Donald MacIntyre, emigrated from South Uist around 1826-28, was the grandson going over puirt à beul. He was 85 years old at or great grandson of Duncan MacIntyre, piper to MacDonald the time. He tells the story of the tune, sings a RORY MacKINNON… “Rory MacKinnon played snippets of Clanranald, around 1759. ‘Big Jim’, a celebrated piper and of a variation of Cha Till Mi Tuille (I Will Return No More) dancer in Cape Breton, died in 1916. His grandson, Angus bit and plays on the practice chanter and you for Helen Creighton.” MacIntyre, was Barry Shears’ piping teacher. can hear his mother’s singing in it. He was also a good step dancer and would actually simulate dancing when he was playing, and you can hear his intricate rhythmic structure, the footwork, as he’s playing the pipes while sitting in a chair. “Alex Currie had such a different way of fingering,” said Barry Shears. “And he played with the pipes on his right shoulder, right hand on top. “When he joined the Army during the Second World War, they told him that playing with the bag under the right shoulder would throw the band’s counter-marches off and they succeeded in teaching him to hold the bag under his left shoulder. But he couldn’t learn the different fingering. By this time he’d

THREE piper-fiddlers at Glendale, Cape Breton around 1930: ‘Black’ Angus MacDonald, ‘Little’ Allan MacFarlane and Angus already played for 20 years in the way that he Campbell Beaton. did, and he always played right hand uppermost on the chanter. called John MacKinnon, known popularly as those of The Burnt Piper in Cape Breton. “That’s what I found in rural Cape Breton: ‘The Burnt Piper’ (An Piobaire Loisge). “We can judge from this tale that piping in there was no standard way of playing the bag- “Another player and step dancer from Cape Scotland was well on its way to becoming an pipe. I can sometimes tell who taught a player Breton, Hector MacMaster, was in Scotland art form and losing its social function as music from a certain area by seeing the way they hold scouting around for a set of pipes at the time of to dance to. You can’t really describe the display their chanter and shoulder the instrument and the First World War. According to local folklore, dances you see performed at Highland games the way they play. There’s something special he went into R. G. Lawrie’s shop in Glasgow as ‘social dances’,” said Barry Shears: “It’s not about that. Depending on where they lived where the great John MacColl was the business’s like you go with your pals for a drink or two and the degree of isolation in which they lived, manager. John McColl was making some final some night and a sword dance or sean truibhas they reflected regional tastes and techniques in adjustments to a set of pipes and offered to play breaks out.” pipe music. a few tunes. After he’d played, MacMaster told “Photographs of the early ear-learned pip- him that, while he was a great march player, his THE ear players of Cape Breton were not ers of Cape Breton show bags under left arms strathspeys and reels didn’t compare so well with note-trained and few read music. They often and under right arms, and left and right hands

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variously uppermost on the chanter,” said Barry “So there were some archaic piping tech- a lullaby to rock children to sleep,” said Barry Shears. “It’s very clear that there was no one, niques and ways of playing and no two ear Shears. “My mother-in-law, Mary Jane Kelly, is prescribed way even of holding or shouldering trained pipers I have on the CD play the same from Beauly, Antigonish County, a descendant the instrument.” way which highlights what a diverse and varied of several families cleared from Strathglas in Barry Shears has identified what appear to tradition piping once was.” the early 1800s, mostly Chisholms and a few be archaic elements of style in the playing of Camerons.” some of his informants. “In recordings I have WHILE piobaireachd had died out from the of the ear-learned players, you can hear embel- repertoire of the Cape Breton pipers recorded A SECOND wave of migration of pipers from lishments you find inDavid Glen’s Highland in the 20th century, there is evidence that Scotland to Nova Scotia took place in the 20th Bagpipe Tutor of 1878, which described a lot piobaireachd was played by pipers in the emi- century, bringing with it the influences of the more ways to embellish particular doublings on grant and early descendant generations. modern competitive style of playing. C and D than you’d play now; it’s almost as if “I came across a song from Donald MacLel- “Some were very good pipers,” said Barry we’ve seen the playing pared down from a wide lan, a blacksmith and bard who composed a lot Shears. variety of technique to a more standard format. of poems and songs in Cape Breton. “George Dey, who eventually settled in People who knew Joe Hughie MacIntyre, one of “The song, entitled Òran a’Ghìogain (The Halifax, had come third in the gold medal the performers on the CD, said he could double Thistle Song), was published by his son, multi- competition at the Argyllshire Gathering in up on just about every note on the chanter. He instrumentalist and poet Vincent MacLellan, 1902 and second in 1903,” said Barry Shears. played two D grace notes on his doublings of in Failte Cheap Breatuinn around 1898. The “He’d been a student of John MacDougall C and B instead of the modern G and D grace song describes a ‘raid’ on a garden of overgrown Gillies when he managed the bagpipe firm of note configuration. “Moreover, some of the ear- thistles and the ‘attack’ was led by the ‘sweet Peter Henderson, Glasgow. Gillies gave him learned pipers didn’t play grips or toarluaths or fingering of the piper’ playingFailte Phrionnsa a nice letter of reference when he came here any of that kind of heavy embellishment. (the Prince’s Salute), a tune that’s often at- looking for work. Dey wandered around North “Also on the CD is a great recording sent to tributed to John McIntyre. So here’s an oral America, spending time in the United States me by Margaret Bennett, a well-known Scot- description of a MacIntyre tune being played and British Columbia where he was official tish folklorist who has researched the Gaels of in County in the 1830s-40s, close to piper for a time to the BC Pipers’ Society in Western Newfoundland,” said Barry Shears. where Robert MacIntyre and his family settled Vancouver. He returned to Halifax in 1912 and “It’s a short recording of Jimmy MacArthur, an around 1813. (See ‘The fate of Clanrannald set up shop teaching modern style piping and ear-trained piper from Newfoundland. Jimmy piper Robert MacIntyre’ by Barry Shears in Highland dancing. MacArthur’s ancestors came from Moidart and Piping Today No. 11, p 36-38.) “According to one of his students, he could Canna to Cape Breton in the mid 19th century “Piobaireachd was certainly something set up a whole in 10 minutes… he and left Cape Breton for the west coast of people recognised because, in this instance, it was quite a sound expert. Newfoundland in the 1860s. Jimmy plays the was being played to lead a group of local people “We had parallel piping cultures here for and , Tulloch Gorum and the Reel to ‘attack’ this overgrown field. And there are some time into the 20th century with the new o’ Tulloch, and there are no heavy low-G based other records of people playing piobaireachd in influence coming in from Scotland but the embellishments, just plenty of grace notes. And the 19th century, so the tradition was brought older style still healthily continuing, and I’ve he tunes his pipes to an E. to Nova Scotia but died out by the early part of tried to illustrate that on the CD. “I met Jimmy’s nephew a few summers ago the 20th century. After you’ve finished putting “Someone from the turn-of-the-century era and asked him to tune his pipes up and play a the hay in, or at a wedding in the winter time, who became a pillar of piping in Nova Scotia few tunes while I video-taped him,” said Barry you want to get up and dance — and that’s why was Kenneth MacKenzie Baillie, a Nova Sco- Shears. dance music was so integral to the lives of the tian from Pictou who joined the Royal Marine “After he finished playing I asked him, ‘Le- rural people here. Artillery in Britain,” said Barry Shears. “He onard, why did you tune your pipes to an E?’ “But one only has to hear the recordings of had a brilliant military career, and played the He looked at me and asked, ‘What’s an E?’ He the light music from Scotland to realise how uilleann pipes and the violin as well as the doesn’t read music and that was just the way much it has changed during the 20th century, Highland pipes. He’d learned his piping from he’d learned to tune his pipes. He plays both and to think that piobaireachd was a sacred Pipe Major Sandy MacLennan, a former gold bagpipe and violin by ear. cow that was somehow kept intact while other medalist, and Sandy’s daughter, Catherine, who “I found that very interesting because James forms of pipe music changed around it, that’s he later married. Catherine MacLennan was a Logan in his book, The Scottish Gael which was a view I just can’t believe. I doubt very much cousin of Lieutenant John MacLennan, G. S. published in 1831, wrote about pipers in parts that piobaireachd, as it is performed today, is MacLennan’s father, and she was a piper who of the Highlands who tuned their pipes to E the same as it was played in the Highlands over did a lot of teaching in Nova Scotia as well. instead of to the tonic A. Dr. William Don- 200 years ago. “So, on the CD, I have some literate pipers, aldson, writing in his book The Highland Pipe “Rory MacKinnon played snippets of a such as MacKenzie Baillie, and a few of his and Scottish Society, 1750-1950 was somewhat variation of Cha Till Mi Tuille (I Will Return No pupils, who play in the competitive style and the skeptical of that practice, but a few of the old More) for Helen Creighton, and my mother-in- rounder marches that were so typical of the late pipers over here were tuning their pipes to E. law’s family used a variation of the same tune as 19th century,” said Barry Shears. “And I have

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four or five tracks of ear-trained pipers.” evening for group and solo step dancing. and tips on playing Cape Breton style music He believes that amplification technol- “So it was quite a tradition,” he said. “I do and the differences between competition music ogy played a role in the final demise of the believe that the pipes were more popular than and dance music. ear-learned piping tradition: “electronic am- the fiddle in some areas of the Nova Scotia. “The importance of detailing descendant plification gave the fiddlers volume, along with “But it was starting to wane by the late pipers was to show how popular piping was the natural dynamics and musical range of the 1930s. among the New World Gaels,” said Barry violin. Pipers are restricted in that we can’t play “And some guy sitting down playing for Shears. “There were so many pipers here a note louder or softer on the pipes and we only square dances in a pair of pants didn’t fit into the that it sparked a cottage industry in bagpipe have nine notes. province’s post-war tourism strategy which set manufacture and we have the names of half a “An interestingly vivid description of a lo- out to portray Nova Scotia as a little Scotland dozen bagpipe makers in Nova Scotia in the cal dance scene was published in 1929 in the in North America. 19th century. Toronto Star: “American tourists would be persuaded to As well, of course, immigrant pipers took Early though it was in the afternoon the big barn come up and to see us, we’re a lot closer than instruments with them to the New World. “I already shook with the ardor of the main body Scotland, a lot easier to get to, and we can have a picture of the pipes Robert McIntyre of the dancers. The harrows and rakes and other wear kilts and, for two or three generations, brought to Nova Scotia, said to have belonged implements piled upstairs out of the way for this the Victorian interpretation of Scottish culture to his great grandfather, John MacIntyre of Ran- occasion, shook and rattled noisily. Sleighs, jingled was promoted heavily here to the detriment of noch,” said Barry Shears. “This was taken by a merrily in fitful starts at each ‘thump’ of the danc- the local Gaelic culture.” friend of mine at the home of one of MacIntyre’s ing feet below. The big room down there was dark “But as recently as the late 1950s and into descendants in Seattle, Washington. And there and the floor was jammed with young dancers. the early 1960s, people were still dancing to are a few examples here in Nova Scotia of two Two fiddlers sawed valiantly away in lively tunes pipe music in rural areas like Grand Mira and drone bagpipes to which a third drone (bass) as the dancers circled and swung with Scotch de- Ingonish.” has been added at a much later date. termination to lusty shouts of “Swing ‘er round”, The old ear-learned pipers were by then “We know when some of these instruments “All the Way”, “Grand right and left”. Four sets coming in for increasing criticism from mod- were made, or at least when they came to Nova were going at a time with moving figures barely ern Scottish-style players,” said Barry Shears. Scotia, so we know what they were doing in discernible through clouds of rising dust which “What upset me the most was when Seumas Scotland at that time in relation to things no one heeded. Scorning such fancy new-tangled MacNeill, principal of the College of Piping, like combing and beading, what the mounts things as these square dances and the effeminate came over to teach at the Gaelic College, begin- and bells were like and so on in the late 18th Sassenach music of the , in a smaller build- ning around 1955. According to local sources, century. ing, the older people danced with great vigor and he dismissed everybody who played in the old “There are about a dozen known sets of more joy than the younger ones. Scotch fours, reels Cape Breton way. He told them they didn’t immigrant bagpipes here in Nova Scotia that and solo dances to the tune of the pipes; and at know how to play and went to the extent of date from the late-18th and early-19th centuries times the smaller children joined them. One of the telling people to put their pipes away until he and there might be more. They are mainly in Campbell girls, Dolena [?], a dainty little ten-year could teach them properly. the hands of descendants of the people who old girl, danced with precision, grace and dignity “After he was here, the old ways of playing brought them here. an old Scotch solo which brought from her elders were branded as worthless and that was a part “I’ve collected a few sets, but others are in Wild highland cries of proud acclaim. Amid these of the reason it finally died out. It is unfortunate people’s basements and attics. Some have been older people each dance was a ceremony unto itself, that he didn’t do less teaching and more research thrown out. Some sets are known to have been and one set only occupied the floor while all others during those brief summer visits. lost: the instrument MacDonald of Glenaladale watched with faces only less grave than those of “If we’d had someone like an Angus MacKay, bought for his piper and bard, John MacGil- the dancers. They stepped the intricate measures a Donald MacDonald or a David Glen col- livray was destroyed in a house fire in the 1880s, of dances as old as their race, and no shouts of lecting in Cape Breton in the 19th century we and a well-worn, two-drone ‘Waterloo’ set was direction marred the beat of their feet no[r] the might have had a written record of a wonderful lost in a house fire in 1970. poetry of their movement.1 tradition but we didn’t and I feel we have lost “Some of this material is still around but a so much.” lot has been discarded or otherwise destroyed. “WHEN I went around in the early 1980s try- These are wonderful artifacts and they should ing to find step dancers who’d actually danced BARRY Shears’ appendices to Dance to the really be in a museum here in Nova Scotia, as to pipe music, I found only one or two,” said Piper: The Highland Bagpipe in Nova Scotia should the Iain Dall chanter, currently in pri- Barry Shears. “But then people would say, ‘that list the more than 80 immigrant pipers who vate hands, which I think is the oldest surviving old guy over there, he used to play for step settled in Nova Scotia and neighbouring areas, bagpipe artifact in North America. dancing’. So I’d go and see him, and hear about 1773-1849, and more than 300 of their first “These are priceless relics.” l these pipers in the 1920s who went around the and second generation piping descendants; FOOTNOTE: 1. Pearson, George (1929): ‘At the White Mill- communities and played… some of the more Scottish pipers from the Lowlands who came ers — a visit to Glencoe Mills In 1929’ (Toronto Star Weekly, popular pipers, such as The Burnt Piper, would to Nova Scotia in the post-immigration period, Saturday January 12, 1929; reprinted in The Clansman, June/ July 1991, pp 9, 43-44). Thanks to Kate Dunlay for supplying play all Sunday afternoon and well into the 1890-1950; references to local bagpipe makers; this reference.

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