Blankenheim Piping Course

As musical interests go – Northumbrian Piping is unsurprisingly fairly geographically limited …  to Northumberland.There are a fair number of pipers out there around the world and there a couple of annual gatherings in the US as well as a week long course in Germany.

25th-30th  April – the Blankenheim Bordunale is a fantastic event – French pipes, hurdy gurdy, song, dance as well as Northumbrian pipes. I met up with Ruprecht Niepold last year- he plays the cornemuse, a Baroque relative of the Northumbrian pipes. The plan is to play some duets together since we’re the instruments are both effectively in ‘old pitch’.

I always look forward to travelling there, the mix of languages is great and the people are a joy to be with. I also get to relearn the mazurka…