Hobbies

Well, there is only one really, but I do go for that one for real.

Music

I love music, any and all music! (Except for most modern popular genres, which makes me hate what most people like – bummer.) I usually have a strong opinion on if a piece is good or bad, but this is not connected to genres, it is strictly for individual pieces. Here's a list of my current favourite genres:

• Ethnic music, especially
  • Classical Indian ragas (love the interesting scales and bends)
  • Mongolian and Tibetan larynx singing (soo amazing)
  • South African mbira music (Stella Chiwese, you are a goddess)
  • Scandinavian folk music (this is a latecomer on my list) especially
    • Erik Pekkari's accordeon playing
  • Celtic music of the traditional kind, not really the modern bland world music. Especially
    • Sharon Shannon's accordeon playing
• Classical western music (a very large genre, I know) especially
  • 18 century opera seria by Handel, Hasse and others (I have a soft spot for male sopranists)
  • Medeieval and renaissance music by Susato, Monteverdi and others. Performers I like are Joculatoris Upsaliensis and Convivum Musicum. Both are Swedish groups led by the same man, Sven Berger
• And last but not least, bagpipes. I, in contrast to some others in my band, like more than the Scottish Highland variety
  • Traditional Irish piping like performed by
    • Leo Rowsome (Possibly the most influential Irish piper ever)
    • Robbie Hannan, a very nice present day piper
  • But mainly solo music on the Scottish Highland bagpipes
    • And especially the classical genre Piobaireachd, a kind of raga for the bagpipes

More of this later.

My instruments

I started out on the recorder at the tender age of 7, like most people in Sweden did at the time. After one year of tuition, I was the only one left in the class, all others had quit to play football or whatever. But at this time the family moved from Enköping to Karlskrona, and I found myself in a bigger class which made it fun again. At this time my teacher wanted me to play the tenor recorder, to make it possible for us to play multi part pieces. This instrument was just too big for me – I simply couldn't reach the holes, which was very frustrating.

At the age of 10 I started out on the oboe in the Kommunala Musikskolan, an (at the time) very comprehensive music education that every not too small Swedish town provided for those who lived there. My teacher worked at the former military band in Karlskrona, Regionmusikkåren, and was a very nice man, although his pedagogical skills were perhaps not the best. Eventually I also got to play with that band and some other ensembles in the neighborhood on a few occasions. At the age of 15 I also started out on the bassoon, taught to me by the son of my oboe teacher. I've always been interested in trying my hands on other instruments as well. Early on I got myself recorders in different pitches and models, and at the age of 13 I persuaded my parents to get me a soprano crummhorn for Cristmas.

At the age of 17 (i.e. in 1979) I moved to Gothenburg. In that city I was not eligible for the Kommunala Musikskolan anymore, so I dropped the oboe and bassoon. But just a few weeks after the move, there was a tattoo in the city, where the two Pipe Bands, The Murray Pipes & Drums (of Gothenburg) and Gothenburg City Pipe Band, played. I immediately took contact with Mats, the Pipe Major of MPD, and the rest is history (literally).

Bagpipes

Incidentially I had already bought a tutor and a cheap practice chanter when I was attending a language course in England a year earlier. So I knew some of the fingering and techniques of the pipes already. And of course I already could read written music. This made me a very fast learner when it comes to the music and the fingering. Playing the bagpipes turned out to be another matter entirely, though.

Normally you don't touch the bagpipes for 6 to 12 months after you've started to learn the instrument. You stick with the practise chanter until you are fairly proficient and have at least several tunes under your belt. Since I learned to play the practise chanter really fast, I started on the pipes after abouth 5 months I think. But it was hard for me, probably because I already played several wind instruments. With mouth blown instruments the air flow directly affects the music, so you have to breathe in at appropriate places depending on the tune you play. Not so with the bagpipes! Here you strive to keep the bag filled at all times and this is done by blowing at regular intervals that has nothing at all to do with the music played. Anyhow, I had a hard time getting my mind to do this disconnect, and it took me about 6 months of hard work to be able to blow the bagpipes well enough to play with the band. Some people manage to do this immediately, like the first time they pick up a set of pipes. Yeah, some have it easy ...

My first public performance with the band was almost exactly one year after I first started to play.