Pipehacker Tip: Create Your Bagpipe Practice Infographic by Vince Janoski

Do you know what it is you spend your time on? Previously, I’ve talked about treating your bagpiping like finance and money and taking stock of your intangible assets. Well, also like finance, you also must take stock of your spending if you are to see where your money goes. Like money, time is an [...]

Pipehacker Tip: Tracking Your Practice by Vince Janoski

Time is a valuable thing. Given the demands of everyday living, it is often hard to fit in the full amount of time one needs for good practice. An active solo competing piper can reach a point where he or she is developing and polishing 15 or more separate pieces of music. A band player [...]

The 5 Best Recording Devices for Musicians by Vince Janoski

The Bullettproof Musician blog is a great place for performance advice and the psychological side of playing music. The latest post lists the five best music recording devices favored by readers. A great snap review of the best tools available to playing musicians. Pipehacker’s favorite, the Zoom H2, features third after the iPhone! You will [...]

The 3-Step Path to Better Bagpipe Goals: “Goal Chunking” by Vince Janoski

The fall and winter months are the perfect time for setting musical goals and developing and building skills to improve your bagpiping. Sometimes though, setting goals can be daunting and the day-to-day trappings of life distract us. We lose track and the work toward our goals, even if you eventually get there, seems never ending. [...]

Pipehacker Project: Recording Your Professional Personal Piping Performances by Vince Janoski

You’re serious about your bagpiping, right? Of course you are. You take all the necessary steps to treat your instrument with care and acquire all the skills and knowledge you need to play good music. So why wouldn’t you treat other aspects of your bagpipe progress with the same import? It always surprises me that, [...]

No-Nonsense Bagpiping by Vince Janoski

It is a month past, but the SFU Highland Arts Festival held the weekend after the band’s terrific performance at New York’s Lincoln Center is still fresh in my mind. I had several fits and starts for a post about the workshop but nothing I wrote captured the right tone. I could talk about the [...]

The Bagpipe Happiness Principle by Vince Janoski

Time is money, they say. If that is true, then what are you spending your money (time) on? “They” also say money can’t buy happiness. But I disagree. If you spend smartly, you can use your hard-earned cash on things that will improve and/or add value to, your life—the things that will bring you closer [...]

Hack Your Practice: Being a Better Bagpiper with E’s by Vince Janoski

All of us want to be better bagpipers, right? Bagpiping is one of those art forms that never stops giving and compels people to never stop working. That is essentially what is at the heart of previous posts such as “5 Ways to Become a Better Bagpiper” and “5 Ways to Build Good Practice Habits.” [...]