Video Transcript:

Today I’m going to help you elevate your bagpipe fingering technique with one of my favorite exercises. It will help you with one of the most important gracenote combinations found in virtually every type of bagpipe tune, and that is the GDE. From jigs and reels to strathspey and marches, piobaireachd, and more, GDEs are more than just a combination of gracenotes; they’re the building blocks of your technique. Mastering your GDEs is essential for improving your technique and helps you play cleaner, faster, and with better consistency.

In today’s video, we’re focusing on one of my favorite exercises I call “Power GDEs.” You can download a PDF of this exercise right now from BagpipeLessons.com. A link is also in the description below. It’s designed to help your fingering, so your gracenotes are executed flawlessly, so you can play your tunes with consistency and confidence. It’s part of my series I’ve created that I call the Power Exercises Series, which includes Power Doublings, Power Taorluaths, Power Birls, Power D Throws, and more. All of these exercises are available exclusively to members of my BagpipeLessons.com Inner Circle Membership.

Joining my Inner Circle gives you complete access to all of these exercises and hundreds of lessons, videos, tunes, and exercise, and weekly live classes with me, to help you take your piping to the next level. Whether you are a brand-new piper or have lots of experience, there’s something for you at the Inner Circle. Learn more and join today at BagpipeLessons.com/membership.

The beauty of GDEs lies in their versatility and their role in helping you develop speed and control. The GDE is a foundational element, and mastering the GDE will help you master other embellishments across all of your other tunes. Today’s exercise is all about deliberate practice, aimed at achieving clear, clean, and consistent GDEs. We’ll explore GDEs played on the same note, like low A, low A, low A, and those involving changing notes, like C low A, low A.

When you practice your GDEs, make sure all three gracenotes are identical in size to keep them sounding crisp and clear. Rhythmically, the goal is to space the gracenotes evenly, so the melody notes are of identical length. We’ll go through an exercise that starts with eight reps of each GDE combination, then four, then two, and finally one. This structure allows you to progressively warm up your fingers and master these note combinations, eventually building up speed and fluency.

Here are a few things to keep in mind while playing this exercise: always maintain good form, which means keep your hands loose and light on the chanter. Don’t grip or squeeze. It’s totally natural to tighten up as you focus on clean, consistent fingering, but your goal is to keep your hands relaxed and controlled, never tight. If you find your hands are getting tired or tightening up, take a quick break, something like 20 or 30 seconds, shake out your hands, and then try again. If your fingers won’t do what you want them to do, relax, try again, or take a quick break. Never play tight.

Also, keep your fingers close to the chanter. This helps you play clean and fast. High finger height slows you down. Listen carefully for crossing noises and make sure you’re not cutting the first note, especially in these combinations that are similar to tunes that start with C-A or B-G. Read the music, even if you have the exercise memorized. Keep your eyes on the music and use the practice to help your sight-reading skills. Tap your foot. The key to steady, consistent timing is a steady, confident foot tap. Play slow; keep things slow and controlled. If you feel you can’t keep up or if you feel overwhelmed by the reading or playing of the exercise, slow it down. The secret to playing well at a faster tempo is to play well at a slower tempo first. Get control, and then things will speed up over time.

Use a metronome. The metronome does one thing extremely well: it keeps a steady beat. Use your metronome to keep things rock solid as you develop and refine your own internal sense of beat. I love to practice my exercises with the metronome, which helps me stay controlled and precise with my timing. To get the most out of your limited practice time, you can use your exercises to work on the fingering technique and the timing and the rhythm because that’s the ultimate goal, right? To play clean and controlled and to use your good technique to play music.

The metronome I’m using is the Pipers Metronome. It’s an app I created specifically for pipers and the way we play and practice our tunes. It has tons of fantastic features you won’t find in any other app. You can get it for Apple and Android, and it’s a free download from the app store or from PipersMetronome.com. After trying it out for free, you can upgrade to the full version to unlock all of the cool features.