There is periodic discussion of non-traditional kilts on the forums to which I belong. Lately, someone posed the question, Have you seen anyone compete solo wearing a Utilikilt? I usually comment on these threads, since, unlike the majority of pipers, I regularly wear both traditional and non-traditional kilts.

Many pipers (or at least, the vocal ones) do not like the Utilikilt. I have seen it disparagingly called an Extremetoolbelt and also a Potato Sack. Funny thing is, I don’t think the makers and wearers of the UK would really care - in fact, they would probably think it was funny. I know I did.

But, since the question posed referred to playing in a competition setting, I thought these pictures might be helpful. Imagine you are a judge and one of these three pipers has just stepped up to play his tunes for you. Who will you pick?

Well, I found out more about the tune Lament for the Rowan Tree, courtesy of the Bob Dunsire Bagpipe Forums.

Turns out it was inspired by the abandoned cottages of crofters who had left the highlands. Here is what the composer, Donald MacLeod, wrote about the tune in his book of piobaireachd:

Traveling through the Highlands, one often sees the ruins of crofter’s cottages, left derelict when the occupants sailed away to begin a new life in a new country.

At the gable end of each ruin stands the Rowan Tree, planted so long a go as a defense against evil spirits. It has witnessed the joys and sorrows of family life and listened to the laughter of children, as they played around the house. The lonely Rowan now stands sentinel, as if awaiting the long absent family’s return.

Interestingly, another Donald MacLeod, over a century earlier, was a witness to the forced removal of the highland crofters from their land during what is now known as the Highland Clearances. The earlier MacLeod was a stonemason on the estate of Strathnavar. Here is how he described the scene (repeated all over the Highlands during this period), as the residents were evicted from their crofts and the crofts were burned:

Nothing but the sword was wanting to make the scene one of as great barbarity as the earth ever witnessed. The consternation and confusion were extreme. Little or no time was given for the removal of persons or property; the people striving to remove the sick and the helpless before the fire should reach them; next, struggling to save the most valuable of their effects. The cries of the women and children, the roaring of the affrighted cattle, hunted at the same time by the yelling dogs of the shepherds amid the smoke and fire, altogether presented a scene that completely baffles description.

We are a homeschooling family, and my children and I have been studying the period of forced removal of the Indian Nations of North America to reservations during roughly this time period. It seems that many of the evicted Highlanders ultimately forced to emigrate could have witnessed scenes in the new continent similar to those they left behind.

No doubt the depradations suffered by the native peoples of this continent are recalled in their laments too.

At this time of year (halfway between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox) the Celtic peoples observe a festival called Imbolc. This observance has spread out with the people, and is also observed here in the United States, where it is sometimes called Groundhog Day.

Apparently, the festival has traditional links with the Rowan Tree, the ubiquitous tree of the Highlands. Not surprisingly, there are tunes about the Rowan Tree. The best known is the 4/4 march of that name, a standard for any pipe band. Perhaps not so well known by pipers is the fact that the tune has words, and very beautiful ones at that. Here is the first stanza:

Oh! rowan tree, oh! rowan tree,
Thou’lt aye be dear to me,
En twin’d thou art wi’ mony ties
O’ hame and infancy.
Thy leaves were aye the first o’ spring,
Thy flow’rs the simmer’s pride;
There was na sic a bonnie tree
In a’ the countrie side.
Oh! rowan tree.

The tune and words date from the early 19th century, and the focus on family ties the words to the Imbolc celebration, which tended to be one of family and community. One of my extended family of friends has a daughter called Rowan. I used to play The Rowan Tree to her before she was born. (I’m sure this is the deep-seated reason she has such a love of music - at 2 3/4 she is a self-described opera diva.)

More recently (in piping terms), Pipe Major Donald MacLeod composed an elegant piobireachd called Lament for the Rowan Tree. I am trying to find out more about this tune. Superficially, it sounds as though it may be based on the familiar song, but I don’t have the sheet music and it’s not that easy to tell. I will pick the (multiple) brains of the piping forums.

In any case, the days are lengthening and that’s always a welcome sign.