Paddi Benson and Grace Lemon are two highly acclaimed Uilleann Pipers who met in London’s thriving folk music scene (pictured above with James Patrick Gavin). The pair joined forces in 2017 to write new music and explore the boundaries of piping, interchanging motifs and layering voices so that the two sets of pipes serve as accompaniment to each other.
Their current workings are centred around the archive catalogue held at the Bethlem Museum of the Mind; the historic mental health records of ‘Bedlam,’ and their resonance within the existing social context. The duo presents a blurred lines project, re-presenting people and places that underpin their music through sound, oration, projection and real-space intervention(s).
Here they talk about how they compose as a duo and their debut piece, acuriousdance.
A few months ago, Paddi sent me an article about the artist Wolfgang Buttress’s installation ‘Bees hum in the key of C.’ It was one of those moments when you smile at your phone and no further explanation is needed (a sure sign we’ve spent far too many hours playing together in the key of C). It was also a nod towards the fact that when we first started writing, the bee’s favourite key was the one to which we also gravitated; for example the ‘C’ on my chanter and the ‘G’ on Paddi’s chanter work so well together, as do the ‘A’ on mine and ‘C’ on Paddi’s.
Idiosyncratic harmonics became our starting point. For composers, this might be considered an unusual approach to writing and one that cannot be readily applied to most contemporary (and ‘reliably’ in-tune) instruments where standardisation means that the particulars of who is playing and which note, is irrelevant. If two concertina players played a ‘C’ and ‘G’, and then switched their ‘assigned’ notes, there would be less noticeable difference (if any) between the two harmonic stagings.
A fascinating aspect of the Uilleann Pipes, is that the pitch and tone of each note on each chanter will differ; it is both a curious and incorrigible instrument to compose on, particularly as a duo. Unconventionally, our writing is therefore done almost by trial-and-error, testing which combination of notes work best together.
Reflecting on the traditional practice of performing on the Uilleann Pipes, they were, until the mid 20th century, predominantly considered a solo instrument. Uilleann Pipes were originally flat pitched, from Bb to C#. In the 19th century, the Taylor brothers of Philadelphia designed ‘concert pitch’ pipes (in D) to be used in bands / dance halls. These were a good deal louder and brighter in tone, and crucially, could be played with a larger range of other instruments.
The ‘undesirable quirks’ and idiosyncrasies of the Uilleann Pipes prevailed – unlike most other instruments. Today’s ‘concert pitch’ sets are not tuned to an even temperament, making the intonation of our chanters and regulators central to our writing. We’re interested in how we can blend different combination of notes to create a broader range of sounds, as though we are responding to and interacting with each other like the right and left hand of a piano rather than on two separate instruments.
We’re currently working on our first piece, acuriousdance, where the blurring of lines between two voices underpins the story we are telling. Our intention is that the listener is caught between ‘who is playing what’, as we dissect segments into ‘call-and-response’ phrases, interchange between melody and rhythmic accompaniment, and, in slower movements, trigger each other to move to different notes at different times (for example, after Paddi lands on a certain note, I move to the next). This ambiguity and tonal blending was inspired by a line in Charles Dickens’ journal, The Uncommercial Traveller, where, walking passed the Bedlam Hospital in Southwark he commented, “Are not all of us outside this hospital, who dream, more or less in the condition of those inside it, every night of our lives?’ – a remark that sums up the wrongs of structural othering and the perversity of delineating the ‘affected’ from the ‘unaffected.”
Exploring the history of the Bedlam hospital(s), we found that in the mid 19th century a ballroom was built therein. Bedlam has become infamous worldwide – and the word itself has entered common usage – due to the worst, punitive excesses of asylums carried out there. In the 19th century, there began a very gradual shift in management of the hospital with a growing emphasis on care and wellbeing for patients. Acuriousdance, which takes its name from Charles Dickens’ description of a similar event at St Luke’s Hospital, is representative of these dances, taking the listener on a journey through jig and waltz motifs into more mournful and chaotic movements drawing attention to darker pervasions of Bedlam history. At the same time, we are mirroring but distorting the very dance hall setting in which concert pitch pipes were first performed.
In terms of what’s next for us, our writing is an evolving process and we are currently exploring how we can further exploit the mechanics of the pipes, from the clicks of the regulator keys to the breathing of the bellows. We will be performing acuriousdance throughout 2020 and hope to record in the latter half of the year.
To keep up-to-date follow Paddi Benson & Grace Lemon on @acuriousdance or visit their website www.paddiandgracemusic.com