Na Píobairí Uilleann

Chairman, NPU

An Píobaire

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8 1 13 20120206 13 started with Mike Robinson, guitar and Northumbrian small pipes beginner; Geoff Warren, fiddle (not photographed); Pat Gould- ing, Uilleann pipes; Mick Cannon, fiddle; Li- onel Miller, small pipes; and myself, small pipes. We regarded ourselves as founder mem- bers of the London branch of the Northum- brian Pipers’ Society but this never became official. Pat Goulding was born in Deptford, south-east London, in 1901. When his mother died c.1905 Pat and his brother were sent to live with their grandparents in Mallow, where his father was from. He returned to his father in Dept- ford in 1923 and worked as a barman while his wife ran a boarding house. Pat learned to play both the war pipes and uilleann pipes, and knew the several uilleann pipers around London in the 1920s and 1930s. He organised the Rotherhithe Pipe Band for the Gaelic League in the 1930s. Pat sometimes played in the Bedford, Camden Town, with Michael Gorman in the late 1950s. He associ- ated with a great many of the post-war immi- grant musicians and in 1957 was a founder member of the West London branch of Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann. He was chairman of the branch until he retired back to Mallow in the early 1980s. Lionel told me there was something special about his pipes but I am un- able to remember what it was – possibly that they were a B or B flat set. Mick Cannon. Regrettably, nobody remem- bers much about Mick who always came to the meetings with Pat. Jenny believes he was em- ployed on the construction of the London Un- derground Victoria Line at the time, but that’s all. Lionel Miller was born at Cove, near Farnbor- ough. His grandfather, a working jeweller, spe- cialised in filigree, and his father was a draughtsman. Lionel honed his inherent skills while an apprentice electrical mechanical engi- neer at the Royal Aircraft Establishment at Farn- borough. He spent a career as engineer in the Merchant Navy before joining the R&D elec- tronics branch of British Oxygen. He played Highland pipes in a pipe band in South Australia. After returning to settle in England he started his hobby of making Northum- brian small pipes and, later, a set of uilleann pipes, including bags, bellows and reeds. He continued his pipe-making, and maintenance of friends’ sets, during retirement at his home at Four Marks in Hampshire. I have no hesitation in describing his meticulous craftsmanship as the finest, working in ebony and African blackwood, German silver and ivory; beautifully fin- ished leatherwork and exquisite reeds. His work was admired when entered in the pipe makers’ class at the NPS’s competitions, but deserves to be more widely known. Lionel died in June 2011, aged 85. Two sets of his Northumbrian small pipes and a magnificent set of uilleann pipes are displayed at the Morpeth Bagpipe Museum. One of the small sets has a 17-key chanter, the ultimate test for any maker and testimony to Lionel’s immaculate stan- dard of work. Colin Ross, the well known Northumbrian pipe maker, remarked that he had never seen keys so well designed and finished, and fitted on the chanter. Lionel’s Australian wife, Rhonda, now 87, assures me that he made his set of uilleann pipes based on detailed measurements of Séamus’s pipes which Séamus entrusted to him for maintenance work from time to time. I recall Lionel being thoroughly unimpressed with some previous repairs, judging that they must have been done by a blacksmith! Lionel Miller Bob Rundle

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