Pipers takes the reader inside the world of the performer community of Scottish piping, introducing the instrument itself and the various different repertories. It also discusses piping techniques as well as information on some of the great piping dynasties and individual pipers. Dr Willie Donaldson shows how 'traditional music', often assumed to be the anonymous product of a dim and distant past, is the creation of gifted individuals operating in a sophisticated and vigorously ongoing enterprise. Since pipers have often been skilled also on the fiddle, keyboards and small-pipes, or as singers or dancers, their story offers fascinating insights into the whole traditional music and song repertoire of Scotland. Pipers is a well-informed and highly readable account by a prize-winning author who is a piper and composer of pipe music as well as an internationally recognised historian of Scottish tradition.

The Highland bagpipe has long been a central strand of Scottish identity, but what happened to the Highland bagpipe in the two centuries following Culloden? How was its music transmitted and received? This study presents contemporary evidence and uses a range of methods to recreate the changing world of the pipers as they influenced and were influenced by the transformation in Scottish society. This book is intended for pipers exploring the achievements and musical concerns of their predecessors; for the general reader interested in a music whose history is akin to that of Scotland's poetry and song; and for all students of the process of tradition.Combining newspaper and manuscript evidence from the pipers themselves with a wide range of historical sources, the author harnesses the insights of the practical player to those of the historian and provides a fresh account of the players and their musical traditions, which have previously been the subject of much myth-making. This is the first history of the musical culture of the worldwide piping community.

Death is inevitable, and yet the vast majority of the developed world seems to want to ignore this fact and avoid the sad inevitability. However, death is an inevitability, and trying to avoid talking about it is a mistake. Estimated Time of Departure takes readers on a journey of one man and his family having these discussions and how powerfully loving and revealing they were. In this funny, moving, poignant memoir, William Donaldson tells the story of how he talked with his parents over an extended period about their end-of-life thoughts and philosophy. He shares the sad, funny, maddening, sweet, and rewarding sides of this journey and makes a compelling and impassioned plea to readers to not miss this opportunity. They were not without sadness and challenges, but by virtue of talking and exploring the topic, the family came closer together and the inevitable passing became, while still sad, a cathartic, deeply rewarding event. Estimated Time of Departure was written to give readers the courage to have these discussions and shows that hope, love, and reverence can be seen by having them.

Every manager knows a business is a system, yet very few have studied systems thinking or system dynamics. This is a critical oversight, one which Simple_Complexity remedies. Simple_Complexity reveals the fundamental system archetype at work in your enterprise and prescribes new and exciting ways to re-invigorate your management thinking. Picking up where the greats in management thought leave off, Simple_Complexity provides a systems context that powerfully enriches traditional management thought and practice.