Bagpipes, wooden flutes, whistles, tune writer. Isle of Lewis and Glasgow, Scotland. Member of Breabach. 
jamesduncanmackenzie.com

Electronic music with a touch of tradition.

Lorne MacDougall is one of Scotland's leading contemporary bagpipers and musicians.  He is known for seamlessly integrating his sounds into outstanding soundtracks with credits ranging from movies including  Disney Pixar’s “Brave” and DreamWorks’ “How to Train Your Dragon” trilogy to television shows like “Doctor Who” and “Thunderbirds”.  His musical talents have brought the attention of such luminaries as Academy Award Nominated composer John Powell describing him as “clearly a hybrid who really does understand the rest of the musical world from the point of view of a being a piper”.  Other recent soundtrack contributions include "Whisky Galore" by Patrick Doyle and "Victoria and Abdul" by Thomas Newman.

Lorne is one of Scotland leading innovative traditional musicians.  Recent times have seen him achieve a 2012 MG Alba Scots Music Awards Instrumentalist of the Year Nomination and previously placed 3 times in the BBC Radio Scotland Young Traditional Musician of the Year Final.  He has an Honours Degree in Scottish Music specialising in Bagpipes. 

As a recording artist he has recorded alongside a wide range of artists from Scottish legends Billy Connoly and BA Robertson as well as more recent stars like John Barrowman and two albums with Susan Boyle.  More global appearances include representing Scotland in Disney’s “It’s a Small World World” for it’s 50th Anniversary video for Disney World. In 2017 he recorded on D Imman's soundtrack of the successful Tamil action film "Bogan" in the song "Senthoora" reaching over one million YouTube views in just days. 

He makes regular media appearances ranging from talent shows like “The X Factor” and “Come Dine with Me” to crime dramas such as BBC 1’s “Shetland” and is no stranger to presenting being behind the online radio show “PlanetPipe” and occasional presenter on BBC Radio Scotland. 

His career has covered the wide spectrum of Scottish music from 5 years touring the USA and Europe with the established world renouned, pioneering traditional folk band The Tannahill Weavers to having had various roles on on all releases from the masters of modern bagrock, the Red Hot Chilli Pipers, being a driving force behind their music from inception. He produced one of their most successful pieces to date with "343 The Fallen" - a single released to commemorate the 15th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in the USA. 

As a composer his tunes have been recorded by some of the folk scene’s greatest artists as well as taken on board as the theme tune to Sky Sports’ SPL Football coverage. After releasing his highly acclaimed debut album “Hello World” in 2010 he is currently working on a follow up in 2018.

The Grace Note Factory©2019 is the product of many sleepless nights, coming up with an idea to bridge the gap between technology and tradition, without to sacrifice on either side.
Having been a professional bagpiper for over 30 years, I got early on interested in merging both worlds, the traditional Celtic and electronic music. I wanted to give the bagpipes new life and a special place within electronic ambient, dance and experimental music. Melody lines and harmonies, chopped up, destroyed and remixed would give the user so many different opportunities to make use of bagpipe sample loops. The general idea was to create a sample library none like any other.

All bagpipe samples were performed by myself and recorded through a variety of dynamic and condenser microphones in a fairly dead room. Different microphone placements made for interesting sound design opportunities. Some samples include only the melody parts played on the bagpipe chanter, some also include the two tenor and bass pitched drones. All samples were tracked and edited in Pro Tools with some additional mastering in Izotope Ozone. I decided to give some samples a “face-lift” through SoundToys processing to display the sonic opportunities for sound designers, musicians and producers.

All samples and loops were recorded and mastered in 44.1kHz, 16 bit mono audio and can be uploaded in your favorite DAW as playback loop or in your sampler and eurorack sample module.

Chop them up, distort them, play them backwards, pitch them up or down or completely destroy them!
Have fun!

The Grace Note Factory is following