music
It Shouldn’t Happen To a Piper… WORDS I DONALD MACNAUGHTON
IMAGES I COURTESY LORNE COUSIN
If you’re one of life’s pessimists you probably believe that if opportunity ever knocked on your door, you’d be in the shower. Well, for a friend of mine, that could have been the case: opportunity did come calling and he was in the shower but fortunately for him, he’s living proof that it pays to be an optimist.
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usician Lorne Cousin who grew up in Campbeltown but now lives a Hollywood lifestyle in LA. His journey from the Highlands to California began with a chance encounter brought about by his passion for bagpipes. “My father, a vet, looked after the animals kept by the McCartney’s at their Highland home so through that I grew up with and became friends with Stella McCartney,” explains Lorne. “I suppose the story really begins with the day Stella asked me to play the pipes at her wedding on the Isle Of Bute but the real adventure begins a year later when one of her pals gave me a call. The phone rang when I was in the shower but the caller left a message on my answer machine – it was Madonna! It was quite a surreal experience, I can tell you,” he laughs. “The message said, ‘Hi, this is Madonna, I hope I‘ve got the right number, I‘m looking for Lorne…’ Imagine Madonna speaking to the answering machine in my wee Edinburgh flat! I phoned her back and someone-else answered the phone so I found myself saying, ‘Hello, is Madonna there? It’s Lorne here…’ When I heard myself saying that, I suddenly thought … hang on, what am I doing? Anyway, she’d seen me play at Stella’s wedding and wanted to talk to me about the possibilities of having bagpipes form part of her band. Long story short and all that, I went on tour with Madonna as part of her band in the World Reinvention Tour of 2004 and played the pipes and danced with her on stage in fifty-six shows around the world. The rest, as they say, is history!” Now, some might say that Lorne’s story equates to him becoming an overnight success but he actually began playing the bagpipes at the age of six so it took him many years of dedicated practice to
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achieve the level of skill that brought him to the attention of Madonna. However, when the ‘lucky break’ came and the opportunity was there for the taking, he was able to make the most of it.
“The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes” – Benjamin Disraeli After the tour, Lorne made the decision to stick with his musical career and returned to LA where he’s been based for three years. “There’s a lot of energy here in California, probably because there are so many people continually coming here trying to ‘make it’ but you probably can make it easier here, certainly in the entertainment industry, and there are greater opportunities to make money, compared to Britain anyway,” says Lorne, reaching forward to ‘touch wood’ as he speaks. “It’s less strange for people to do it
here but with so many people trying to do the same thing, you have to have something different; something that works, or a niche.” Self promotion, or blowing your own trumpet, is not something that comes naturally to most Scottish people. It’s not part of our culture to celebrate ourselves or our achievements, in fact anyone thought to be getting a bit full of themselves in the Highlands will no doubt find themselves getting cut quickly back down to size. “That’s probably one of the most noticeable cultural differences,” agrees Lorne. “Here in LA you have to be very forthright. You’re almost continually having to push and promote yourself, you have to just tell people what it is you’re good at, you can’t be subtle in any way, subtlety doesn’t work at all! It’s not something we like to do as Highlanders is it? What was it someone once joked – ‘I scored the winning goal in the World Cup ten years ago, but I didn’t like to say’” he laughs, nodding his head at how true it is. “You do have to promote yourself and it does go against the grain a bit because it’s not how we’re brought up but it’s what people expect here and it’s what they like; they like you to know people so you eventually get used to name-dropping!”
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“The harder I work, the luckier I get” – Gary Player The Hollywood experience and the celebrity parties haven’t changed Lorne’s down-to-earth approach to life and I’d say that’s quite an achievement in itself in a very ‘false’ environment. “It’s important to just be yourself and not to change who you are just to try and fit in. I think the people in power here, the ones who’ve got on here, have all learned to recognise the genuine people amongst the wannabes. But you also have to recognise your own strengths. My strength is that I’m from Scotland, and that’s what got me here. I was lucky with the Madonna tour in that she wanted a genuine Scottish aspect. She wanted all the kilts and the bagpipes and everything but she didn’t want to compromise on authenticity – it wasn’t all Brig-O-Doon,” smiles Lorne. “There’s no point in being false to try and get somewhere although I do have to milk the being Scottish thing a bit,” he laughs, pointing at his legs, “not wearing my kilt today!”
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Lorne, along with drummer Steve Sidelnyk who’s worked with the likes of Madonna and Seal, has now formed an amazing band named ‘DRAM!’ They made their first live appearance at the launch of the Dewar’s Academy of Whisky in Shanghai in 2007 and went on to play at the Sundance Film Festival in Utah. While they rapidly carve themselves a glittering career in the music industry with their popularity growing and an album now on iTunes, Lorne has remained true to himself and his passion for the bagpipes but he still continues to drive his ambition to make his music ‘the future sound of bagpipes.’ DRAM! have released a cracking version of Auld Lang Syne just in time for Hogmanay: what will your New Year resolution be? Who says it shouldn’t happen to a piper? It did. Who says it shouldn’t happen to you? n