Once again the pipers' gathering to honor the memory of two great uilleann pipers from the traveling community in Ireland, Johnny and Felix Doran, is taking place this weekend in Spanish Point, Co. Clare. 

A year ago, thanks to the encouragement of Ennis man Oliver O'Connell, one of the Doran Committee organizers, I paid a flying visit to this festival weekend which in 2008 was marking another centenary, that of the birth of Johnny Doran, who died tragically at the age of 42 in 1948. 

While the harp may appear to be Ireland's national symbol, when it comes to the pure drop cognoscenti, the uilleann (elbow) pipes are the instrument that serves as the most inspiring because in the right hands, its music stirs the soul, heart and mind. 

Piping Tionols are plentiful now, but the memory of that one a year ago was vividly brought home to me with the newly released DVD "Traveller Piper: A Celebration of the Piping Tradition of Johnny and Felix Doran," produced for Na Piobairi Uilleann by Artisan Productions (www.pipers.ie). 

If you want some insight into the cult of Irish pipers this video compilation capturing the highlights and salient commentary of the festival at the Bellbridge Hotel overlooking the craggy west coast of Clare makes a welcome addition to your music library.

Moving this event to West Clare from its original Wicklow setting where the Dorans were reared, in part, pays homage to piper Willie Clancy, whose Miltown Malbay roots gave rise to the summer school there named after him and John Kelly Senior, from nearby Kilbaha, whose music show in Dublin attracted all the great musicians.

Clancy took lessons from Doran whenever he was in the locality like at the Miltown races, while Kelly helped promote and preserve Doran's genius and craft on the pipes by getting him recorded by Ireland's Folk Commission back in 1947, a year before his untimely death.

Those recordings on acetate allowed several generations of pipers since to be inspired by his great playing, and also recognizing the role of the travelers in spreading traditional Irish music around the island before mass media and technology had the hold it has on us now.

The DVD runs only an hour and a quarter, but it captures the setting and the high regard that the capacity audience and weekend attendees had for the Doran influence. 

Among the pipers who played in the concert on Saturday where some excerpts appear are John Rooney, Mickey Dunne, Paddy Keenan, Finbar Furey. Fiddler John Kelly Junior serves as an appropriate surrogate for his father on the disk, as he did on the weekend bringing his children Aoife, Lia and John down to play from their home in Dublin.

Later on they joined a mighty array of pipers in a sitting room of the Bellbridge Hotel for a late night session that still burns bright in my memory, though it does not appear on the DVD nor do any of the other multiple sessions held over that weekend.

The DVD (good for all regions) can be purchased through the website of Ireland's premier organization devoted to the promulgation of the uilleann pipes, Na Piobairi Uilleann (the Pipers Association).  One of their activities is to encourage Tionols and summer schools where piping is prominent, and as part of that they offer scholarships to the various summer schools including the Catskills Irish Arts Week this year for the first time.

Further details are available on their website. f you are ever in Dublin, it is worth a visit to their historic Henrietta Street HQ in a Georgian era building lovingly restored with funding from their primary benefactor, the Arts Council of Ireland.