Award-winning Northumbrian pipers Jonathan Pearson & Alex Barrass pool their considerable resources to produce a showcase work.  A Trip to Stocksfield demonstrates, over 67 minutes, the power and charm of the Northumbrian Small Pipes.

AWARD WINNERS

Both Jonathan Pearson and Alex Barrass have been playing music for a goodly proportion of their lives.  Jonathan picked up his first instrument when he was seven years old and worked his way through brass, woodwind, guitar and drums before, at the 2023 Rothbury Festival, he was enticed to try the Nothumbrian Small Pipes.  Within two years, he was an award-winner on the instrument.

Alex’s introduction to the pipes came earlier – at his Hexham high school, when he was 15.  The enthusiasm and ability of his mentor Andy Lawrenson and tutor Chris Ormston inspired Alex to develop his style and technique and he won his first Open piping competition aged 19.  He’s now the most decorated piping competitor of recent years.

The pair hooked up on the Leeds folk circuit when they were both Leeds University students and they made their debut as a performing duo at the July 2025 Rothbury event.  If you weren’t already aware, you’ve probably realized by now that the Rothbury Traditional Music Festival is Ground Zero for Northumbrian pipers…

CAPABLE HANDS

Jonathan and Alex started work on A Trip To Stocksfield shortly after that debut performance.  The album is more than a mere collection of tunes, although the material featured here makes for very pleasant listening indeed.  No; a Trip to Stocksfield is a showcase that demonstrates what happens when two of the most accomplished pipers in the land get together to work their magic.

The album’s press release describes A Trip To Stocksfield as: “…over an hour of Northumbrian pipes, mandocello and melodeon.”  That’s a description that some may find somewhat daunting.  But, fear not.  We’re in four of the most capable hands that you could ever imagine and A Trip To Stocksfield is a pleasure – from start to finish.

The album comprises 12 sets of tunes and the listener quickly gets the feeling that these are tunes that Jonathan and Alex have honed by months and years of playing them in clubs, pubs and sessions, often in the company of other accomplished members of the piping community.  The material is a good mix of Jonathan’s own tunes, traditional tunes that are both well-known and obscure, tunes from the repertoires of some of the most famed composers of the folk genre (Jamas Scott-Skinner, Billy Pigg and Tom Clough) and the compositions of Jonathan’s and Alex’s contemporaries.

THE PIPERS CALL THE TUNES

Both Jonathan and Alex play their pipes and Jonathan also adds mandocello and melodeon.  As you’ll imagine, the focus is squarely and perpetually upon the pipes, but the backing instrumentation has been well-chosen and is used subtly and with discretion.  There are a couple of exceptions – in the rendition of Margaret Watchorn’s 14^th April, for example – where Jonathan’s melodeon takes its place on the front line, alongside the pipes.  But, usually, the melodeon is used to provide the foundation drone upon which everything else is placed.  And the mandocello sets the rhythm.

But A Trip To Stocksfield is all about the pipes and they’re played with a fluency and a joy that is quite breathtaking.  The duo have a real knack of selecting the right tunes to pair together and they exercise that knack seamlessly.  They’ll quite often start a set with a slow-paced tune and gradually pick up the pace as the set progresses.  And the effect, in pieces such as Cheviot Set, Back to Kirkwhelpington, and the eponymous A Trip to Stocksfield is akin to watching warmth and brightness spread, as the sun slowly rises.

SLOW, PACY & DOWNRIGHT RACY

Those three sets are all album highlights and there are several other high points, too.  Opening track George Carrick the Fiddler sets the template for the album with its mix of bright and wistful tunes and its blend of the traditional and the contemporary.  F Natural Set shows how easily the fiddle tunes of the great Scott-Skinner can be adapted for other purposes and, perhaps best of all, Kielder Castle’s merging of the slow, the pacy and the downright racy takes the listener’s breath away.

Whether you’re already in on the secrets that Northumbrian pipes have to offer or whether this represents the portal to a new and exciting world, my advice is the same.  Cock an ear to A Trip To Stocksfield.

Listen to George Carrick The Fiddler – the album’s opening track – below:

Jonathan Pearson & Alex Barrass: Bandcamp

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