Bill Ochs

Teaches at Irish Arts Center

Bill Ochs has been called a "central figure in the renaissance of the tin whistle" by National Public Radio's All Things Considered and "the leading tin whistle teacher in North America" by New York's Irish Voice newspaper. He has devoted over thirty-five years to playing and teaching the instrument. Ochs is author of The Clarke Tin Whistle, an instruction book now in its eighteenth printing with over 237,000 copies in print. He is producer of Micho Russell's Ireland's Whistling Ambassador, and co-producer of Cathal McConnell's Long Expectant Comes At Last, both of which were nominated for "Best Celtic Album of the Year" in the NAIRD Indie Awards. Ochs also plays the Irish uilleann pipes, which he learned from master pipers Andy Conroy, Pat Mitchell and Tom Standeven in Ireland and the U.S. Ochs's piping studies in Ireland were supported by a 1976 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. His piping and tin whistle playing can be heard on the Rounder CD Light Through The Leaves. Ochs's performing credits include playing for José Quintero's Broadway production of A Touch of the Poet, Pilobolus Dance Company's Broadway début, the soundtrack for Bob Rafelson's film Mountains of the Moon and the première of Wind by Eiko and Koma at the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival. He was also piper in the original touring lineup of The Green Fields of America, which included Liz Carroll, Jack and Charlie Coen, Michael Flatley, Sean McGlynn and Mick Moloney. Ochs has written on Irish music for New York Magazine, Sing Out, The Pipers' Review and other publications. He is currently working on a book about the music of Micho Russell.