Better than bagpipes – IOTW Report

Better than bagpipes

30 Comments on Better than bagpipes

  1. I must be weird or Scottish because I like bagpipes. I also like a good polka with accordions and Cajun music. The music I hate the most involves any kind of music with a sitar. And elevator music playing softly in the background when you’re at a store and you find yourself singing along with it. The worst is the damned music they play while I’m on hold on the phone waiting for the next available representative to answer my call, I’d like to kill whoever put that terrible earworm tune on Horizon Credit Union’s phone line when I’m calling to check my balance in my checking acct. since the credit union is physically closed because of the damn wu flu.

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  2. At the bottom left corner of the package: “Sorry for YOU loss”.

    I knew it!! Made in Chy-NA!

    I wonder how many of these were shipped with Newsom’s defective mask order.

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  3. Back about 1957 my parents dragged me on a vacation and away from my first girlfriend in life. The highlight was that the local news mentioned that the next morning would be a recreation of the battle history of the bagpipe…in the low mountains you could not see the enemy approach but you could hear them coming as about 100 pipes played sending the ever louder noise your way in an effort to psych out the enemy. It was indeed memorable, awesome and impressive . I became an instant fan and over the decades less so. 100 pipes in the mountains Good, one in a distance Good, all other bad. My dear friend Mackie, a ww 2 ACE, at his funeral knew this and in one of the four hills in Dallas, about a half mile from the grave site he requested one piper or fifty..he got one and it was great music when from afar…saved enough money by not going with fifty to party for two days..

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  4. …I learned to pipe as a nod to my Scots heritage, but kept it down to chamber pipes because it was mostly for my own amusement, and also because I don’t do it enough to be good. I’ve piped in my church and a couple of others, the one in the Black church being very much a novelty to them, but politely applauded nonetheless. I’ve also piped for a couple of funerals, the one for my friend’s 3 month old being the hardest, but my public piping now is mostly limited to going to the cemetary for my long departed father on his birthday and on Father’s day. Had to go early for his birthday ’cause they Covid-closed the cemetary just before the actual day, but I was there Sunday for Father’s Day with chanter and drones. And no, I don’t dress with kilt and sporran althogh I have the heritage (and the legs) to support it, but I just go as a son who still misses his father.

    It’s an acquired taste to be sure, but it does bring some comfort. My mother appreciates that I remember him this way and goes with me at times, and I will do the same for her in her time should it precede mine. Those I’ve piped for seem to take some solace in it, and I’ve had people come up to me in the cemetary weeping and thanking me for it when it touched them as they contemplated their departed, even though it wasn’t intentional on my part.

    You never know who’s listening.

    I never do more than 3 verses of “Amazing Grace”, less if it’s raining or if I’m winded for some reason, so I’m not bugging anyone for long. If anyone or any cemetary’s been bothered by it, they’ve never said anything.

    For a funeral, I’ll usually start piping some distance from the grave and walk up on the first verse, play a second verse at grave side, then walk slowly away on the third verse, sort of commemorating the arrival, life, and departure of the loved one by the way the sound approaches and retreats. I’ve seen more elaborate rituals where a piper will walk to the grave piping, where a second piper already is who joins him in the second verse, then the first piper stops and the second piper walks away, but I’ve not participated in one like that myself, again I’m just not that good.

    The only real complaints I’ve had is from my birds. My Quaker parrot absolutely HATES my pipes and bitches up a storm when I rehearse, but like I said, I don’t pipe that often, so no need to call the SPCA or PETA.

    So, think what you want about the pipes, but know that they do bring some people some comfort in difficult situations.

    Which is all we can do for one another at times.

    Hate me if you want, I’m gonna do it anyway at those times and whenever the Spirit moves me, as long as I have breath in my body.

    Maybe one day, my son will do the same for me.

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  5. …as to the kazoo, I like Douglas Adams’ take on it…

    “The cheery quality of Ford’s voice was beginning to grate on the barman’s ears. It sounded like someone relentlessly playing the kazoo during one of the more somber passages of a war requiem.
    -Douglas Adams, “So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish”

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  6. I once saw The Tannahill Weavers back in 1984, a Scottish band who play great bagpipe music use a didgeridoo for the bassline, it was quite impressive. They were playing at a small tavern where we were packed in like sardines, we were definitely a standing room only crowd. And boy oh boy was the music ever loud inside that small tavern, it was a great night with great music. The name of the Tavern was the Viking Tavern.

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