TIME to tootle on your chanter, folks. Yep, our subject this week is the bagpipes. Before we start chuntering properly, aye we ken: nothing uniquely Scottish about them. Everybody else had them. Same with whisky, haggis, the kilt, blah-blah. Scottish, you say? We’ll soon see about that.

So, let’s get a few historic factoids oot the road. There appears to be some pretty ropey evidence that yon Hittites had them. Hittites: aye, thaim. Anatolians, don’t you know? Then the ancient Egyptians get dragged into the debate, followed by the Romans. Top emperor Nero is said to have been a bagpiper, though that might just be a mistranslation of “blowhard”, or possibly “windbag”, and there is no evidence that he played Senex Langus Syne on his pipes while Rome burned.

But, come on, are the bagpipes associated with Scotland? Yep, ’course they are. All the clans had their piper-in-residence, so to say, most notably the MacCrimmons, associated with the Clan MacLeod. Are you proud of the pipes? ’Course, you are. When you’re away, do they call you? Yep. They stir the blood, do they not? No? Nurse, bring a larger syringe full of adrenaline and Lagavulin.

Alas, much blood was stirred, indeed spilled I should say, in one of the earliest Scottish references to the pipes, at the Battle of Pinkie of 1547 which, in a surprise development, we lost. After the ’45, which we also lost, playing the pipes was supposedly banned for several decades. This is disputed by some historians though it’s certainly true that in November, 1746, piper James Reid, of Angus, was tried for treason and hanged in York after the court concluded his bagpipes were “an instrument of war”.

And war, indeed, played most merrily on the pipes in the years that followed. As the British Empire spread around the globe, so the pipes went with it. In the First World War, a solitary piper would lead Highland regiments – known to the Germans as “devils in skirts” or “the ladies from Hell” – over the top, their ancient martial spirit stirred by the noble quest to secure a square yard of mud for Britain.

As the 20th century progressed, the British Army’s use of the pipes deepened, though more for ceremonies of remembrance and so forth. A similar role is provided in America and, of course, Canada, notably when mourning fallen heroes such as police officers and firefighters.

Edinburgh has its annual Royal Military Tattoo, with massed bands, and European and world championships take place in normal, non-Covid times. But beyond this “official’ world, the pipes have continued as the people’s woodwind.

On YouTube, there’s a wonderful video of the “last train out of Glasgow” where strangers get up and dance and sing to a spontaneous performance by a piper. According to some sources, there is evidence of alcohol having been consumed prior to embarking on the the last train out of Glasgow at night.

At any rate, this fantastic piper plays a medley of tunes ancient and modern, thereby giving the lie incidentally to American author Jack Finney’s claim that: “When you’ve heard one bagpipe tune, you’ve heard them both.”

Also on YouTube, you can find a selection of videos by Jimi the Piper, including many works of his own composition, filmed around various parts of Scotland. Around about the turn of the century, Edinburgh filled up with busking bagpipers of various abilities, and Jimi was always the best of these, looking the part like a warrior from Braveheart and belting out tunes with subtlety and gusto as required.

If you prefer a girl with your skirl, Jim Ramsay has uploaded film of a “lone piper busking” on Glasgow’s Buchanan Street, she reportedly being Kristina MacDonald of Partick, while furth of Scotia a take on Amazing Grace by Archy J., “The Snake Charmer” and “India’s first professional bagpiper”, has had more than 30 million views. Phew!

If you still like your pipes played with sodjers, check out 5 Scots battalion marching into Canterbury to an appreciative welcome from the locals, who are treated to a medley including Cameron Loch (“I wish you were whisky”). That video has had more than 3 million views and, in the 3,000-odd comments, it’s instructive to read how many people from all over the world, not to mention English folk, are stirred by the sound.

Even before the days of YouTube, the pipes were being incorporated into modern music, not least in the wonderful work of the late and much lamented Canadian-Scottish multi-instrumentalist Martyn Bennett, known as “the techno piper”. The Red Hot Chilli Pipers describe themselves as “the most famous bagpipe band on the planet – ever!”, and who would dare disagree?

You may also have seen various drum-heavy “tribal” outfits strutting their stuff in the straths and shopping centres. And, of course, who can forget Paul McCartney’s Mull of Kintyre?

So, playing the pipes: it’s not as easy as it looks. And it doesn’t even look easy. The celebrated flautist James Galway once said: “I got to try the bagpipes. It was like trying to blow an octopus.” The problem is, you have to play the right notes on the chanter while blowing and squeezing the right amount of air into the bag.

Sounds too much like multi-tasking for this single-minded (only one brain) writer. And, of course, you need thick woolly socks for some reason and somewhere to practise, like your own island. Before droning to a halt here, I should give a shout-out to the Irish uilleann pipes and the Northumbrian smallpipes (think I first heard these on a Mike Oldfield album; lovely).

But it’s the piob mhor – the great pipe of the Highlands – that really tempts a chap to shout “Heuch!”, at least in the privacy of his own home. There are, I should add, people who can’t stand the pipes, something to do with the fact that it grates on their sensitive earlobes and is, I guess, an unrelenting, continuous sound. These people are Satanists and should be avoided.

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