A bagpipe minimally consists of an air supply, a bag, a chanter, and usually a drone.
Some bagpipes also have additional drones (and sometimes chanters) in
various combinations, held in place in stocks—connectors with which the
various pipes are attached to the bag.
Air supply
The most common method of supplying air to the bag is by blowing into a blowpipe, or blowstick. In some pipes the player must cover the tip of the blowpipe with his tongue while inhaling, but modern blowpipes are usually fitted with a non-return valve which eliminates this need.
An innovation, dating from the 16th or 17th centuries, is the use of a bellows to supply air. In these pipes, (sometimes called coldpipes) air is not heated or moistened by the player's breathing, so bellows-driven bagpipes can use more refined and/or delicate reeds.
The possibility of using an artificial air supply, such as an air compressor, is occasionally discussed by pipers, and although experiments have been made in this direction, widespread adoption seems unlikely for the time.
Bag
The bag is simply an airtight (or nearly airtight) reservoir which can hold air and regulate its flow while the player breathes or pumps with a bellows, enabling the player to maintain continuous sound for some time. Materials used for bags vary widely, but the most common are the skins of local animals such as goats, sheep, and cows. More recently, pipers have started to use bags made of synthetic materials including Gore-Tex; synthetic bags are the most common.
Bags cut from larger materials are usually saddle-stitched with an extra strip folded over the seam and stitched (for skin bags) or glued (for synthetic bags) to reduce leaks. Holes are cut to accommodate the stocks. In the case of bags made from largely-intact animal skins the stocks are typically tied into the points where limbs and the head joined the body of the living animal, a construction technique common in Central and Eastern Europe.
A major innovation in bag design since the 1990s is the addition of
moisture control systems to bags for mouth-blown pipes that keep
moisture from the piper’s breath from condensing on the pipes, drones,
and reeds, a situation that can lead to decay and other problems, such
as reed malfunction. Bags with zippers can be fitted with moisture
control cartridge systems attached to the drone stocks to remove
moisture as air passes through bentonite
clay particles. Corrugated tube traps attached to blowpipe stocks also
aid in moisture control. These types of systems require bags with
zippers.
Chanter
The chanter is the melody pipe, played by one or two hands. A chanter can be bored internally so that the inside walls are parallel for its full length, or it can be bored in the shape of a cone. Additionally, the reed can be a single or a double reed. Single-reeded chanters must be parallel-bored; however, both conical- and parallel-bored chanters operate with double reeds, and double reeds are by far the more common.
The chanter is usually open-ended; thus, there is no easy way for the player to stop the pipe from sounding. This means that most bagpipes share a legato sound where there are no rests in the music. Primarily because of this inability to stop playing, grace notes (which vary between types of bagpipe) are used to break up notes and to create the illusion of articulation and accents. Because of their importance, these embellishments (or ornaments) are often highly technical systems specific to each bagpipe, and take much study to master.
A few bagpipes (the musette de cour, the uilleann pipes, and the Northumbrian smallpipe) have closed ends or stop the end on the player's leg, so that when the player covers all the holes (known as closing the chanter) it becomes silent. A thick leather leg strap, known as a "Pipers Apron" is used for this purpose. This allows for staccato playing on these instruments, although even where the chanter can be silenced, complex embellishment systems often exist. Momentarilly silencing the open end of the Uilleann pipe chanter on the "Apron" allows the melody pipe to sound the next register. This is not done on other forms of bagpipes.
Although the majority of chanters are unkeyed, some make extensive use of keys to extend the range and/or the number of accidentals the chanter can play. It is possible to produce chanters with two bores and two holes for each note. The double chanters have a full loud sound comparable to the "wet" sound produced by an accordion. One ancient form of twin bore, single reed pipe is the "Scottish Stock and Horn" spoken of by Robert Burns.
An unusual kind of chanter is the regulator of the uilleann pipes. This chanter is in addition to the main melody chanter and plays a limited number of notes, operated by the ends of the palms pressing down the keys. It is fitted in the stock for the drones and laid across the knees, allowing the player to produce a limited but effective chordal accompaniment.
A final variant of the chanter is the two-piped chanter (confusingly also usually called a double chanter). Two separate chanters are designed to be played, one with each hand. When they are played, one chanter may provide a drone accompaniment to the other, or the two chanters may play in a harmony of thirds and sixths (as in the southern Italian zampogna), or the two chanters may be played in unison (as in most Arabic bagpipes). Another form is called a "Magdeburg Pipe/Schaper Pfeiff", found in the plates of the "Syntagma Musicum of 1619" by Michael Preatorius.
Because of the accompanying drone(s), the lack of modulation in bagpipe melody, and stable timbre of the reed sound, in many bagpipe traditions the tones of the chanter are appropriately tuned using just intonation.
Drone
Most bagpipes have at least one drone. A drone is most commonly a cylindrical tube with a single reed, although drones with double reeds do exist. The drone is generally designed in two or more parts, with a sliding joint so that the pitch of the drone can be manipulated. Drones are traditionally made of wood, often a local hardwood, but also (particularly nowadays) from tropical hardwoods, such as rosewood, ebony, or African Blackwood, and sometimes from brass or plastic (for modern pipes designed only for practice playing). Some drones have a tuning bead, which effectively alters the length of the drone by opening a hole, allowing the drone to be tuned to two or more distinct pitches. The tuning bead may also shut off the drone altogether. In general, where there is one drone it is pitched two octaves below the tonic of the chanter, and further additions often add the octave below and then a drone consonant with the fifth of the chanter. This is, however, a very approximate rule of thumb.
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History
Ancient origins
It seems likely the bagpipe was developed from (and coexisted with) an instrument similar to a hornpipe or shawm. Indeed in several different piping traditions today the bagpipe is played alongside a shawm-like instrument, in Brittany, Galicia, Italy, Aragon, Catalonia, Asturias, Istria, Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia, Macedonia. Where or when a bag was first attached to one of these instruments is likely to remain a mystery. However, although the Aramaic word sum·pon·yah´ (סומפניה), appearing in Daniel 3:5, 10, and 15, has been translated "dulcimer" (a stringed instrument) and "symphony", modern Bible translations generally render the expression as "bagpipe." Koehler and Baumgartner's Lexicon in Veteris Testamenti Libros gives the meaning "bagpipe" (Leiden 1958, p. 1103).
The earliest possible reference to a bagpipe occurs around 400 BC, when Aristophanes, the Athenian poet jibed that the pipers of Thebes (an enemy of Athens) blew pipes made of dogskin with chanters made of bone. [1] Several hundred years later, Suetonius described the Roman Emperor Nero as a player of the tibia utricularis (Life of Nero, 54). Nero is reported to have said he would play the bagpipe in public as a penance for not winning a poetry contest.[citation needed] Dio Chrysostom,
who also flourished in the first century, wrote about a contemporary
sovereign, probably Nero, who could play a pipe ("aulein") with his
mouth as well as with his "armpit" (Or. 71.9).
From this account, it has been deduced that a true bagpipe was used —
having a blowpipe, bag and a chanter; probably a double chanter since
double pipes were used at this time). A coin of Nero depicts a bagpipe,
according to the 1927 edition of Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.
Spread and development
Prior to the 12th century, only a few Pictish and Irish stone carvings record the continued existence of bagpipes during this time.
The time in which bagpipes were first introduced to the British Isles is debatable. Findings of statuettes of bagpipers in Roman era archaeological digs in England suggest the probability of Roman introduction. Ireland has references going back at least to the Middle Ages. There are also the stone carvings previously mentioned which date back to the 8th century, as well as Pictish carvings from the 8th century.[1] An explosion of popularity seems to have occurred from around the 12th century; the tune used by Robert Burns for "Scots Wha Hae", "Hey Tutti Taiti", is traditionally said to have been the tune played as Robert the Bruce's troops marched to the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314. During the 12th century, Europe underwent a flourishing of art and culture as her horizons were being expanded with the crusades. The bagpipes were no exception, and many of Europe's unique bagpipes began to develop around this time.
Actual examples of bagpipes from before the 18th century are extremely rare; however, a substantial number of paintings, carvings, engravings, manuscript illuminations, and so on survive. They make it clear that bagpipes varied hugely from set to set. It seems likely that bagpipe makers at that time would have mostly been primarily woodworkers or turners with an incomplete grasp of the art of pipemaking.
The role of the bagpipe would have varied naturally from place to place, but in Bulgaria it was said, "A wedding without a bagpipe is like a funeral," and in Britain they were a common adjunct to religious festivals. In Britain, pipers became part of the travelling minstrel class, acting as carriers of news, gossip and music around the country. In the Scottish Highlands, the pipers started to displace the harpers, the chief Celtic musicians since Roman times, by about the 16th century. In 1760, the first serious study of the Highland bagpipe and its music was attempted, in Joseph MacDonald's 'Compleat Theory'. Further south, we have a manuscript from the 1730's by a William Dixon from Northumberland. This contains music which fits the Border pipes, a nine-note bellows-blown bagpipe whose chanter is similar to that of the modern Great Highland Bagpipe; however the music is quite different, consisting mostly of extended variation sets of common dance tunes. Some of the tunes in the Dixon MS correspond to tunes found in early 19th century published and MS sources of Northumbrian smallpipe tunes, notably the rare book of 50 tunes, many with variations, by John Peacock. The Northumbrian sources give a view of a separate and very distinct piping tradition from that of the Great Highland Pipes.
As Western classical music developed, both in terms of musical
sophistication and instrumental technology, bagpipes in many regions
fell out of favour due to their limited range and function. This
triggered a long (but slow) decline which continued in many cases into
the 20th century
Recent history
During the expansion of the British Empire, spearheaded by British military forces which included Highland regiments, the Great Highland Bagpipe was diffused and has become well-known world-wide. This surge in popularity was boosted by large numbers of pipers trained for military service in the two World Wars. The surge coincided with a decline in the popularity of many traditional forms of bagpipe throughout Europe, which began to be displaced by instruments from the classical tradition and later by gramophone and radio. Police forces in Scotland, Canada, Australia and the USA (although not as commonly widespread) have also formed pipe bands. The Tayside Police Pipe band, still in existence, was founded in 1905. In the United Kingdom and Commonwealth Nations such as Canada and New Zealand, the bagpipe is commonly used in the military and is often played in formal ceremonies. Foreign militaries patterned after the British Army have also taken the Highland bagpipe into use, including but not restricted to Uganda, Pakistan, and Oman, effectively spreading official military use to Africa, Asia and the Middle East, respectively.
In the modern era the use of bagpipes has become a common tradition for military and police funerals and memorials in the anglophone world, and they are often used at the funerals of high-ranking civilian public officials as well. Weddings, dances and parties are also venues for piping.
In more recent years, often driven by revivals of native folk music and dance, many types of bagpipes have resurged in popularity, and in many cases instruments that were on the brink of extinction have become extremely popular. In Brittany, the concept of the pipe band was adopted, the Great Highland Bagpipe was brought in and the bagad was created, a showcase ensemble for Breton folk music. The pipe band idiom has also been adopted in Spain where various types of band are popular.
In English-speaking regions, a bagpipe player is known as a "bagpiper" or "piper," and the surname Piper derives from the latter term. Other European surnames, such as Pfeiffer (German), Gaiteiro (Portuguese-Galician), Gaiteru (Asturian), Gaitero (Spanish), Dudák or Gajdar (Czech), Dudás, Sipos, or Gajdos (Hungarian), Zampognaro (Italian), Tsambounieris (Greek), Gaidar (Bulgarian: Гайдар; derivated from Гайда, Gayda - bagpipe), Gaidar (Russian), Duda, and Dudziak (Polish)[2] may also signify that an ancestor was a player of the pipes.
In the late 20th century, various models of electronic bagpipes have been invented. The first custom-built MIDI bagpipes were developed by the Asturian piper José Ángel Hevia Velasco (generally known simply as Hevia).[3] Some models allow the player to select the sound of several different bagpipes as well as switch keys. As yet they are not widely used due to technical limitations, but they have found a useful niche as a practice instrument (particularly with headphones).
The Pitt Rivers Museum in England contains a collection of bagpipes from around the world, and the Museo de la Gaita in Gijón, Asturias, Spain, founded in 1965, features bagpipes from around the world.
Modern usage
Types of bagpipes
Dozens of types of bagpipes today are widely spread across Europe and the Middle East, as well as through much of the former British Empire. The name bagpipe has almost become synonymous with its best-known form, the Great Highland Bagpipe related to the , overshadowing the great number and variety of traditional forms of bagpipe. Despite the decline of these other types of pipes over the last few centuries, in recent years many of these pipes have seen a resurgence or even revival as traditional musicians have sought them out; for example, the Irish piping tradition, which by the mid 20th century had declined to a handful of master players is today alive, well, and flourishing a situation similar to that of the Galician gaita, the Aragonese Gaita de boto, Northumbrian smallpipes, the Breton Biniou, the Balkan Gaida, the Turkish Tulum, the Scottish smallpipes and Pastoral pipes, as well as other varieties.
Traditionally, one of the main purposes of the bagpipe in most traditions was to provide music for dancing. In most countries this has declined with the growth of professional dance bands, recordings, and the decline of traditional dance. In turn, this has led to many types of pipes developing a performance-led tradition, and indeed much modern music based on the dance music tradition played on bagpipes is no longer suitable for use as dance music.
