Comments on: Guest Post: Fires of Faith in Great Britain, 1848

By: Eric Boysen

Eric Boysen — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 18:22:04 +0000

Badly played pipes are indeed an instrument of torture, and well played . . . well . . .

But I love them.

By: Anne (U.K)

Anne (U.K) — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 10:55:11 +0000

I’m a Londoner, living in Scotland, and I concur entirely that bagpipes are an instrument of war. Torture, too, in some hands….

By: Polly Aird

Polly Aird — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 18:04:18 +0000

You probably already know that among the punitive measures taken by the English after the Battle of Culloden was one that outlawed bagpipes as “instruments of war”!

By: Bruce Crow

Bruce Crow — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 17:11:51 +0000

Yes! they are. He did have a little practice pipe he could use inside which was much softer. He probably spent more time on it than on the real thing. But that can only go so far to help you learn the music.

By: Polly Aird

Polly Aird — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:38:49 +0000

Bruce, in the Highlands, at least before the Battle of Culloden in 1746 when in the aftermath the Highland way of life was systematically rooted out, bagpipes were always played outside, with fiddles inside their little huts. Bagpipes are loud!

By: Bruce Crow

Bruce Crow — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:11:46 +0000

My roommate at BYU (in 1987) played the pipes. He would play outside the Marriott Center when nothing was going on there. It afforded him some privacy because it wasn't on the way to anything so no one walked by. But when he did we could hear him all over campus. He also taught lessons and through that met his future wife who was one of his students. When they practiced together outside the Marriott Center the effect was astonishingly louder than just one. He and his wife still play for events like reunions, funerals, and the like.

By: Ardis E. Parshall

Ardis E. Parshall — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 15:17:05 +0000

Then send me a private email, ’cause I don’t know. (You know you were waiting to be begged — admit it!)

By: Mark B.

Mark B. — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 14:32:27 +0000

And, in deference to the Scots, I’ll resist the temptation to tell the joke about why pipers walk while they’re playing.

By: Ardis E. Parshall

Ardis E. Parshall — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 08:58:15 +0000

There used to be someone who occasionally played the bagpipes somewhere in the Provo/Orem area — it was at such a distance that I couldn’t even tell which direction it came from, and I wouldn’t be surprised if people all over the county heard it, the way sound bounced off the mountains. It was so haunting and heroic at the same time that I’ll bet I’m far from the only one who wished to be part Scot whenever he played. Just sayin’.

By: Anne (UK)

Anne (UK) — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 08:18:40 +0000

The Church is stagnant here and has been for a while; if only your collected ancestors hadn’t been so darned righteous! However all donations of offspring are welcome- the kilt is not obligatory so Kevin needs a different excuse