Secretly Incredibly Fascinating - Bagpipes

Episode Date: April 17, 2023

Alex Schmidt and Katie Goldin explore why bagpipes are secretly incredibly fascinating.Visit http://sifpod.fun/ for research sources, handy links, and this week's bonus episode.Hang out with us on the new SIF Discord: https://discord.gg/wbR96nsGg5Hear Alex's new "explainer podcast" about all things MaxFun: https://youtu.be/6kNplapKs-w (It's uploaded to YouTube because he filmed his face while he taped it.)

Bagpipes. Known for being loud. Famous for being Scottish. Nobody thinks much about them, so let's have some fun. Let's find out why bagpipes are secretly incredibly fascinating. Hey there, folks. Welcome to a whole new podcast episode, a podcast all about why being alive is more interesting than people think it is. My name is Alex Schmidt, and I'm not alone. I'm joined by my co-host, Katie Golden. Hey, Katie. Hey there. Top of the morning to ya. Lad. Laddy. I see we're getting a Scots-Irish vibe going. This is good. Haggis. Scotch tape. Ooh. Ooh. Turn into more Scottish. More Scottish. The Irish are like, where are you going? Where

are you going? Turn into more Scottish, more Scottish. The Irish are like, where are you going? Where are you going? Shamrock and Scotch egg. What's in the middle there? The Isle of Man? I think we're on the Isle of Man.

Hello, Manx listeners. If there are any, I would actually be interested to know. Shout out to you. And this is a very fun topic because it turns out it's extremely international. But the topic is bagpipes. And thank you so much to The Dan on Discord. That's Dan with two A's. What a wonderful idea. And thank you, Discord supporters of this show for voting on it.

Katie, what is your relationship to or opinion of the topic of bagpipes? I got to say it depends on the quality of the bagpiper because I live in a little town called Turin and there are a lot of musicians and I love it. I love that there are so many musicians. There are a lot of people that are street performers and they, you know, I wish they would stop doing Hallelujah. Like I would, I actually want to pay musicians money not to play Hallelujah because they play it so often. Anyways, that's beside the point. There are... Which, I have to know which Hallelujah is it, the classical music or the Leonard Cohen? Leonard Cohen. I actually don't hate the song, but now I do.

I used to not, used to be a nice song. Now it's too much. I've overdosed on it. But you don't really care for that song anymore. Previously was fine with it. But there are two bagpipers in the city and one of them is really good. And I love to hear it. I can actually hear it from my apartment. And it's quite beautiful. He's got a good number of songs that he plays and cycles through. The other one has just one song. And he doesn't play it well.

And that's the thing with bagpipe music is I feel like it's very galvanized. So it's either really good and it's very enjoyable or it's really, really bad. And you're in sort of sound hell. That does make sense. Yeah. And it's probably hard to tell either visually or with your ears. But does it look like they're playing like a big Scottish bagpipe? Like, is it plaid or is it one of the other bagpipes in the world

that we're about to talk about? I believe it is the Scottish bagpipe. I do believe it is plaid. I don't know that I've heard any bagpipers here that are not the Scottish bagpipe, but I know that there are other bagpipes in the world and I'm excited to talk about them. Yeah. Cause I, I really didn't know that until now, until after researching, I just knew it as a Scottish instrument. And I very much agree that a bagpiper needs to be very skilled for me to want to hang out during, especially a loud performance. And, and I was in like band in school growing up. I played the trumpet. So I knew wind instruments from that, but there aren't bagpipes as a component of that in U.S.

school bands. I used to play the French horn in band. And I don't know if you know too much about the French horn, but you put your hand inside to kind of shape the sound a little more, but then your hand gets all sticky. And I feel like there are all sorts of creative ways that we've come up with instruments to either make a reservoir for air, like with bagpipes or accordions or shape the air. So yeah, I'm actually really excited to learn more about bagpipes. Maybe I can give that one bagpiper who doesn't play so good some tips. The rest of the show is just notes for that dude. Like we're American Idol judges.

A little pitchy, a little pitchy. Yeah. There's so much to discover about this world here. And on every episode, our first fascinating thing about the topic is a quick set of fascinating numbers and statistics. This week, that's in a segment called. All right. Imagine two dogs looking into each other's eyes, eating pasta, but it's just one strand of pasta.

Now, hold that image in your mind as your ears are up for a treat. This is the part, the most mathiest part, and we call it stats and numbers. The dogs have gone through the pasta and they meet in the middle and their noses touch man you really you really evoked the scene that's great i i paint pictures with my mouth yeah and it's a disney picture thank you so much x care x on discord caroline thank you for that very fun idea from lady and the tramp we have a new name for this segment every week please make them as silly and wacky and bad as possible. Submit through Discord or to sifpod at gmail.com.

And with that one, I also, I don't think I had any like Scottish pitches at hand for that, but I wanted to steer away from that for this first bit because the first number is more than 130. More than 130, that is the number of kinds of bagpipes in the world from all sorts of cultures and places. A lot of bags, a lot of pipes. Yeah. I mean, it makes sense to me that there's a lot of parallel invention because what's the worst thing about playing with an instrument? You're running out of breath. You're always out of breath.

So why not externalize the lungs with a bag? That's the worst thing about playing with an instrument. You're running out of breath. You're always out of breath. So why not externalize the lungs with a bag? Exactly. Like there's all sorts of people who figured out that you can just blow air into a sack and then take breaths as you do that. But you get a continuous pitch as you push the air back out of the bag that you saved up. It's just a really good idea. pitch as you push the air back out of the bag that you saved up. It's just a really good idea, regardless of how people might feel about like, oh, that great Highland bagpipe from Scotland's too loud. It's still objectively a great way to get a continuous noise. Works really well.

Right. Like if you want continuous uninterrupted noise, that's how you do it. Yeah. Toddlers, toddlers pay attention. Oh, no. Cool attention. Oh, no. Cool tip. Parents hate it. That's a little ad on toddler Internet at the bottom of articles like parents hate him and it's a bagpiper. Parents hate this one cool trick to make nonstop noise.

Well, and it turns out I just recently went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art here in New York. It turns out they very recently did an extensive study of their bagpipe collection. They recruited Cassandra Baloso-Bardin, who's an associate professor in music at the University of Lincoln in the UK, but helped the Met go through their huge collection of world bagpipes. They apparently have 53 different types just at the UK, but helped the Met go through their huge collection of world bagpipes. They apparently have 53 different types just at the Met, and they believe there's more than 130 across the world. She says, quote, from India to Ireland, Sweden to Libya, bagpiping covers a wide geographic expanse, roughly aligned with the Indo-European map, as well as the Middle East and Northern Africa. Wow.

Yeah. And the like brief immediate takeaway here is takeaway number one. There's a long tradition of bagpiping all over Europe, North Africa, West Asia, and South Asia. I mean, I guess we might get into it, but I'm curious, like what sort of the different designs are like, do they all sort of have the same basic design or do they have some diversity in terms of how the bagpipes work? It's a little of both. Yeah. And there's basically too many to break down the exact range of differences. Like there's the Italian instrument called the Zampogna, which is apparently an older Italian instrument. It might be hard to find today. There's one called the Tutti in Southeastern India, the Illin pipes in Ireland, the Torapil

pipes in Estonia, the Tulum in Turkey, and the Zucra in Libya. I don't know if I'm pronouncing those right, but this is a world instrument. And the next number here is five, because that's the basic number of parts of a bagpipe instrument. They're all some combination of these and maybe dropping an element or two, but it's usually a set of five different parts. Oh, that's interesting, because I can only think of three, like one nozzle to blow in, two bag, three pipe. That's three of them. Yeah. That's the other two. So this is the five parts here. There is that blowpipe. And then I never really thought about this, but bagpipes, especially the modern ones, are usually woodwinds. So another part is a reed. If people were in

school band and had single reed or double reed instruments, pretty much all bagpipes involve some kind of wooden reed. And we don't have archaeological examples because that tiny wet piece of wood breaks down, but we know that that's an element of it and it's part of the main bagpipes today. I see. Okay. Then there's the bag. And part of why this has been parallel invented so many places is that they're traditionally made of animal skins, such as sheepskin and goatskin. Because that was flexible and already kind of a solid thing if you don't break it apart as you remove it from the animal. remove it from the animal. Yeah, because I feel like it would be hard to have an airtight,

relatively airtight material that is also bendy unless you're taking it out of a dead animal. Like I wondered even if they just use straight up bladders or something, but it sounds like more they just kind of use the skin. Yeah, either tan it or otherwise preserve it in some way. And also in modern times, there's synthetic fabrics like Gore-Tex that you can use. But those are relatively recent. Like there's a big tradition of animal skins being the thing for this for a long time. I'm just I'm glad they do some treatments and they don't just take like a hollowed out dead goat and start breathing into its face and sound comes out its butt. I'm thankful for the steps between dead animal and music that were taken. Yeah, it shouldn't be that easy.

Come on. Now I'm curious, though. Anyone has ever tried to play a dead goat? No, actually, I take that back. Don't email us. We don't want to know. I'll accept it if you live on the Isle of Man, because I asked earlier. Otherwise, forget it. But that's three parts, the blowpipe with a reed, and then that goes into a bag.

And then the other two parts are some kind of melodic pipe. And that's any pipe where there's an interface for your fingers to control it and select notes. Like I think of a clarinet with that, like your fingers going up and down that. Yeah. And then the fifth part is at least one drone. And a drone is a pipe that emits one or more continuous notes. Ah, I see. Interesting.

That set of like out pipes and also finger interface lets you make a set of notes. And that's an element that varies a lot, like how many drones there are and what noises they make. Right, right. Because that's one of the main features of the bagpipe is you have multiple tones happening simultaneously, which is generally not something one person can do with woodwind. Really? Yeah. Like there's, I don't really know much about it, but I'll link about traditional throat singing. Yes. Like that's one of the few other situations

where a human is just generating chords. That's wild, you know, and I guess a piano, but that we all know that the guitars, you know, sure. Yeah. I mean, but yeah, like with just your mouth generating a whole chord is quite impressive unless you slam your face against a keyboard. Like I may not be the master of bagpipes or throat singing, but I can do that. You can use your nose, though, to do a scale. And that's fun. But yeah, that's the super basics. And I'm excited to link pictures and even videos and stuff.

We're not going to play you bagpipes on this episode. We'll let you consume bagpiping as you like. But there's all sorts of varieties and they all really vary. Like I found inland pipe videos from Ireland and it's a much smaller instrument than the Scottish bagpipes I've seen. It's a distinct thing and cool. distinct thing and cool. It just makes me, again, like think about all the sort of animal parts one could use to create that, the bagpipe bladder. And now I'm thinking of a pufferfish, which I don't, I don't want to happen because I like pufferfish and I like them not to be killed and turned into things. But also I just keep imagining the pufferfish bagpipe and it is, it is funny.

Also, despite my whole deal, I did think of a sea creature with this too. Like I feel like the Scottish bagpipes are sort of octopus shaped. They are. It's sort of that topographical vibe and I'm into it. Yeah. Yeah, there's something about an undulating bag with a bunch of phalanges coming off of it that does feel like aquatic deep sea nightmare. With the types of these, the next number is 2800 BC. So approaching 5000 years ago, 2800 BC.

That's the estimated age of a set of silver pipes found at the site of the Mesopotamian city of Ur. Wow. So were these, they were just solo pipes or do we think they were attached to something? Perfect question. That is kind of a debate about them because we figured the bag would degrade faster than the pipes. But, uh, and another key source this week is a book. It's called The Bag Pipe, The History of a Musical Instrument by Francis Collinson, a member of the School of Scottish Studies at Edinburgh University. He says that a dig in the late 1800s found the crumpled remains of a set of silver pipes. And it's debatable whether these were specifically used for bagpiping, but they like technologically resemble some of the melodic pipes and other key pipes of a bagpipe system. So it's either a forerunner or the thing. Right. I mean, I guess because now I'm thinking of other possible multi-pipe instruments and there's like the pan flute, there's harmonica, you can do sort of chords on those. But yeah, I mean, I guess you'd have to see if those match up more to something like that or parts of a bagpipe and you would need a degree in bagpipeology for that.

Yeah, and I also checked a piece about it from Bo Lohrgren, professor at Hunter College. They both kind of study bagpipeology. And yeah, they say it's being debated, but it's at least similar. And either way, it points to bagpipes being pretty ancient. Yeah, that's interesting. Because another example of this here is, I'm calling it a number because there are numbers in it, but the book of Daniel chapter three, verses five through seven. This is a book of the old Testament and the Christian Bible or the

Ketuvim and the Hebrew Bible. That part describes bagpipes. Huh? And like ancient Babylonia. Is it something that heralds angels that come to earth? Something that heralds angels that come to Earth. Be not afraid. I mean, something about very Scottish angels.

I'm sure some people think of them that way. They're Scottish and that's just what they figure. But I really like it. Be not afraid. Yeah. It's just Shrek, but with angel wings. I was thinking of Groundskeeper Willie. We have a lot of Scottish cartoon characters in the U.S. here, and I hope that's okay with everybody.

We got Unca Scrooge, Shrek, Groundskeeper Willie. Wow. Is that all of them? There's got to be more. Ducks and bagpipes combining as recent topics on the show, folks. It's all one thing. This was all planned. Yeah, and this is in some translations, apparently, but Penn State University professor of acoustics,

Daniel A. Russell, says that some translations, including the NASB, the New American Standard Bible, describe a Babylonian woodwind instrument from the 500s BC, which is best translated to English as a bagpipe. And it's oddly a story where it's being used to worship a golden idol. The Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar makes his people worship a giant golden idol, and they use a bunch of instruments such as the bagpipe. his people worship a giant golden idol, and they use a bunch of instruments such as the bagpipe. And then it becomes, I think, a pretty famous Bible story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who refuse to worship the idol. They're punished by being thrown into a furnace, but then an angel protects them and they live. And that convinces Nebuchadnezzar to permit the god of the Jews.

I see. They're not just being punished for their dork-ass names. Yeah, I mean, Nebuchadnezzar can't talk, right? Right. It's all Spider-Man pointing at each other. They all sound like pharmaceuticals to me. When names go old enough, they start sounding like pharmaceuticals. Yeah. Agahnimnom.

Yeah, they either sound like bacteria or drugs. And another old bagpipe thing here is the year 121 AD. That's the next number, 121 AD. That's when a Roman historian claimed that the emperor Nero played the bagpipes. Yeah, I have a sort of question. Ah, yeah, I have a sort of question. I think that there was like something where it was like Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Yeah, that's the rep. But there wasn't fiddles back then, right? There were not fiddles. Our historian Mary Beard says that Nero was emperor during a great fire in Rome in the year 64 AD.

But if he played music during that, he would have strummed a lyre, most likely. He wasn't mainly a bagpiper, but yeah, they didn't really have like bowed instruments like fiddles. So either there's a mistranslation or somebody just did anachronistic pretending he had a violin, you know? Or somebody just did anachronistic pretending he had a violin, you know? Yeah. I mean, yeah, either way, I guess it's still disrespectful to jam out on a liar. Yeah. So he played the bagpipes. Was that also meant he was ignoring his civic duties or did he just like the bagpipes?

He just liked them. He just liked the bagpipes. He just liked them. And this is sort of hearsay, too, because the historian here writing this in 121 AD is a guy named Suetonius writing a book called The Twelve Caesars about a bunch of emperors. So he wrote this more than 50 years after Nero died and is probably hearing it secondhand. It would be a funny thing to make up, though. Like, oh, yeah, Nero, he played bagpipes. This guy's just lying through his teeth. Right.

Also accordion. Huge nerd. Huge nerd. Tiberius, electric guitar. He ruled, dude. He's so cool. The recorder. Caesar liked the recorder, and that's why they had to kill him.

I do. the recorder and that's why they had to kill him i do i want the movie of that where like in slow motion his recorder falls to the marble floor of the forum or when it breaks into pieces that's the dramatic bit like as he's stabbed these horrible recorder notes get blurted out yeah and like you know not all roman emperors were into playing music themselves, but apparently Nero prided himself on musical skill. He had like imperial writers describe him to the public as being as good at music as the god Apollo. And allegedly he could play the lyre, the water organ, the flute and the bagpipe. Okay, what is a water organ? It's sort of like a pipe organ, but powered by water.

It's that dumb answer. Like there's a hydraulic system for keeping notes going, but it's very antique. So maybe when they're saying like he fiddled while Rome burned, could that have just been sort of a metaphor for how he was more interested in music than statesmanship or something? Yeah. Yeah. People kind of think that because he was also excited about being in theatrical shows and connected to gladiatorial matches in a safe way for him.

And so, yeah, he was sort of a showboat guy and an arts guy and could have still been good at ruling. But with all these emperors, you have to check if it's like they were actually bad or their opponents just like pooped on them after they took over, you know. It's kind of a Bill Clinton in the saxophone situation where that was, I remember in the 90s, every political cartoon was like Bill Clinton playing a saxophone situation where that was, I remember in the 90s, every political cartoon was like Bill Clinton playing a saxophone. Yeah.

It was like deeply embarrassing. It was supposed to be, but it's fine. You know? Yeah. I, that was supposed to be some kind of flaw and it's like, you know, of all the things to criticize a president. Right. Of all the things to criticize a president.

Right. Speaking of wind instruments in general, the next number here is 2016. The year 2016. When we banned bagpipes for good. Oh, sort of. But with this number, that's when a scientific study concluded that a musician died from a disease that they nicknamed bagpipe lung. What? No. And this is what what really happened is an existing disease that is incredibly rare happened to a bagpiper for probably the first recorded time. A 61 year old patient in the UK died of hypersensitivity pneumonitis.

Hypersensitivity pneumonitis, which is a severe inflammation of the lungs leading to a dry cough and breathlessness. And according to a study afterward, they believe it was because of fungus and molds inside of his bagpipe that he kept breathing in a bunch. Oh, my God. Oh, that's awful. And I don't want to scare people, it's like a freak thing. And apparently the easy solution is to clean and disinfect your instrument. And this also applies to all woodwind instruments. This has also been nicknamed farmer's lung due to mold from old haystacks in a freak way, also killing people this way.

And it's also treatable. Apparently, there was another professional bagpiper in 2013 who showed the same symptoms and they figured it out. And then with rest and treatment, he was fine. I guess that's something that you have to fill out on your medical forms is whether you bagpipe or not. I don't smoke three drinks a week, 100 hours of bagpipe a week. What do you think it is? What do you think's going on? Yeah. But yeah, I mean, I guess statistically speaking, you know, cars still more dangerous than bagpipes. So don't like throw away your bagpipe in a noisy clump. Although I can't like if someone did like just toss their bagpipe into the garbage, it would make a very funny sound. Yeah, boy.

It turns out to be great foley art for some movie sound effect that we all love. And again, super freak thing, super rare thing. Also, I remember being a kid who played the trumpet and being real lazy about cleaning the thing. So kids, just clean your instruments. You're not going to like suddenly die of this disease or something. It's just like good to do in general. Oh, the smells of band class. I once, okay. So I sat in front of the clarinet section. And there was a clarinetist who shall not be named, but they emptied their clarinet juices. You know, so I don't, everyone who's been in spit valves,

everyone who's been in band knows this, but if you haven't, when you blow into an instrument, you're using your human breath, especially like with woodwinds or brass, like you're using an embouchure that is generating a lot of spit and it builds up in your instrument and you don't want your instrument to turn into like just a gurgle machine. So then you have to empty out the spit valve. And so

generally speaking, you kind of don't want to do that on the person in front of you. You kind of don't want to do that on the person in front of you. But that's what happened to me. The clarinetist emptied their spit valve out onto my, not onto me, but kind of onto my shoe and my book bag. So I was not happy about that. The smell was very bad. It was unintentional. At least I hope it wasn't like an assassination spit valve.

Unintentional. At least I hope it wasn't like an assassination spit valve. I offended the boss of the clarinet section. Speaking of many wind instruments, the next number is 95 to 110 decibels. 95 to 110 decibels. That range is the volume of scottish bagpipes that sounds loud because of the numbers but can we compare it to another sound for reference yeah it is loud and is also in the range of noises we deal with like according to the atlantic that's the approximate noise level of a construction jackhammer ah so very loud yeah but But also I could find sources that say it's comparable to the volume of brass instruments played loudly, especially the trumpet. So it's a little overstated

how loud it is, but it is loud. And also the note is continuous usually. So that is a loud experience for sure. And with everybody's experience of this, there's another quick takeaway in the numbers here. They baked into the numbers. Takeaway number two. The 2010s might have been a relatively peak period of cities banning bagpiping. Okay, so my joke was actually true. Yeah, like there's kind of two factors going on here. And one of them is the 2010 Men's Soccer World Cup.

Because the 2010 Men's Soccer World Cup was in South Africa. And it became famous for being the home of the Vuvuzela loud blowpipe kind of instrument, which is not a bagpipe. But it does let you make a droning sound, especially if it's a whole crowd. It's a bagless pipe. After that event, vuvuzelas are also fun. And so people tried to bring them to other sports. And so a lot of sports and also from there, just cities started doing local or temporary bands on a range of instruments, including bagpipes.

If we're banning the vuvuzela, what else is similar? If we're banning the Vuvuzela, what else is similar? And in particular, the 2011 Rugby World Cup and 2015 Rugby World Cup, both banned bagpipes and the Scottish national rugby team complained. They said it was a disadvantage to them culturally for bagpipes to be banned from the games. Yeah, the bagpipes is what gives them their sports energy. I feel, I feel conflicted because on one hand, I do think that if someone bagpiped directly into my ear, I would want jail for them. But I also, I think that there should be more freedom, uh, to play music where you want. I just think that maybe like there should be a crowd dimension to it. So instead of just banning it, what if it was like you need a an area, a person free area of like

six feet? And that's kind of a thing cities have tried to do. Bagpipes are allowed, but specifically there are limits on it. And Bloomberg City Lab says that the English city of Oxford blocked one bagpipe busker from playing in 2008 because there was a local rule that put a one hour time limit on street bagpiping. Like you had to stop after an hour, but they just kept going. So then they revoked the guy's privileges from doing it. Interesting. Yeah. I don't know. Maybe that's fair. I just, I also feel like maybe bagpiping should be sort of like a driver's license where you have to get your license to bagpipe. Like you have to pass a bagpipe test.

Whatever the student bagpiper sign is, I want to see it. It's, it's either very tartan or just big and yellow and plain. Buskers especially, because with cities banning it, you can pretty much do it inside your place, as far as I can find. You might get like a noise complaint and then have to deal with that. But there's all kinds of laws and local changes about busking, like playing a bagpipe on the street. One peak issue of that was in Vancouver in 2012. Apparently, a college student who was like a competition-winning bagpiper requested a permit to busk with a bagpipe and discovered that the city had banned a set of instruments with a new regulation. But then he proceeded to publicize that and get the world bagpiping community criticizing Vancouver. And it also turns out at the time, Vancouver's mayor was a Canadian of Scottish ancestry.

Ah, they got one of their own in there. That's what you got to do. You got to get a bagpipe on the inside. It truly seems to matter. Like they wiped out this regulation within a few days because Mayor Gregor Angus Robertson said this is bad and offensive to Scottish people. He even has a super Scottish name. But yeah, that's, I don't know. I think it is, I don't like the idea of banning certain instruments. I think that blanket regulations on, hey, don't like deafen people, right? Like don't blast something in people's ears and don't play when people are trying to sleep or something. But

just banning specific instruments seems, I don't know, xenophobic in a way. Yeah. And especially any place with either Scottish people or people of Scottish ancestry that particularly seems to get called out in this situation. Even though, again, the bagpipe is a world instrument, so many players today are playing the Scottish version or think of the Scottish cultural element that, yeah, people kind of say, hey, much like it's kind of xenophobic to ban the vuvuzela because maybe a prejudice against African people is playing in. It's a little bit xenophobic to ban this Scottish, more or less national instrument. Yeah, because I feel like if someone blasted a trumpet into my ear and someone blasted bagpipes into my ear, it'd be the same amount of damage to my eardrums.

So it's not like I don't understand banning something just because maybe it has some kind of reputation for badness or because it's like, oh, well, this kind of music is annoying. It's like, well, you know, that's very subjective. Yeah. That all brings us into the last number for the numbers this week. And it's a bloody one, but it brings us to the past. It's the year 1746. 1746. That is the year when the government of England executed a Scottish bagpipe player on the grounds that his bagpipe was a weapon of war. Oh, my.

What? Huh? What? And huh? And also, additionally, what? We just go into that song Scotland the Brave like wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah. What? What?

Yeah. Yeah. So this was in the context of a rebellion that was mostly based in Scotland against the English King George II. But there was the Battle of Culloden in 1745. The rebellions defeated and a piper named James Reed is captured. He was playing the bagpipe. Good name for a piper. I gotta say, James Reed, on point. It's R-E-I-D, and I did not realize that until I said it out loud. But yeah, sure. Yeah, that's disappointing. Cause I thought maybe it's like something where sometimes your last name is like Fletcher or Smith or Schmitty

and it like reflects some kind of profession. So I thought like his last name was Reed because he plays anyways, I guess not. Yeah. Shout out to people last name Horn. Your ancestor might have done that stuff, you know? It's great. But so James Reed, fun guy, he's captured and then put on trial in 1746. And he tried to argue that he was innocent of the crime of bearing arms against the king because he was just carrying a bagpipe. He was not handling a sword or whatever too. And then the court disagreed. Francis Collinson describing the ruling, quote, no regiment ever marched without musical instruments such as drums, trumpets, and the like. A Highland regiment never marched without a piper. Therefore, his bagpipe in the eye of the

law was an instrument of war, end quote. And. I mean. And then he was executed. That was it. Wow. Okay. Well, I feel like if I had been his defense lawyer, I would try to make the argument that how can you kill good when you're so busy listening to great bagpipe music? It mellows you out.

Right. It's not that multi-note music where notes stop and start. Oh, it makes you jittery. It makes you warlike. Also, don't ask about the volume or the context. Don't think about it. bagpipe as basically being a sword or a bow or something. And we're going to jump to a break, but then we're going to come back to what that story kind of means and what it has meant for the bagpipe in the world. It's got to be a headache to get those things for TSA. Wow. Or if it like folds down, if you can kind of make it compact, that would be nice. You're just trying to close your luggage. It's like... If you can kind of make it compact, that would be nice, you know?

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the halls. Wow. And we're back from packing our many bagpipes. And folks, there's one last takeaway for the main show here. It is takeaway number three. English conquerors, contrary to rumor, did not ban the Scottish bagpipe, but they did complicate bagpiping and use it imperially. Ugh, the English. I know there's a lot there. It's English conquerors, contrary to a rumor, they did not ban Scottish bagpipes in the 1700s, but they did make it complicated to play that and then end up using it in the British Empire. Yeah, typical English people. I'm sorry, I shouldn't insult all English people, but typical English colonialism. So what do you mean by them making the bagpipe more complicated? We're going to quickly run through a bunch of Scottish history to establish this, but in the late 1740s, England crushes a rebellion that was mostly based in

Scotland. And then from there passes punitive laws against a lot of Scottish things. And that led to an implied ban on Scottish bagpiping. But that was never the text of the law. It was just that they cracked down on a lot of traditionally Scottish activities. And also there's this story that was never the text of the law. It was just that they cracked down on a lot of traditionally Scottish activities. And also there's this story that was famous at the time of one piper getting executed. So then pipers were like, I think this might be legal technically, but I don't have a good feeling about what the English troops occupying our highland will feel about it. So maybe not. our highland will feel about it. So maybe not. Yeah, I mean, that is I think that is kind of like the the theme with colonialism is both absconding with culture, but then making it criminalizing culture of the place that you are colonizing. Yeah. And it also plays into the really specific way England's conquered and colonized Scotland because they treated it differently than most of their other colonial possessions. Like they incorporated Scotland into a nation of Great Britain and the United Kingdom in a way where then Scotland was participating. And so it

went from being bagpipes are a instrument and symbol of Scottish resistance to they're still that, but also they're incorporated into the British military going worldwide. Why do you think that there was so much cultural incorporation? Was it just the proximity or did they just visually look at Scottish people and it's like, it's harder to tell who's who, so I guess we should chill about it? I think both, especially because even before the 1700s here, there was a lot of monarchical personal union between England and Scotland. And so between that and getting over the Protestant Catholic difference and seeing themselves as Christians in a world of non-Christians and speak in the same language in many ways, there was enough cultural crossover. And also

just being on the same piece of land probably helped too. Like, like the same Island. I mean, like they sort of treated Wales the same way, but even starting earlier. Man, it's just so, I don't know, mercurial. Real quick here. This is going to be 2000 years of Scottish history in like a minute. So Scotland. Let me take a steadying breath. Oh, sure.

Okay, go for it. Into the bag, into the bag. Yeah, there you go. So Scotland, it's on the same island as England and Wales, an island called Britain, and it's one of the four kingdoms that make up today's United Kingdom. For centuries and centuries, it was a separate kingdom that was either at peace with England or at war with England or some kind of political union with England. Jump into pop culture, if people know the movie Braveheart,

that's about a war of Scottish independence in the late 1200s and early 1300s. So for a long time, there's been this kind of back and forth. It's complicated. Yeah, they really feel a lot of ways about each other. Yeah. And then in the 1600s, England and Scotland begin to have the same ruler. There's a King James VI of Scotland who at the same time becomes King James I of England. So he's both King James VI and I at the same time, and also rules Wales by extension. But from there, they start to gradually be incorporated into one country. In the early 1700s, laws create the United Kingdom of Great Britain.

But then also there's trouble with the monarchy as far as who backs who, because that guy James is from a family called the Stuarts, and he's also Catholic. A lot of the rest of Great Britain was Protestant. And so they push for a different family called the Hanovers from Germany to take over. And this means in the 1700s, there's royal stewards trying to overthrow the royal Hanovers and the main steward power bases in Scotland. So for various religious and family grudge and just general reasons, revolts against the king of Great Britain start in Scotland a bunch and then are also tied up in some people wanting Scottish independence and some people

wanting more freedom for Catholics and a bunch of complicated stuff. Yeah. I don't know. It just all seems so exhausting. You're like, you're already royalty. Why don't you just play like golden bagpipes and take a nap on, you know, just heaps of gold? I don't understand the energy for so much fighting. Yeah. And then also part of it comes from outside the country, because then countries that want to see Great Britain be less powerful, such as Ireland and France, support revolts by people like the Stuarts. So then that's part of the energy. Proxy wars, yeah. And all this leads us to this execution story because in the early 1700s, there are two major revolutions and some other revolts by a group called the Jacobites.

Jacobite is based on the Latin version of the name James. So it's like Stuart supporters. Jumping up pop culture again, if people know the Outlander books and TV series, they often focus on the 1740s Jacobite rebellion and a last battle at Culloden in 1745, which is where that real life Piper gets caught and then executed. So we've got a lot of tension between Scotland and England in the 1700s. How did that kind of get resolved? Yeah, and it basically got resolved through cruel punishing laws and also some cultural absorption and exchange.

Yeah. Well, yeah. And also maybe somebody listening to this in a few years is like, didn't Scotland just go independent? Maybe. I don't know, man. Like, could be. They keep talking about it. Go for it, Scotland. They killed your boy with the bagpipes. You gonna let that stand? I don't think so. Yeah, because like, separately, besides all this Royal House,

Catholic, Protestant, Scotland versus England tension, there's a long history of bagpiping in Scotland. And there are multiple colleges of piping that get founded there and also in Ireland. Apparently, powerful Scottish families would send boys away for years to train as pipers and then come back and be like the clan piper. Wow. Get your pipe HD. Get your pipe HD. Right. The families would have, like, bagpipe covers made and their tartan. If people don't know, tartans are specific.

Like, for each noble house has their own tartan. Then bagpipes are also the main instrument of the revolt. Like they're carried by the troops and they're representing Scotland and they're seen as rebellious. I see. And so their utility in war is sort of to boost morale and make people bloodthirsty. I know that if a bagpipe played Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, I would be a little bloodthirsty. You overthrow Charles III? Like, oh, wow, that got out of hand. I'm sorry. Yeah. So like England's King George II and the parliament, they pass a punitive law after this revolt called the Disarming Act. It doesn't just forbid weapons. It forbids highland dress. It bans tartan or plaid stuff.

Francis Collinson says in a few cases, English forces executed people on site for wearing tartan. Oh my God. That's not chill. That's pretty unchill. That law plus the story of a guy getting executed leads people to say, I guess I shouldn't play the bagpipes for a while, or I should just play a practice chanter, which is a little bloat. It sort of looks like a recorder to me. I'm sorry, that's insulting. People sort of keep the bagpiping low-key for a while, and then also a lot of the powerful clans either had their assets seized or had other difficulties that they ran into after this revolt. And so then they couldn't afford to train pipers too. So all that hurts bagpiping in Scotland. I guess bagpipe is one of the most difficult instruments to play on the down low. Yes. Yeah, I'll link about practice chanters because it's no bag and no other drones

and stuff. It's just so you can practice fingering and blow air. So like you could do that or you could just try to find a really remote part of the highlands, I guess. That's that's your options. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's horrible. Again, it's like easy to forget just like the really ugly history of colonialism that only England did and no other country did, I say as an American. So it is while there are English colonies that become the United States and are going to revolt in a few decades. And so what happens is this British Empire that put down that rebellion, they started also incorporating Scotland into Great Britain more fully and also recruiting Scottish people and Scottish pipers to serve in the Imperial British Army. But, hmm, pipes for me, but none for thee. Yeah, like that act of disarming is 1747. And then as early as 1757, a future prime minister in parliament named William Pitt, the elder, suggests recruiting Scottish regiments for the empire. They're called Highland regiments. They have that to this day. And there was not an official ban on bagpiping, but they made a legal carve out for those regiments to wear tartan and do like Scottish stuff.

made a legal carve out for those regiments to wear tartan and do like Scottish stuff. And so then those regiments said, oh, yeah, between that carve out and being military, surely we can play bagpipes. And the answer was yes. So they started being a main source of piping. That's a real testament to the allure of bagpipes, how much they rock, how great they jam out, because the English tried to do a genocide, but they could not say no to the dulcet tones of those bagpipes. Yeah, it overcame all of the English stuff that, again, only they do. No other country that I'm aware of. Bagpipes slap too hard to get colonialism. bagpipes slap too hard to get colonialism.

Bagpiping jobs in the British military become a key source of people continuing to play, continuing to learn it, pass on the tradition and the music. And then also the, just the reach of the British empire specifically propagates Scottish bagpipes versus other piping traditions in other countries in Europe and Africa and Asia. And then also the military element is why a lot of U.S. and Canadian police departments and fire departments will play bagpipes in like ceremonial stuff and funerals specifically. They don't do it on patrol, but like if you've seen the movie The Departed, they play them at a funeral. Yeah. Yeah. That would kind of ruin like any element of surprise the police would have if they just announced their presence with a bagpipe. But if they replace police sirens with bagpipes, that at least be fun. You know?

It would work about as well, I feel like. Yeah. Yeah. It's almost an electronic bagpipe, the siren. Yeah. We have an old episode about it. It's, yeah, it's what it is. But I would initiate so many car chases just to hear that sweet, sweet bagpipes.

Like every cop show, like they start to play the theme from Dragnet or the Law and Order sound or whatever, and then immediate bagpipe drowning it out. Just immediately burst it out of your TV, like spill your food. The wire would have been much more musical. Were there a lot of like Scottish people involved in the, in sort of early policing in the U.S. or was it just because it was both English and Scottish influence, the bagpipes? It's both. Yeah. Yeah. Because also there's just been a lot of Scottish migration to the bagpipes. It's both, yeah. Yeah, because also there's just been a lot of Scottish migration to the U.S. and to Canada.

And so, yeah, that's part of it, too. And I couldn't find super solid stuff on it, but there seems to also be, you know, separate Irish piping, not that exact instrument that then those people kind of played into that, too. I see. Yeah. Yeah, that's interesting. So it's sort of a war instrument, Imperial instrument. And, and like you said, the English couldn't keep it down. I want to hear the, the Imperial march on the bagpipes. I, I am so confident that I could Google that and find that right now. I'm sure it exists. Yeah. A hundred percent sure it exists. Just play that right now. Like at home,

play that in the background as you listen to the episode. The only question is how the player is dressed. That's the only thing I don't know for sure. Ooh, like Darth Vader, but in a kilt. Yeah, that's it. Yeah. That's the only part I don't know. Plaid cape? I don't know. With a tartan helmet. Yeah. folks that's the main episode for this week welcome to the outro with fun features for you such as help remembering this episode with a run back through the big takeaways. Takeaway number one, there's a long tradition of bagpiping all over Europe, North Africa, West Asia, and South Asia. Takeaway number two, the 2010s might have been a peak period of cities banning bagpiping. And takeaway number three, English conquerors did not ban the Scottish

bagpipe, but they did complicate bagpiping and use bagpipes imperially. Those are the takeaways. Also, I said that's the main episode because there is more secretly incredibly fascinating stuff available to you right now if you support this show at MaximumFun.org. Members get a bonus show every week where we explore one obviously incredibly fascinating story related to the main episode. This week's bonus topic is one teenager who secretly took over Scott's language Wikipedia. Visit SIFPod.fun for that bonus show, for a library of more than 11 dozen other secretly incredibly fascinating bonus shows, and a catalog of all sorts of Maximum Fun bonus shows. It is special audio just for members. Thank you for being somebody who backs this podcast operation. page at MaximumFun.org. Key sources this week include the work of Cassandra Baloso-Bardin, Associate Professor in Music at the University of Lincoln and a Senior Fellow of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Also the book The Bagpipe, The History of a Musical Instrument by Francis

Collinson. And the book A People's History of Scotland by Chris Bamberry. That page also features resources such as native-land.ca. I'm using those to acknowledge that I recorded this on the traditional land of the Canarsie and Lenape peoples. Also, Katie taped this in the country of Italy. And I want to acknowledge that in my location and in many other locations in the Americas and elsewhere, Native people are very much still here. That feels worth doing on each episode, and join the free SIF Discord, where we're sharing stories and resources about Native people and life. We're also talking about this episode on the Discord, and hey, would you like a tip on another episode?

Well, each week, I'm finding you something randomly incredibly fascinating by running all the past episode numbers through a random number generator. This week's pick is episode 36 about dice. Speaking of numbers, mathematicians have decided a die can have 120 sides. That's the maximum amount. We talk about why there, so I recommend that episode. I also recommend my co-host Katie Golden's weekly podcast, Creature Feature, about animals and science and more. Our theme music is Unbroken Unshaven by the Budos Band. Our show logo is by artist Burton Durand.

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