| A friend and I actually looked into this our sophomore year of college. There's a local piping group in Birmingham that gives free lessons, and the was it was explained to us was this: we would spend at least a year just working on the chanter, or the fingering part. We would buy a practice chanter (a combination mouthpiece w/internal reed and fingering tube) and learn the fingering technique first. An interesting fact is that you can't tongue on bagpipes! That's why you hear so many grace notes when they play. After that time, we would get an actual set of pipes.
Also, keep in mind that the bagpipes were originally used on the battlefield! It's no wonder they're so loud and obnoxious sounding; but, I still love them!
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--Matt-- |