LL-L "Music" 2009.03.05 (02) [E]

[Lowlands-L List]

===========================================
L O W L A N D S - L - 05 March 2009 - Volume 02
===========================================


From: Stan Levinson <stlev99 at yahoo.com>
Subject: LL-L "Music" 2009.03.04 (05) [E]

While we're at it, the Irish had the good sense to power their pipes other
than with their breath -- I guess so that they could keep talking while
playing them.... :)
Stan

----------

From: Tom Mc Rae <thomas.mcrae at bigpond.com>
Subject: LL-L "Music" 2009.03.04 (05) [E]

On 05/03/2009, at 8:42 AM,  R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com> wrote:
Historically, bagpipes are indeed found in most parts of Europe as well as
in parts of North Africa and in West Asia all the way via Arabia and Iran to
India.

 Folklorist Robin Williamson (Incredible String Band) recited a poem
allegedly written by a mediaeval Welsh poet who was engaged in amorus
dalliance with a cute local girl when a shepherd came over the hill playing
his bagpipes. The poor lass had never experienced the din before and ran off
in terror.

Robin's updated version of the poem curses the shepherd and his damned
rattlebag.

Further down the track let us remember the portion of JS Bach's "Peasants'
Cantata" where they sing

"Let us hey to the inn where the doodlesack plays.

Hey loorie loorie etc".

Regards

Tom Mc Rae

Brisbane

AUSTRALIA

"Oh wad some power the Giftie gie us,

Tae see oorsels as ithers see us

Robert Burns


----------

From: Mike Morgan <mwmosaka at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Music" 2009.03.04 (05) [E]

I understand some people claim that bagpipes were invented in Thrace.

Hmmm, maybe they were taken back to the Gaeltacht as a souvenir for
relatives by Celts passing through Thrace as they went back home from Cetlic
Galatia (in Turkey) for the summer holidays ;-))

U C > || mwm
================
Dr Michael W Morgan
Ishara Foundation || ईशारा फॉउंडेशन  || イシャラ基金
Mumbai/Bombay *|* मुंबई *|* ムンバイ/ボンベイ (インド)
www.ishara.org
+++++++++++++++
Wer fremde Sprachen nicht kennt, weiß nichts von seiner eigenen. (Johann
Wolfgang von Goethe)

----------

From: Wesley Parish <wes.parish at paradise.net.nz>
Subject: LL-L "Music" 2009.03.04 (05) [E]

On Thursday 05 March 2009 11:42, Lowlands-L List wrote:
<snip>

> From: Paul Finlow-Bates <wolf_thunder51 at yahoo.co.uk>
>
> Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2009.03.04 (04) [E]
>
> An Irishman once insisted to me that they invented bagpipes - as a joke,
> which the Scots haven't got yet.

I can believe that - the Irish and the Northumbrians both hit on the idea of
putting the arm to work in pumping the bag with a bellows instead of puffing
into it like the rest of the world.

> Actually, as you say, a very ancient and widespread instrument.  I've
heard
> Hungarian and Swedish ones, amongst others.
>
> Paul
>
> Derby
> (which has no native bagpipe as far as I know)
>
> ----------
>
> From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Music
>
> Folks,
>
> Historically, bagpipes are indeed found in most parts of Europe as well as
> in parts of North Africa and in West Asia all the way via Arabia and Iran
> to India. There are claims that bagpipes were played in Ancient China but
> later fell into disuse.
>
>
> The Roman *tibia utricularis*, a type of *aulein* (pipe) Emperor Nero
> (37-68) is reported to have been able to play "with mouth and armpit," is

Don't tempt me.  I have all sorts of horrible images of precisely _how_
Emperor Nero might have played the pipes with mouth and armpit, none of
which
does me any credit.

> widely assumed to be a type of bagpipe. Furthermore, there are claims that
> Greeks played bagpipes before the common era. No details are known about
> bagpipes prior to the Middle Ages and Renaissance at which time they
became
> very popular and remained so in folk music until the end of the 19th
> century. Most bagpipes produce very loud sounds. Perhaps this is one of
the
> reasons for them having been choice instruments accompanying (noisy)
> peasant dances in earlier times.
>
> We know, among others from engravings and paintings, that bagpipes were
> commonly played in what are now Belgium and the Netherlands, also in the
> southern parts of Germany. Personally I do not associate them with
Northern
> Germany's part of the Lowlands. But apparently bagpipes used to be played
> there as well. For instance, The chanter of a 13th-century bagpipe of the
*
> Hümmelchen* type was found in the area of Husum (Hüsem) in Northern
> Friesland, Schleswig-Holstein. (The *Hümmelchen* came into its own in the
> Renaissance but may have existed earlier.) In fact, the German word *
> Hümmelchen* for this seemingly smaller version of the
> *Schäferpfeifen*("shepherds pipes") with a softer, more buzzing sound,
> is apparently not the
> diminutive form of *Hummel* 'bumblebee' but was derived from *hemeln ~
> hämeln* ~ *humeln* 'to truncate', 'to shorten', 'to lop', in Middle Saxon
> ("Middle Low German"), the language of the north.

Michael Praetorius may be the name you need here.  His treatise on musical
practices, *Syntagma Musicum*, also contains an appendix on musical
instruments, de Organographia, which contains a drawing of a nice little
bagpipe.

It's been used as the basis for various reconstructed (Lowlands) bagpipes.

> I understand some people claim that bagpipes were invented in Thrace. Be
> this as it may, assuming a connection with early shepherding cultures
seems
> reasonable considering that the bag seems to have begun as (and in many
> cases remains to be) an intact goat's or sheep's skin and especially loud
> sounds carried over long distances are a common feature of Eurasia's
> pastoral instruments and singing styles. Given indications that some forms
> of bagpipes existed already in Classical Greek times, I hardly think we
can
> really determine where this type of instrument was first invented. For all
> we know, it may have been invented in an area in which its use came to be
> discontinued a long time ago. (See my first paragraph.)
>
> Because of their iconic status, bagpipes are nowadays only associated with
> Hiberno-British cultures in popular cultures. Most people are surprised to
> find out about the true extent of this type of instrument. I would even go
> as far as suggesting we consider it a Eurasia instrument. (I do not think
> there are equivalents in traditional American and Oceanic cultures.)
>
> Regards,
> Reinhard/Ron
> Seattle, USA

•

==============================END===================================

 * Please submit postings to lowlands-l at listserv.linguistlist.org.

 * Postings will be displayed unedited in digest form.

 * Please display only the relevant parts of quotes in your replies.

 * Commands for automated functions (including "signoff lowlands-l")

   are to be sent to listserv at listserv.linguistlist.org or at

   http://linguistlist.org/subscribing/sub-lowlands-l.html.

*********************************************************************
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/lowlands-l/attachments/20090305/e23f257a/attachment.htm>