For reasons not entirely clear, there’s a new burst of interest in the bagpipe-an ancient instrument that probably had its beginnings not, as is commonly thought, in the Scottish highlands but in the Sumerian plain. Aristophanes mentions it in some of his plays. Manufacturers in Scotland say they can’t meet the demand from Europe and Hong Kong. Germany is a hotbed of Dudelsack enthusiasm, and Czechoslovakia has devoted an entire festival to the instrument. And in America, Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Mellon University has now made it possible to major in the bagpipe. The idea came from Elden Gatwood, retired principal oboist of the Pittsburgh Symphony and admirer of renowned piper James McIntosh, who was already teaching at CMU. Marilyn Thomas, head of the university’s music department, says the faculty saw a chance to lend a much ridiculed instrument “the credibility it needed.” To date, only one person has successfully completed the rigorous audition process for the new field of concentration: Jon D. Fiant has just completed his first semester.
The 25-year-old freshman from Reading, Pa., already has a college degree (he studied finance and economics). He gave up his banking job to start over again in music. To help pay his tuition (more than $15,000 a year), Fiant works full time as a restaurant busboy. His academic regimen includes music theory and history, keyboard studies, solfege (syllable singing) and eurythmics. He sings in the chorus and must practice the bagpipe at least three hours a day. “He was shocked at that, and the progress I expected from him,” says McIntosh, “but he has responded well.”
Mastering the bagpipe requires more than just strong lungs and enormous manual dexterity, although those of course are essential. The bag is inflated either by air pushed through a blowpipe or by a set of bellows. The player fingers the chanter–the pipe that looks something like a recorder, though it’s fitted with a reed–to produce the melody. (Each of the drones, the pipes protruding from the top of the bag, produces one continuous fixed tone.) “Playing is very technical, very precise, but tone value is equally important,” says McIntosh. Much depends on the piper’s powers of interpretation. “It’s virtually impossible to write the music as you wish it to be played. Many students don’t understand what’s in the music.” Shapely legs aren’t a requirement, but they help. “I don’t want to say it’s part of the act, but if you don’t look good in a kilt you might as well not start,” says Fiant.
In part because the bagpipe has a very narrow range–only nine notes–most serious composers have ignored it. Fiant would like to see the repertoire expand beyond the traditional marches and reels for which it’s best known. He wants to write bagpipe music himself and encourage others to do so. “I see a great untapped synthesis of bagpipes and other instruments and other music, maybe electronic.” He hopes one day to teach. “Predominantly,” he says, “I’m interested in doing the work Jimmy McIntosh is doing, being an evangelist, preaching the gospel of bagpipe.” This is a man with a mission. With a name like Jon D. Fiant, could he be anything else?
