minstrel: medieval bagpipes

[ImDaCow at aol.com]

Hello!

Bagpipes are really, really fun!  I built mine from a kit I got from the 
Renaissance Workshop Company <http://www.rwcweb.com/details.jsp?id=3>.  
Actually building the bagpipe was not too hard (although the bag pattern they 
give is /very/ large, and the bag sealer didn't work - I used home-made 
stuff).  But you would need to know about fiddling with reeds (or know 
someone who does) to actually make it play.

Piffaro (one of my favorite ensembles) is one of the only groups that I know 
of that plays bagpipes, all on Renaissance music though, but I think the 
bagpipes are the same as what you are looking for.  Also, CDs with Tom Zajac, 
a member of Piffaro, usually have bagpipes on them.  Piffaro plays 
insturments by Joel Robinson (Robinson and Ross Woodwinds, NY) and Paul 
Beekhuizen (www.paulbeekhuizen.nl, and there are pictures on the site, of 
course).  I think the Robinsons are about $800, and the Beekhuizens $300-400.

<http://prydein.com/pipes/pipes.html> has a ton of manuscript pictures of 
bagpipes, and some present-day ones, though not all the modern ones are of 
the bagpipes you're looking for.

I don't know of any books or videos, though.  Not that there aren't any, I 
just haven't looked for them :)

Feel free to contact me if you need more information!

David


> anyone know of where to look for makers/sellers of mideavel bagpipes and 
> recordings/books/videos of them?