The Bagpipe Society

More in Common than you would think!

In 2014 I had the opportunity to borrow a set of Swayne G pipes from a friend. Initially I expected it to be difficult to pick up. My main experience was playing the Italian transverse ocarina, an instrument that, on the surface, could appear completely unrelated. Yet I quickly realised that many similarities exist, similarities that allowed me to pick up the basics of the bagpipes quite easily.

To give a quick introduction, ocarinas are wind instruments that produce sound using the resonance of a hollow chamber, instead of a tube. This gives them a very distinctive timbre, often described as haunting or ethereal. The term ‘ocarina’ is very loose in its meaning, encompassing novelty sculptures that produce only one or two notes, to concert quality musical instruments. I play Italian transverse ocarinas, a design developed in Budrio in the 19th century.

They have a linear, in bagpipe parlance, ‘open’, fingering system. This variant is not well known in the UK as of writing, and most of what gets sold as an 'ocarina' here is of exceptionally poor quality. Yet the transverse ocarina is widely known and played to a very high standard in most of Asia, with a growing number of players in the USA.

On first glance of the G bagpipe's fingering chart I immediately noticed how both instruments have a near-identical sounding range:

the bagpipe plays from G to C with an extension to F natural.
A G ocarina plays from G to C, with an extension to F sharp below the tonic.
The bagpipe being almost chromatic, and ocarina is fully chromatic, both using cross fingerings.

That similarity gave me an immediate set of music that I could play on the bagpipe just by learning the fingerings. Fingerings are similar enough that I could pick them up pretty easily too.

I'd also already developed a good skill in creating expression though fingered ornamentation as ocarinas cannot vary their playing volume. Ocarinas have very unstable pitch, each fingering varying over 4 to 6 chromatic notes with blowing pressure, only sounding the intended note at one volume.

Due to that skill the continually-sounding nature of the bagpipes was easy for me to adapt to. I'd also read that these fingered articulations I had been using before had developed from bagpipe playing, and it was really interesting to use them on their original instrument, going 'full circle'. Both instruments can be played with similar playing techniques and ocarinas respond similarly to finger movements as a bagpipe. The entire chamber is always in oscillation and thus cuts/strikes can be performed using any hole.

Finally, both instruments are loud and have a 'cutty' timbre. People could easily hear me playing along with the sessions and workshops at the 2022 blowout using An alto G ocarina, over a room full of G border pipes. I believe that bagpipe and ocarina would make an effective musical pairing given their distinctively different timbres and similar technical capabilities.

I had to return the set of pipes that I borrowed and have been without until getting a set at the 2022 blowout. It will be interesting to see how they work together.