So You Want To Learn the Pipes?

What you need to know to get started

Whether you're interested in exploring your Celtic heritage, keeping music in your life, adding another instrument to those you already play, meeting neat people and traveling all over, or you just want to wear a kilt and annoy the neighbors, learning the Great Highland Bagpipe is a fantastic hobby. I meet a lot of people who say they've always wanted to learn, and if you're serious about it, there's no reason you can't. On this page you'll find some tips and advice to get you started, as well as some FAQ about learning the bagpipes.

This page has my teaching policies and instruction rates if you're near enough to Fryeburg to meet with me in person.

How to get started

Here a number of steps to playing the bagpipes. This is not necessarily an industry standard, but it's the course I recommend with my students.

1. Want to play the bagpipes
2. Research
3. Contact an instructor
4. Buy a chanter and tutor book
5. Have your first lesson, learn the scale
6. Practice
7. Begin having regular lessons, learn gracenotes and embellishments
8. Practice
9. Learn your first tune
10. Practice
11. Learn more tunes
12. Practice
13. Buy a set of bagpipes and have it set up
14. Learn to make the bagpipes make noise
15. Learn to make the bagpipes make music
16. Practice
17. Play your tunes on the bagpipes
18. Practice
19. Join your local Pipe Band Association and read the magazine
20. Join a band and learn the band's tunes
21. Practice
22. Perform with the band
23. Practice
24. Learn a tune for solo competition
25. Practice
26. Play in a solo competition

Notice a theme? As with any instrument, practice is essential. It's hard to force yourself to do and it can be discouraging, but without it you have zero chance of going anywhere with the bagpipes. If you hear a great piper play, or listen to recordings of the best pipers and bands, it's easy to get frustrated, but remember that every piper started where you did. Even the best had (and sometimes still have) squeaks, squawks, wrong notes, memory slips, and discouraging moments.

Your piping career should not end at this list by any means, but I'm not going to put anything else on the list. Solo competitions are optional, but recommended as an incentive to play properly.

Check the FAQ for more detailed information for many of these steps, and click here for my teaching policies.