I love them. Think it stems from watching the military tattoo with my grandad who i adored as a youngster. My chap today told me he has a booked a piper as a surprise for our wedding. so thrilled but cant share the news with anyone as we want our guests to be just as surprised.
He will play for the guests arrival, me walking down the aisle, whilst the photos are taken and finally play us into our wedding breakfast. I am happy for him to play what he wants for everything but me walking down the aisle. That is a special moment and I want a special song to reflect that.

We dont have 'our' song and I havent got one in mind so any ideas of a specific bagpipe song or a song that would sound good on bagpipes to walk me down the aisle to?? :-)

How lovely, my Dad used to play the pipes before his chest got bad.

Oh what a lovely idea.  :-)  I have no words of widom as to which tune, but appreciate your excitement.  I know it will be a wonderful day.

No idea of tune either, but I love the bagpipes!

Highland Cathedral :D

It's got to be Marie's Wedding!

Love them outside but I once shared a dressing room with some of the Dagenham Girl Pipers and I found that a bit of an ordeal not just the noise level but seem to remember the necessity of eggs and treacle or some such concoction used to keep the bag supple, can't really remember the substance used but the smell has never left me.

Amazing Grace always sounds nice on bagpipes.

Thank you for the suggestions. Have had a listen and now I'm spoilt for choice - they were all lovely!! Some people hate the sound but I've never heard anthing about the smell before, that's a new one on me :-)

I've never heard anthing about the smell before, that's a new one on me

It wasn't the bagpipes that smelt bad it was what ever the concoction was that they used to keep the bag supple, they said it was egg and treacle but that may have been their idea of a joke but as the weeks go by it does not improve if you are sharing a small space with it.

They are kept supple with some concoction, I remember my Dad telling me but can't remember now, maybe they have less smelly ways of doing it these days.

My Mum returned home one day to find my dad washing the bag of his bagpipes in the kitchen sink, detergent of choice Fairy Liquid,there was water every where because each time he pushed down water shot out of each hole, she told him he had better clean up the mess and went off to visit a friend, when she returned the kitchen was spotless,she went through to the bedroom and glanced out the window Dad had put up the "whirly" and hung the bag on it to dry, it looked like a cows udder with extra teats, goodness knows what the neighbours thought it was.

Shortly afterwards he sold them after several enquiries to his advert, Mum said it was a sad day as he had had them for over 50yrs, Dad passed away less than a year later.

Dressing rooms always smell, but it s a dressing room smell and you are used to it and don't notice normally, it would be different these days as they no longer use greasepaint but never the less they all used to smell the same - that is unless you were sharing with 6 or more bagpipes. It may not have been that bad but it was different and a sickly sort of smell (as I said when I was told egg and treacle I believed it) and it was that smell when you opened the door not the expected one so I have never forgotten it, the warming up process was a bit much as well 6 bagpipes playing on the drone pipe (or what ever it is called) in a small room may well have done my ears no favours.

My OH and brother in law play the pipes. We were piped out of the church and into the hotel and had the pipe band play at our reception so various tune were played but Highland Cathedral was one of them. I would listen to as many pipe tunes as you can and remember they sound different played on the pipes with no drum corps. As for concoctions for seasoning the sheepskin bag, gone are the days, they use goretex bags these days so no need.

Ah! that is why no one knew what I was talking about.

As for concoctions for seasoning the sheepskin bag, gone are the days, they use goretex bags these days so no need.

Any idea what it was that was used in the days of my youth?

Something makes me think castor oil!!!

Something makes me think castor oil!!!

That was not what our pipers used but may be people used different things, after all we used to take our make up off with liquid paraffin.

Just asked my OH and he used airtight seasoning which he bought from Hardies in Glasgow but other people used different other 'brands'. He also said folk used icthamol ointment and glycerin, other used honey.

Just been told that some pipers have gone back to using hide bags again.

Ah, now honey rings a bell, perhaps it was egg and honey not treacle - may well have been honey because I don't like the smell to this day.