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Scott Campbell played the bagpipes by the mirror pools on a recent Wednesday afternoon, filling the air with their unmistakable sound.

“Bagpipes are by far the most barbaric of instruments, because they are so loud,” Campbell said.

Campbell, mechanical engineering, is known as Scott the Bardbarian on Facebook.

“I do a role-playing show called Dungeon Master and I decided that I would give my character the class bardbarian,” he said. “It’s like a bard, but loud.”

Campbell has recently formed a pipe band and routinely practices by the mirror pools.

Steven Shin, undeclared, said it was cool that Campbell was able to just be himself and play the bagpipes on campus.

“I like it,” said Hanif Payandeh, engineering. “I grew up in Canada and they always had bagpipes at official functions.”

This semester, Campbell brought his bagpipes to his music appreciation class.

“It worked out perfectly,” said music appreciation professor Dr. Alison Bjorkedal. “We were discussing the Middle Ages that day and the bagpipe is an important musical instrument from that era of European history. It was a great opportunity for the class to see a bagpipe up close and to hear the strength of the sound.”

Campbell began playing bagpipes in the sixth grade at Altadena’s Foothill Middle School and has taken private lessons ever since.

It takes two years of dedicated practice to start playing well, he said.

“The biggest challenge to playing bagpipes is starting out because it takes so much air,” Campbell said. “But once you are able to play, learning new songs is not much of a challenge.”

Now he performs at funerals, weddings and golf tournaments.

He books his gigs by word of mouth and on his Facebook page, scottthebardbarian. The gigs help pay for his classes at PCC.

Campbell said he was a little nervous when he first started playing in public, fearing that people would be critical of it. But as of yet, he has never heard any negative comments about his bagpiping. Instead, it seems to draw favorable attention.

Between sets that afternoon, there were isolated bouts of applause and two people stopped and spoke with him.

“People frequently approach me asking questions about (the bagpipes) and I’ll talk to them for a bit and continue playing,” he said.

A bagpipe consists of four main parts, a blowstick, a bag, a chanter and one or more drones (pipes). The bag can be made of animal skin or synthetic material.

Campbell uses a black synthetic bag.

“I have not tried playing with an animal skin bag before,” Campbell said. “They tend to be less consistent (than a synthetic bag), but when they’re good, they seem to be better.”

Campbell chose to play the bagpipes because of his Scottish heritage.

According to Scotland’s official website, www.scotland.com, they are the national instrument of Scotland.

“I play bagpipes for fun,” he said, then placed the bag under his arm, blew air into the blowpipe and began to play “Amazing Grace” in the final rays of the setting sun.

http://www.bagpipes.co.uk/construction-of-the-bagpipes.html

http://www.scotland.com/blog/scotland-bagpipes-a-national-symbol

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