1

Grace Notes 3
Calls and Responses 4
A Short Overview of the Bagpipes from the Iberian
Peninsula - Cassandre Balosso-Bardin 9
gaita and gajda - Musings on a Strange History of Names
Michael Peter Vereno 18
My Gaita Journey - as a maker and player - Anton Varela 25
The Subgalaic Gaitas - Kevin Tilbury 30
Gaitas-de-fole in Portugal and their connection to Galicia
Susana Moreno Fernández 36
Pipes and Pipers: Galician Symbols of Ever Evolving
Meaning - Mano Panforreteiro 46
A Galician Gaiteiro in London - David Carril Castiñeira 54
In the Bag - Daniel Bellón 55
Tools of the Trade - Diego Piñeiro 58
Where to go now 59
Photo Gallery - Dave Rowlands 67

2
Grace Notes
Well, there I was, thinking that last Chanter’s bumper
edition was going to be a one off – but here we go again!
I’m very pleased that it is the gaita and the pipes of
Iberia that have caused this second oversized volume in a
row because there’s a special place in my heart for these
instruments. What has become very clear to me in reading
through all of the articles is that in the same way that the
generic word “bagpipe” covers a multitude of different forms
and type of instrument, so it is with gaita. Before starting to compile the
submissions whilst I that there were a number of regional variations, I wasn’t
aware of the sheer variety and complexity of gaitas and the number of different
pipes from the Iberian peninsula. Yet again, as with other bagpipes across
Europe, we see how the gaita has been used as a strong signifier by people
reclaiming their regional and cultural identity.
I always like thank all contributors to Chanter because I am so grateful that
people succumb to my powers of persuasion and arm twisting. Without them
there certainly wouldn’t be a journal. But on this occasion I must give a special
thanks to Cassandre Balosso-Bardin who has not only written a couple of articles
herself but has helped me considerably in the planning by suggesting potential
contributors and by doing some of the translation. Thanks also to those who
have submitted articles not written in their first language, a difficult task when so
much of the writing is of a technical nature.
As with so many things, this edition was a year in the planning but it
somehow all came together in the last two weeks. Phew!

Bagpipe Society Accounts

The Bagpipe Society’s Annual accounts for 2016 have been finalised. Despite
this being a bumper edition, there is insufficient space to display them to the size
where they are readable. They are available for view on the website for viewing
and also copies will also be made available at the Blowout prior to the AGM.

MEMBER’S PASSWORD! Don’t forget that if you want to use the Member’s Only
section of the Bagpipe Society website, that the password for access is “bourdons”.

3
Calls and Responses
Editor’s Note: There was something of an editorial oversight in the last edition. Somehow, Jon Swayne’s
response to Andy Letcher’s question on tapering bores (p.11) acquired an extra paragraph at the end of his
article. At this point I must confess I have no idea where the paragraph came from or who wrote it! So, I will
reprint it as a “Call” and hope that there are some “Responses”and to both Jon and the questioner – apologies!

Call: Conical bores differ from cylinders in pitch, the latter playing an octave
lower. A D Smallpipe chanter plays at the same pitch as a D Border but is half the
length. Can then a chanter be made that can switch between the two and hence
play two or more octaves?

Response to: “Thoughts on 'Tuning and Temperament' by James Merryweather

(Chanter Vol 31, No 1, p53)
Jon Swayne
James rounds off his heartfelt article on this thorny subject by anticipating
disagreement. I hasten to assure him that I heartily concur with his main
assertion, and in fact have several times written along the same lines in this very
publication. But I do have some comments and observations which I would like
to put to him and share with readers.
My experience of learning music at school was somewhat different from
that of James. I started playing flute at the age of twelve (and recorder rather
earlier), and singing in school choirs. From the start the practice of listening to
yourself in relationship to other musicians/singers in order to be 'in tune' with
them was drummed into us, so that it became a matter of habit, though not
invariably implemented successfully. When intonation in choirs or ensembles fell
below the standards of the teacher or conductor, they didn't hesitate to stop and
put it right, if necessary in the same way as in James's example by building the
chord note by note from the bottom up. Like James, I played in a wind quintet for
over ten years, and if necessary we used to stop and look at problem chords as a
matter of course.
What I don't remember is ever having explained to me what being in or
out of tune means in objective, physical terms, let alone the concepts of Just or
Equal temperament. I remember just one telling remark: my flute teacher when I
was twelve or so said that she found it not so easy to play with a piano because
they were tuned differently. Unfortunately she did not elaborate.
Bagpipe Tuning: I am glad that James gives examples of musicians
playing notes which depart from consonance for a particular reason, either to
give extra emotional weight, or because a particular musical tradition demands it

4
or otherwise. It is all to easy to get into the habit of thinking that the intonation
practices of western art music are the only ones that matter.
As for tuning the chanter, I like the importance and detail he attributes to the
process, and he is quite right that it is a process which takes time and careful
attention to detail. He says however that 'there seems to be no absolutely right or
wrong, black or white in chanter tuning'. This may be a conclusion he has come to
as a result of the experience of playing a bagpipe newly received from the maker,
and in practice he may be right to the extent that there are so many variables
involved, but in principle I believe we should allow that in order to tune a chanter
to the exacting requirements of a modern musician such as James, a maker has to
adopt a number of 'rules' for which there is little room for departure from black
or white; for example:
· he must establish the correctness of the overall pitch of the chanter
relative to a universally recognised pitch standard, such as A=440hz
· he must do this at a known temperature, usually 20 degs Celsius
according to British Standards
· as far as possible he must adjust each note of the scale to be in tune with
the drone(s); if he does this by ear, then he must certainly know what he
is listening for, and he must be certain that the drone is stable and
invariable (in my experience, it is exceedingly easy to be confused by a
drone which is just not quite stable enough); if he does it against a tuner,
then it goes without saying that not only must he know what adjustments
to make for the fact tuners normally measure equal temperament,
whereas we are aiming for just intonation, but also, it is usually necessary
to turn off the drone which may otherwise confuse the tuner; in that case
it would be essential to use a pressure meter to monitor playing pressure
(a useful check, whatever method you use for tuning)
· in the preceding paragraph, I said 'as far as possible'; this is because if
there are any cross-fingered notes, a compromise may be necessary; an
example would be F and F# on a French style fingering Border chanter in
G; the tuning of both notes depends on the size of the top fingerhole; if
the F# sharp is made sharp enough to satisfy all leading note
requirements, then the F natural may sound too sharp
The above process having been carried out correctly, then if the new owner is to
have the same experience as the maker, he must ensure that the same conditions
apply, that is to say, that the temperature must be the same, the drones must be
tuned to the same pitch as the maker tuned them, that he uses the same playing
pressure as the maker and so on.

5
 As far as just tuning is concerned, the scale is a matter of figures and not
open to argument. The following chart (adapted from the writings of Uncle
Octavius in a previous Chanter) may be useful in seeing the correct frequencies
for a just diatonic scale in G, and how they compare with equal temperament.

Some comments on the above:

1. Since equal temperament has twelve equally spaced intervals to the
octave and frequency doubles at the octave, then the frequency of the
semi-tone is arrived at by multiplying the frequency of the first tone by
the twelfth root of two (1.0596 etc); if this is done twelve times then you
reach the octave. This is more easily accomplished on a calculator by
using the alternative arrangement of two to the power of one over twelve.
This is how the equal temperament interval ratios above are derived.
2. The just intonation interval ratios are simple whole number ratios, the
consequence of which is that their harmonics align, resulting in an
absence of beating. For example, the third harmonic of G = 392 x 3 = 1176.
The second harmonic of D = 702 x 2 = 1176.
3. Perhaps the most interesting line from our point of view is the final one
giving the difference in cents. This is the one to use if you care to check
your chanter against a tuner. Note that the third (B) and sixth (E) are the
furthest away from equal temperament, by 14 and 16 cents respectively,
whereas the fourth and fifth (C) and (D) are only 2 cents different, a small
amount and not easy to hear. If you want to try experimentally tuning
your drone to an equal temperament fifth, the following may help. As
you know, intervals which are slightly mistuned 'beat' or vary in
intensity, which is partly how we hear mistuning in the first place. The

6
 rate of the beating is determined by the difference in frequency between
the two notes. If we take the equal temperament interval G to D in the
above chart, the notes are too far apart to beat directly, so the beat we
hear is taking place between the third harmonic of the G (392 x 3 = 1176)
and the second harmonic of the D (587.3 x 2 = 1174.6). 1176 – 1174.6 = 1.4 –
just under one and half beats per second, or exactly 5 beats in 7 seconds.
In fact what a piano tuner does when he tunes a fifth is to count the
number of beats in a certain period of time.
4. Don't pay much attention to the figures for F nat and F#; they are
theoretical and unlikely to be used in a real chanter for the reasons I've
given above.

In his section on the Piano and equal temperament, James states that he
thinks it must be equal temperament that leads to the perception of different
moods for different keys. I can't follow the logic of his reasoning. If the
relationship between the notes remains the same regardless of key as is evidently
true in equal temperament, and as James alleges is the case with his 'orchestra
where proper tuning is possible', then in neither case can there be a subjective
difference between keys except for 'higher' and 'lower'. The most I can say about
it is that before harmony there were modes, the early church modes and the
ancient Greek modes on which the church modes were supposedly based. These
were supposed to have different characters because the each mode had a different
arrangement of small and large intervals. One can well imagine that each mode
can have been perceived as having a different character. James explained his
general objection to the sound of a piano tuned to equal temperament. When
music developed to the point where keyboards were required to play harmonised
music in more than one key, a system had to be found of tuning the notes of the
keyboard so that the music sounded as consonant as possible over the course of
the piece. Before the development of equal temperament, various systems were
tried, including one called mean-tone temperament (of which there were
numerous varieties), which was in wide use in organs and pianos at least until
the mid‑19ᵗ� century. As a generalisation, in the meantone system the thirds were
tuned nearly true over a limited range of keys. When composers started to write
music which modulated beyond those keys, the compromise tunings (wolf notes)
became more obvious and the search for ways to get round this eventually
resulted in the equal temperament system. My point is that before it became
possible to modulate freely, each key on a keyboard instrument must have had
demonstrably different character, because the component intervals of each key
were subtly different. This is one possible explanation for the attribution of

7
different moods to particular keys, but I don't believe that it is the fault of equal
temperament.
In declaring that equal temperament is one of music's worst ideas, I fear that
James is tending to be waylaid by the misconception that equal temperament has
to do with anything but the tuning of fixed-pitch instruments and in particular
the piano. In playing pipes, in performing in a wind group or a string quartet,
who is there commanding 'slavish adherence to manufacturers' settings and
artificial temperament rules'?
I'd like to finish by quoting from my bible on these matters, Intervals Scales
and Temperaments by LS Lloyd and Hugh Boyle. Lloyd says: “It is often said that
equal temperament has made a marked contribution to the art of music. That
statement calls for some qualification of its literal meaning. The mistuned
intervals of this temperament make no contribution to the art of music. Good
violin players are conscious of them on the pianoforte, and some pianists of
sensitive hearing are well aware of differences between the intonation of a good
string quartet and that of a pianoforte. A good orchestra does not play in equal
temperament, nor must the faulty intonation of a poor one be identified with
equal temperament. The real contribution that equal temperament has made to
the art of music is indirect; it lies in the fact that, in spite of its mistuned intervals,
equal temperament made possible the continued use of a keyboard with twelve
notes to the octave, such as had been used for mean-tone tuning. To that
continued use of a twelve-note keyboard is due the nineteenth-century
development of pianoforte technique and pianoforte music.”

Letter to the Editor

Hi Jane
I saw in the Chanter that you are producing an Iberian Special, and
thought this might be of interest to you.
I was visiting the English writer, Robert Graves, house in Mallorca in
2015 and saw that he had several pictures/prints by an artist called Trajani, circa
1800. I bought postcard copies of the pictures. They show delightful vignettes of
ordinary life from those times. One of the pictures shows a chap playing a great
big bagpipe with a double chanter that has more finger holes than fingers. (A
common practice amongst artists, ancient and modern). Still it's a cracking little
picture. I've seen pipes played in Mallorca, but never with a double chanter.
Pete Randall

8
 The Iberian Peninsula is extremely rich in instruments. The bagpipe was
a common instrument in the northern part of the country. This short overview of
the different instruments one can find will hopefully give you an indication of the
huge variety of bagpipes to be found in Spain and Portugal.

Gaita de fol (Galicia, Asturias, Portugal, Sanabria, Bierzo, Cantabria)

The gaita de fol (gaita with bag) is probably the best-known European
bagpipe after the great Highland Bagpipe, mainly thanks to Galician musicians’
international careers such as Carlos Nuñez and Susana Seivane. Bagpipes have
been present in Galician iconography since the medieval ages and have
accompanied Galician music ever since. One of the oldest versions of the bagpipe
featured in Iberian iconography includes a bag, a blowpipe, a drone and a double
reed conical melodic pipe. This type of bagpipe was commonly found in Galicia,
Asturias and Northern Portugal, Northern Zamora, in the Bierzo area (in the
province of Leon), reaching the western part of Cantabria. From this large single-
reed drone and double-reed conical chanter bagpipe, two main types of
instruments can be identified: the Trasmontana (Northern Portugal) and Sanabria
gaita and the gaita from Galicia, Portugal, Bierzo and Asturias. Within the second

9
group, Pablo Carpintero distinguishes two further sub-groups: the gaitas from
Northern Portugal to Lisbon (with the exception of the Trás-o-Monte region),
Galicia, the Eo-Navia area in Western Asturias, Northern Sanabria and Bierzo and
the gaitas from Asturias and Cantabria which, according to him, are nearly
impossible to differentiate. There are fine and subtle differences within these sub-
groups relating to the shape and size of the double reeds, the scales and how they
go up the octave.

Gaita de fole (Trás-o-Montes in Portugal and Sanabria in Zamora)

The northern Portuguese gaita de fole consists of, much like the Galician
version, a blowpipe, a drone and a double reed conical melodic pipe. Unlike the
Galician gaita, however, the bagpipe from the Trasmonte region is thicker and less
fine with a wider reed. Aside from its more rustic appearance, it uses a scale with
a neutral third, which gives a distinctive character to its musical repertoire.
Unlike many other bagpipe traditions that underwent a revival in the 1980s and

10
opted to standardise the instrument by using a scale that was closer to the equal
temperament in order to tune it to other instruments, the Portuguese revivalists
chose to keep the characteristic scale of their bagpipes. This allowed them to
maintain the organological characteristics of their instruments and to interpret
their repertoire with a feeling of historical and musical continuity. See Susana
Moreno’s article for more information.

Gaita de fol (Galicia)

The better-known
Galician bagpipe is the gaita de
fol with a double reed conical
melodic pipe, a blowpipe and
one to three drones. Although
many now play on pipes with
an open fingering system,
developed to play major and
minor scales on a range of well
over an octave, some even
approaching two octaves, older
Galician bagpipes varied geographically. The greater part of Galicia used
bagpipes with a single drone. These used chanters that, much like the Trás-o-
Monte pipes today, had a neutral third and a low subtonic. There was a wide
variety of tonalities all over the region with a tendency towards higher keys as
one travelled northwards. Lower pitched bagpipes (B) were called tumbais and
higher pitched bagpipes (D, Eb) were called grileiras Aside from these
characteristics, only bagpipes the very northern part of Galicia went up the
octave. Whereas most of southern and eastern Galicia played with open
fingerings, the northern and northwestern areas of the region played with closed
fingerings. Today, however, the instrument is very much standardised and only
few people still play with closed fingerings. From the central parts of Galicia
appeared the quartets, which are now widely played all throughout the region:
two or three bagpipes, a small drum and a bass drum. Towards the southeast and
eastern parts of Galicia, bagpipes were often played alone accompanied with a
drum and a bass drum, sometimes joined by clarinets or small street bands. The
secondary drones of the Galician bagpipes were probably added around the 17th
or 18th century as no iconography prior to this period portrays bagpipes with
more than one drone. The smaller, secondary drones were not placed on the
shoulder but over the free arm of the piper and were initially found only on lower
pitched instruments. Finally, in the very centre of Galicia, gaitas with three drones

11
were played and made until the mid-20th century. The bass drone rested on the
shoulder. The two smaller drones, one much shorter than the other, rested on the
piper’s arm and were both inserted into a common stock that protruded laterally.
Gaitas de fol had a central role in society as they were played at festivities
not only for dancing but also for religious ceremonies and processions during
patron saint celebrations. Like many other bagpipe traditions, it experienced a
period of decline throughout the 20th century and was revived in the 1970s (see
Anton Varela’s account in this edition). Today, the gaita is both a cultural and
musical instrument, taught in conservatoires, schools and music schools. It
represents a people and a region but it is also a musical instrument whose
boundaries are constantly being pushed by young artists exploring different
musical worlds. Additional technological developments have allowed the
instrument to go into these new directions with synthetic bags, reliable reeds
(both cane and plastic) and melodic pipes tuned to modern scales. Although the
most common key is C, many pipers also play in D and more recently have
started playing in G for a softer, lower sound, which allows them to play in
sessions with others more easily.
For more information and detailed images of the different gaitas:
http://www.consellodacultura.gal/asg/instrumentos/indice-de-instrumentos/

Cane bagpipe (Galicia)

Now nearly forgotten, Galicia used to have small cane bagpipes. These
consisted of an animal’s bladder fitted with a single reed cane chanter, a cane
drone and a short cane blowpipe. They were mainly made for children and young
people who showed an interest in music so that they could practice before
playing a wooden bagpipe.

Gaita de Rosca (Galicia)

The gaita de rosca a single reed bagpipe found in Galicia. Found in the
southern area of Baixo Miño, the remaining bagpipe consists of a single reed
cylindrical chanter with a wooden horn attached to the end. Its name, rosca, seems
to refer to the decorative nodes found on between each tone hole. The original
specimen, provided by Alfonso Álvarez Pousa from Cristelos, Tomiño, in the
Galician province of Pontevedra, had no bag. It was reconstructed by Pablo
Carpintero following the instructions of the informant. According to the latter,
this instrument was played both with and without a bag, the melodic chanter
played directly from the mouth. Alfonso Álvarez Pousa had made two of these
instruments in his lifetime: one in 1998 and one when he was a child. The melodic
pipe was played with open fingerings and only had six tone holes, a thumbhole

12
and three tuning holes on the horn. This instrument seems to share many
characteristic with other single reed wind instruments found in the rest of Spain
including the Portuguese palheta, the gaita de Gástor from Cádiz, the gaita serrana
from Madrid or the Basque alboka. Interestingly, the Cantigas de Santa Maria (see
illustration) seem to reference a bagpipe with a similar morphology in its
illustrations, featuring what seems to be cylindrical melodic pipes with a
perpendicular horn at its extremity. Much still needs to be discovered about this
instrument, but, if its origins are indeed local, it would seem to be a relic of the
single reed bagpipes that were probably found all over Europe.
Pablo Carpintero, bagpipe maker and researcher playing the instrument
at a conference: http://bit.ly/Chanter26

Gaita de barquin (Galicia)

The gaita de barquin (bellows bagpipe) is a lesser-known bagpipe found in
Galicia and Portugal until the early 20th century. It was only played until the
1930s and by then was limited to the Baixo Miño area. It is thought that these
bagpipes may have been played in Galicia since at least the late 18th century.
Aside from the bellows, bagpipes of this kind that passed down to this day
feature two shoulder drones emerging from a single stock. The two drones were
of different size and played an octave apart. Other than this, the melodic pipes
presented much the same characteristics to other contemporary instruments with
a low third and subtonic. Some instruments did, however, have a small key that
allowed musicians to play the tonic up the octave by uncovering a small hole in
the middle of the pipe. This leads researchers to think that pipers playing the gaita
de barquin probably did not play above the first octave, unlike other pipers from
other parts of Galicia.
For more information see: González, C., Marín X. R. e Meixide, C. “Un
instrumento esquecido: A gaita de barquín”. Pontevedra, revista de estudios
provinciais, Nº 8-9

Gaita marcial (Galicia)

The gaita marcial (martial bagpipes) was invented by Xosé Luis Foxo in
the late 1980s for the creation of his bagpipe band, the Real Banda de Gaitas de la
Diputación de Ourense (the Royal Bagpipe Band of Orense). This bagpipe, called
by some a Galician-Scottish hybrid features three drones slung over the shoulder,
is tuned in Bb, and is played in a big band formation with artificial hide drums
for processions with costumes that are not traditionally Galician. This caused
great controversy in Galicia and ignited from the start what was called ‘la Guerra
de las Gaitas’, the war of bagpipes, with musicians from all over Galicia taking
sides.
13
Gaita Asturiana (Asturias and Cantabria)
Much like in Galicia, the bagpipes have been present in Asturias since the
Middle Ages. In the 16th century, professional pipers were regularly registered in
local archives. In the 19th century, many pipers were hired and paid by churches.
This was the time of famous pipers such as the Gaiteru Llibardon who played at
the International Exhibition in Paris in 1889 and later recorded the first known
Asturian bagpipe album in Milan. Much like in other regions of Spain, the
bagpipe declined throughout the 20th century and the instruments were put
together with pieces from different bagpipes. However, there were still one or
two active pipers per village although very few of them were well-known
musicians. The Asturian bagpipes went through a revival in the 1980s. Bagpipes
were not standardised and varied according to the individual choices of the
artisans. Today, however, the model of bagpipes widely played is copied from
Cogollu, an Asturian maker active at the end of the 19th century and the
beginning of the 20th century. Asturian bagpipes are larger than the Galician
bagpipes although they are played in the same key. They are played with closed
fingerings and can easily go up the octave; its range extended to at least a fourth
above the octave. Today, Asturian bagpipes are internationally represented
thanks to the musician Hevia who is also well known for using electronic
bagpipes in his music. More recently, since the beginning of the 21st century, the
Cantabrians have also taken ownership of their bagpipe tradition although the
instrument they play is virtually the same as the Asturian gaita.

Gaita de boto (Aragon)

The last player of the gaita
de boto (boto: bag), Juan Mir Susín
from Siriñena, died in 1975,
marking the end of the instrument’s
life. Bagpipes had been written
about in Aragon since the 14th
century although current versions
of the instrument only dated back to
the early 19th century. In 1980,
however, after combined efforts
with Pedro Mir, the last piper’s
nephew, and Martín Blueca, the
villager’s piper who played the
Galician gaita, a copy of Juan Mir’s
bagpipe was created. Little by little

14
Aragon bagpipes reappeared in the region and in 1988 a dozen musicians
gathered to meet in Ainsa, marking the first steps of the revival.
The gaita de boto, usually played in C, is formed of a double reed conical
melodic pipe, two drones and a blowpipe. The small drone is parallel to the
melodic pipe, both inserted into a common stock, much like Central French
bagpipes. The longer drone rests on the shoulder and can be adorned with
metallic engravings. Some older bagpipes had the different pipes covered with
the skin of a grass snake. The bag is covered not with the more common textile
case but with a small dress. Legend has it that a long time ago, a blind piper lost
his young daughter. In order to remember her, he put her dress over his bagpipe
so it would feel like he was holding her when he was playing. Since, bagpipe
bags in Aragon are covered with colourful dresses.
For more information: Blueca Vitales, Martín and Pedro Mir Tierz, 1998. La gaita
de boto aragonesa, coedited with the Asociación de Gaiteros de Aragón and the
Diputación General de Aragón.

Bot Aranes (Pyrenees, North Catalonia)

This bagpipe, local from the Aran Valley on
the northern border of Catalonia, not far from the
city of Tarbes in France, is another single reed
bagpipe found in Spain. The word bot means the skin
flask. In the Pyrenees, where this bagpipe is to be
found, these were mainly used to transport wine or
oil. The instrument is formed of a blowpipe and a
cylindrical melodic pipe with six holes, inserted into
a stock attached to the bag from the neck. According
to research, the instrument does not have any
drones, specific decorations or any thumbhole.
The bot from Aran is thought to be a
medieval bagpipe. Iconography of bagpipes
presenting the same morphology dating from the
13th to 15th centuries can be found all over the
Pyrenees and beyond. These pipes were survived in
this valley although they were probably played in a much wider region, with
morphological variations. In the early 20th century, they were played in the
northern part of the Aran valley and were known throughout the region by
people who met travelling musicians or who had lived in Aran. The bot from
Aran was mainly played to keep the cows, to accompany singing and walking.
Today, bagpipe maker and musician Pierre Rouch, who researched the
Aran Bot and many other wind instruments from the Pyrenees extensively,
15
makes Aran pipes in B flat, the key that best matches the descriptions he gathered
during his research.
Video of Pierre Rouch playing the bot from the Aran Valley at the Blowout in 2015
with the Matta Rouch trio: http://bit.ly/Chanter27

Sac de Gemecs (Catalonia)

The name sac de gemecs literally means bag of moans, probably referring
to the sound made by the instrument. Bagpipes were widely played in Catalonia
since the 13th century when it was often played at court. Since the 14th century,
the Catalan pipes were played in different formations, mainly with a shawm and
sometimes with another instrument, whether string or wind. This small ensemble
was called a cobla and, over time established itself as a fixed formation of wind
instruments. The bagpipes could be played within this formation, as a solo
instrument or with a pipe and tabor, like in Mallorca. Very similar
organologically to the Mallorcan bagpipes, the sac de gemecs disappeared from
Catalonia in the early 20ᵗ� century. Unlike in Mallorca, the sac de gemecs were not
considered as shepherd instruments – these were more the realm of flutes and
even shawms – and were mainly played by trained musicians. By the 1930s, no
more bagpipes were played in Catalonia and the only surviving musician in the
1970s had not touched the instrument for decades. The sac de gemecs was revived
in the 1980s after a couple of musicians visited Mallorca to understand more
about their instrument and benefit from the knowledge gathered by the
Mallorcan musicians who had had the opportunity to learn from an unbroken
line of pipers. Since, the revival has taken off and many Catalan musicians play
the vernacular bagpipes, thus becoming sacaires (pipers).
For more information: Busquets, Simó and Francesc Sans. Les cornamuses i el sac de
gemecs. Sabadell. 1995 Or: http://elsacdegemecs.blogspot.co.uk

Xeremies (Mallorca)
The name comes from xeremie, xeremia or xirimia (shawm). These were
shawms played since the Middle Ages in different cobla formations (see sac de
gemecs). The word xeremies most probably makes references to the collection of
shawms used in one instrument and is always used in the plural form.
The xeremies were traditionally made out of a one year-old goatskin. The
rear end was tied and the neck and the two front legs were used for the pipes.
The mouthpiece was attached to the left foreleg and the melodic pipe to the right
foreleg. The xeremies boast three drones attached to a common stock that is fitted
to the neck of the animal skin. The drones hang in front of the instrument,
creating considerable counterweight for the musician. Until the 1970s, only the

16
larger drone was in use. The two smaller drones were mute until they were
opened by local pipe maker Joan Morey in the late 1980s. The loss of
craftsmanship over the late 19ᵗ� and early 20ᵗ� century may have contributed to
the muting of the two small drones. Today, however, the xeremies can be played
with three drones (tonic, fifth and octave). The xeremies are traditionally played in
C# although other tunings (C and D) can be found in groups playing with other
instruments.
The xeremies are traditionally played in a colla. The colla is the inseparable
unit of a bagpipe player (xeremier) and a flute (flabiol) and drum (tambori) player.
The flabiol is similar to a short recorder played with the five fingers of the left
hand with the tambori slung over the palm, hit with a drumstick by the right
hand. The colla is a solid unit formed of two musicians who often played together
for life. Even nowadays, the bagpipes are rarely heard without the flabiol and the
drums, including in modern bands. The unity of the duo is so strong that both
musicians are referred to as ‘xeremiers’, whether they play the bagpipes or the
flute and drum.

Bagpipes have been present in Mallorca since the 13ᵗ� century. However,

if one looks at local iconography in the 14ᵗ� and 15ᵗ� century this instrument had a
smaller bag and no drones. The current morphology of the xeremies appears in the

17
18ᵗ� century in the Christmas nativity statuettes. By then, the bagpipes had
become a shepherd’s instrument and remained so until the revival in the 1970s.
Bagpipes were played at night to keep the goats in the fields so that the
landowner could hear from his bedroom that the shepherds were not sleeping.
The colla was also essential to local celebrations and led the people into the
revelry. After a period of decline in the 20ᵗ� century, the xeremies were taken up by
a new generation of young men in the 1970s. This led to a boom in the 1990s and
2000s. In contrast to the dozen xeremiers still alive in the 1970s, over 600 people
play one of the colla instruments in Mallorca today.

Anyone interested in bagpipes and their cultural distribution throughout

the world has probably at least once raised an eyebrow over a strange similarity
of names: In Western Europe we find the various types of gaitas in Spain and
Portugal, whereas the Balkans show different kinds of gajda (throughout the
article I will use this spelling in order to denote the numerous variants).
Naturally, this intriguing similarity has called on the attention of scholars every
now and then – however, the outcome has not quite been satisfying, as I will
show. What follows is a part of my doctoral thesis „Die Stimme des Windes“
(„The Voice of the Wind“), which deals with the history of bagpipes and their
names. Since it remains yet to be translated into English, I am glad and thankful
to be given the opportunity to provide this small insight.

O segredo da gaita – The mystery of the gaita

Concerning the contemporary meaning of this family of terms, I would
like to begin in the West. On the Iberian Peninsula gaita commonly denotes a
bagpipe of the „Western type“, with conical double reed chanter and one or more
single reed drones. It should be added that the single drone variant very much
resembles depictions of High Middle Ages bagpipes; in fact, the instrument
seems to have hardly changed over centuries. Bagpipe areas are Aragon (two
drones), Asturia (one drone), Galicia (two or three drones) and the North of
Portugal (all Portuguese types have one drone). In Castilian, Galician and
Asturian, gaita literally just means „pipe“; indeed, there are also gaitas which are

18
probably remnants of a far older reedpipe culture. e. g. the gaita de El Gastor of
Cádiz, which features a single reed, four sound holes and a hornbell. Such
hornpipes are sometimes also labelled as albogue, which is a cousin of Bask alboka
– both are in fact of Arabic origin, where al-bûq means „horn“. Also, an obscene
use of gaita for penis may be encountered. In Brazilian Portuguese the term has
been shifted to denote the accordion (pretty much like French musette). Rarely, a
use of gaita even for the hurdy gurdy is documented; the connection between
both organologically unrelated instruments is, of course, the drone sound.
The Balkan group is less complex. All instruments which are named gajda
(including variants of the term) are bagpipes. Interestingly, the term is applied for
very different types of instruments. The Macedonian bagpipe, which is used both
by Slavs and Greeks, has one single reed chanter and one single reed drone pipe;
the Bulgarian low pitched kaba gaida and the high pitched dzhura gajda as well
as Serbian specimen are variants of this instrument; a comparable bagpipe is the
Romanian cimpoi, which is, however, less developed and often individually
designed for the needs of the piper. As a plural word, gajde is used in Serbo-
Croatian as a name for the multi-voice bagpipes of Banat, Slavonia and Baranya
(Serbia, North Croatia and South Hungary). These bagpipes commonly have two
parallel chanters, one of which only plays the tonic and dominant, the other
having a compass of a sixth or octave; additionally, they have one separate drone
pipe two octaves below the tonic of the chanter. In Slavonia and the Drava region
another bagpipe of a similar kind, but with up to four bores in the chanter, is
called dude, another plural. Similar are also Slovak, Polish and Czech gajdy; in
Slovak, the name stands both for the multi-voice bagpipes and the instruments in
the North West of the country bordering Poland and Moravia (Czech Republic),
which exclusively feature one single reed chanter and one drone pipe. Curiously,
the term has not entered the Hungarian language, where the bagpipe (also a
multi-voice design) is called duda, in parallel to a Balto-Slavic family of
Czech/Polish dudy, Lithuanian/Latvian dûda, Belorussian/Ukrainian duda and
Croatian dude.

Early evidence
Textual records of the term gajda are only found from the 16ᵗ� century
onward and remain scarce until the 19ᵗ� century. This lack of context makes a
sound judgement about the instrument’s name and thus its history difficult,
especially since older Communist ethnologists tended to overemphasize the age
and uniqueness of any given regional culture. Indeed, the first undoubted record
of a gajda (both in depiction and name) is to be found in a geographic work by
Nicolas de Nicolay in 1552, who depicts a “Greek villager” with the instrument.

19
Travel reports by the German authors Stephan Gerlach (1570) and Samuel
Schweiger (1578) as well as by Polish traveller Hristofer Sberatski (1622) mention
bagpipers in modern-day Bulgaria at dances and weddings. Similar records are
provided by François Pouqueville between 1789 and 1801, and an Italian priest
called Baldini speaks of a ban against the instrument in 1828 by local authorities.
In Central Europe evidence is likewise not very strong before the end of the
Middle Ages.
In the Romance West the name gaita is concentrated on the Iberian
peninsula. One of the earliest account is to be found in the Libro de Buen Amor (ca.
1330) by the Archpriest of Hita, who mentions a gayta alongside a francés odrecillo,
a “French bag”. Probably, the term denotes a kind of hornpipe here. Another
contemporary source (Poema de Alfonso XI, 1328) labels the gayta as sotil, “subtle” –
an indication for a sweet sounding instrument, probably not the shrill gaita of
today. In Galicia and Portugal no source for the instrument name survives from
the time before 1500, and only once is a gaitero (“bagpiper”) mentioned in the 13ᵗ�
century.

On the etymology of gaita

Juan de Corominas summarized various etymological theories
concerning the name gaita in 1954 in his Etymological Dictionary of the Spanish
Language. The least probable of them is that of Cobarruvias (1611), who thought
it to be descended from gayo “gay, merry”; his contemporary Diego de Urrea
believed it to be an Arabic loanword (he thought of ghaiz, meaning “to get
angry”, literally “to blow oneself up”). Another theory links it to the verb aguaitar
“to watch, to guard”, which would make the instrument a night-watcher pipe;
though the English expression wait/wait-pipe demonstrates that such a naming
would be possible, phonology says otherwise – from aguaitar only *guaita could
arise. Corominas himself thought entirely different: His article clearly shows that
in the case of gaita no Arabic origin is very likely, since the word lacks the
classical three-consonant scheme of this language; he further develops the theory
that gaita is in fact a loanword borrowed from the Visigoths who reigned over
large parts of Iberia in the early Middle Ages. The origin would then be Gothic
gaits “goat”, and gaita thus a romanized version of a term denoting the material of
the bag of a bagpipe. Corominas shows some parallels for this process in Middle
French chevrette “bagpipe (little goat)” or Polish koza (“goat”). In his opinion
therefore, the North African folk oboe ghayta has borrowed its name from
Spanish.
French scholar Pierre Bec (La cornemuse – sense et histoire de ses
designations, ISATIS 1996, and Les instrument de musique d’origine Arabe, ISATIS

20
2004) is highly critical of this view, which is very popular since it turns the tables
in the question of how much Arab influence is to be found in Spanish musical
instruments. He argues that Gothic heritage here is not per se impossible, but
highly unlikely due to the conformity of the name in all Iberian dialects and
languages – this would very likely not be the case if gaita were such an old
loanword; he further adds that an early Spanish gaita would have likely led to
Portuguese and Catalan *geita and Castilian *guecha. Since the Visigoth and other
Germanic loanwords are scarce in Spanish and were incorporated when the
language itself was still a Vulgar Roman idiom, they are usually subjected to
phonological development – gaita is not. I have to add that Corominas’ view in
fact poses more questions than it answers. To make a Visigoth origin plausible,
the term must have been coined before the early 8ᵗ� century, before the Moorish
invasion. However, in order for an instrument to be called a “goat” because of its
goat-hide bag, it needs to feature such a bag in the first place; therefore, if this
etymology were sound, we need to accept that the Visigoths would have had a
thriving bagpipe culture already back then – there is absolutely no other evidence
to back this theory. Is seems unlikely that if this were true, there would be no
other evidence for the instrument (the first definitive Medieval mentioning of a
bagpipe is provided by Rabanus of Fulda in his book “De universo” over a
century later); furthermore, the term is exclusively used for musical instruments,
since it did not replace Latin capra “goat” (Modern Spanish cabra). Besides, the use
of gaita also for simple reedpipes shows that the term originally would have just
meant “pipe” and all cases of its denoting a bagpipe would then be examples of
pars-pro-toto naming, a semantic broadening which can also be observed in
English, were bagpipes are often referred to as the pipes. Corominas proposes an
inverse process, were bagpipe would have been semantically broadened or better
“de-specified” to encompass any reed instrument, for which I have found no
parallel cases in Europe; that e. g. French musette was also used for an oboe aside
from “bagpipe” is only consistent with its original and never fully lost meaning
“pipe” in general.
Finally, the chronology is what speaks most clearly against Corominas.
He himself informs us that gaita is only mentioned in the 13ᵗ� century – this means
that there is a gap of over 600 years between the first source for the term and its
alleged borrowing from Gothic, a long time in which hardly any phonological
changes should have happened if Corominas’ theory was sound. Adding this to
the already displayed problems in semantics, I have come to reject Corominas’
thinking entirely.

21
An Arabic loanword after all?
Since all approaches so far have not lead to a wholly acceptable
etymology of gaita, I would like to offer an alternative. I agree with Bec, who sees
gaita as a traveling polysemic term. Since a borrowing from Germanic is unlikely,
the only obvious alternative remaining is an Arabic source – however, this must
be viewed as equally problematic, as Bec points out. If gaita was indeed an
Arabism, it would obviously come from the northwest of the peninsula, where
Arabic influence was hardly present. Furthermore, it does not correspond to any
Arabic tri-consonant radix, and it is absent from the instrument list of Ibn
Khaldûn (14ᵗ� century). However, Bec chooses not to propose a solution of his
own to the problem and leaves the question to scholars of the Arab language.
We can thus conclude that gaita is very probably neither a Gothic
substrate nor an Arabic superstrate – this leaves only two possibilities: The term
could belong to the Pre-Roman substrate of the Celtiberians or the Basks, but in
both cases ancient language documents which might give us any valuable insight
in this matter are entirely absent. The fact that Modern Bask onomatopoetically
uses tuta to denote the Spanish bagpipes seems to contradict the theory of an
ancient piping culture. Thus, the only remaining solution must be that gaita is an
outsider – but where did it come from?
To help with an answer we must first clarify the geographic distribution
of the term. As an expression for an oboe-like shawm very similar to the Turkish
zurna, Arabic ghayta extists mostly in Northwest Africa. The Haussa language
borrowed it together with the Arabic article al-, thus calling it algayta. From
Haussa the term was further transmitted into the Tuareg Berber dialect, where it
commonly denotes the “Haussa oboe” or any reedpipe or even flute. Clearly, the
instrument’s name was adopted into Haussa from Arabic, but since no etymology
is plausible in this language, I would like to propose that we are dealing with a
Berber word after all. Since no written sources about Medieval or Ancient Berber
languages exist, we are limited to speculation, but it is conceivable that a Berber
term for an originally foreign instrument (we know that such oboes did not
originate in Northwest Africa) was adopted by the local population, transmitted
to Haussa and from there back into some Berber dialects. Given the low social
status of Berber languages, this is entirely possible. If we would have to look for
an apt candidate, we should search for a term following the usual pattern for the
naming of wind instruments – that is, describing either the shape, material or
sound of the instrument. Indeed, Kabylian tagait “Doum palm” could be such a
candidate - the initial t- prefix is a feminine marker in Berber, therefore either this
very term or a lost cognate could have been the model for ghayta. No instruments
are commonly made of this plant, but the shape of the ghayta with its wide sound
bell might be viewed as tree-shaped. In that case, ghayta would be semantically
22
comparable to French hautbois “loud wood” (oboe) or Viennese picksüßes Hölzl
“honeysweet wood” (clarinet). Sometime before the 14ᵗ� century, the term could
have travelled to Spain and its Christian North, where runaway slaves from the
Muslim regions did flee, Berber musicians among them. Even if tagait were the
wrong source, any other Berber word could undergo the same process. Thus, I
would like to endorse this view in spite of said difficulties.

On the way to the Balkans

What remains now is an answer to the question how to explain the
obvious connection between the Iberian gaita family and the Balkan gajda group.
First of all, it should be pointed out that the intervocalic /d/ which is featured in
all Balkan and Eastern European variants of the name could point towards
Ottoman Turkish, where weakening of intervocalic /t/ to /d/ is regular. Since even
only distantly related languages as Serbian and Greek feature the exact same
word, it is likely not a very old borrowing, otherwise it would have been
subjected to earlier sound changes. Genuine Turkish origin of the word or a
relationship to Georgian guda “belly, bag, hose” is implausible due to
phonological reasons. Furthermore, Turkish gayda is only used in the far
Northwest of the country in order to denote the Macedonian/Bulgarian bagpipe,
therefore any Near Eastern origin seems unlikely. Persian, from which Ottoman
Turkish has borrowed a great number of expressions, does not know the word.
Given the distribution of the term in Iberia and Northern Africa, I am convinced
to look for an answer there. But how should it be imaginable for a Spanish
expression to be implanted in the Balkans so early, and for a very similar
instrument?
A possible answer might be found in the early Iberian Romance presence
in the Balkans and the Eastern Mediterranean which already began with the First
Crusade and continued to exert great influence at least until the fall of
Constantinople in 1453. One element in these relations between East and West is
the story of the Great Catalan Company which was originally a mercenary
company under Byzantine emperor Andronikos II but later became renegade and
conquered Thessaly, reigning over the duchies of Athens and Neopatria for
almost eight decades until 1388. Additionally, it is conceivable that gaita could
have travelled to the Eastern Empire by Jewish emigrants, who started to settle in
Thessaloniki and Constantinople well before the 15ᵗ� century. It is thus by every
means possible to explain the presence of a Western Romance term in this area at
that time, given the amount of opportunities.
Concerning the contemporary meaning of gaita and later gajda, we see
that today the term is exclusively used to describe bagpipes in Eastern Europe

23
and the Balkans. Given the fact that shawms of the zurna type, which exist in
abundance in the latter region, are never called gajda, I think it safe to assume that
the term was already fixed in denoting a bagpipe on its arrival. We might now go
on in musing about a possible relationship not only of names, but of the
instruments themselves, as Anthony Baines did back in 1960. Indeed, there is a
certain similarity at least between the older types of gaitas in Iberia and the gajda
of the Balkans – both have one single chanter and one single drone; however, the
gajda features single reeds exclusively, whereas the gaita has an oboe-type
chanter. But as we can see in the Insular Greek bagpipe name tsambouna, which is
obviously an Italian influence (from zampogna), it is well possible that an already
established instrument is invested with a new name, since there is no direct
organological relationship between the zampogna and the tsambouna.
To summarize this maze of language borrowings I think it safe to give a small
overview of relatively secure information concerning the etymology of gaita/gajda:
1. The term is likely to be of Northwest African origin, probably from a Ber-
ber language; a relationship with Kabylian Berber tagait “Doum palm” is
possible.
2. A Germanic or Romance etymology is unlikely and can be excluded.
3. The semantic compass of the term in Iberian Romance languages ranges
from simple single reed pipes to complex bagpipes.
4. The Balkan group goes back to a loanword which was probably spread
through Turkish, given the intervocalic voicing of /t/ to /d/. This term has
to be of Iberian region because only there does it carry the meaning “bag-
pipe”, which is unknown in Arabic. Given the numerous contacts be-
tween Iberia and the Eastern Empire during the Middle Ages there are
plenty of possibilities for this transfer.
This explanation is part theory and part speculation, but I hope it helps with
further developing and clarifying the story of an instrument with such vast
cultural impact.

Detail from house in Evora, Portugal. Photo taken by Dave Rowlands

24
 I started to play the bagpipes in the 1970s in Ferrol, Northern Galicia. It is
relevant to recall the situation at the time: they are the inevitable circumstances
that put my story in context. In the previous decade, Spain had abandoned
autarky and the isolation policy that had defined the initial period after the war. It
led to economic prosperity that influenced the social fabric, changed customs and
encouraged the desire to change. The gaita, along with the Galician language,
never ceased to represent the people’s most complete expression of belonging to a
unique community, the Galician community. The instrument, maybe even more
so than language, embodied this community’s emotional roots.
Thus, all bagpipers and nearly all of the artisan bagpipe makers were
forced to take up other jobs and activities in order to make a living. Several
musical associations, who had maintained the traditions during the precarious
years of the dictatorship, had survived in the area of Ferrol as well as a few young
pipers who had embarked on the task of refining the styles, modes, repertoires as
well as attitudes of their musical forbearers. The four young musicians that we
were, playing a formation of two gaitas, a tamboril (small drum) and a bombo (big
bass drum), the canonical formation of the time, incorporated this movement,
which dignified of the music, the role of the piper and the bagpipes in the
tradition and the society of the moment.
Due to the fact that Ferrol was a military settlement, the town had several
military bands whose musicians joined popular orchestras, took music exams and
theory classes. Bagpipe music also included musicians who followed formal
training and the case of maestro Bellón, the most influential figure in Ferrol’s
bagpipe world in the second half of the 20th century, is a telling example.
However, this symbiosis did not happen in other Galician regions where
bagpipers were closer to a specific style and a manner of interpretation that were
less scholarly (I use these terms with caution) and were embedded in oral
tradition.
So, unto us, the young people, was thrust the mission of change, that we
interpreted as the search for original authenticity, tarnished over the last decades
by pieces that we judged inappropriate for the gaita, although these were played
precisely to cater for the taste of an audience that, out of habit, asked for foreign
tunes. We did away with the inclusion of saxophones, accordions, clarinets, snare

25
drums as we deemed them inappropriate and unnecessary to play the melodies
and harmonies of our folk tradition, we wanted something that was simpler,
cleaner and, above all, more respectful towards the past and the source of this
music. For more than 30 years, the core of the dominant strand of traditional
Galician music was coherent with this vision and was over time established
without any further discussions. I was fully active in this process.
During those years, the music of the gaita broadened its social role. To the
usual accompaniment of choir music, dance and street processions in local
festivities, we gradually increased its presence on stage thanks to the
development of the instruments and to the incorporation of more complex music.
The ability of new chanters to play chromatic scales allowed us to play new
musical compositions that widened the limited scale of chords, inherent to more
rudimentary instruments.
I followed this path, first with the Follas Novas quartet and then with the
Raparigos de Ferrol. Both groups fit into what we thought was the simpler and
more respectful way of playing traditional music. These were years where we
participated in festivals, competitions, parish processions for patron saint
celebrities known as alboradas (it was, and still is, inconceivable to imagine such a
local celebration without the sound of the bagpipes and the bang of the
firecrackers in the early morning hours), album recordings, recorded
performances, the extension of the repertoire, rehearsals and so on. The second
group, Raparigos de Ferrol, was Galicia’s most successful quartet in competitions
open to traditional groups, winning many awards. We won these prizes with our
own style based on a clear sound, clean and open with a solid technical basis, an
intelligent interpretation of the traditional music repertoire originally written for
a different instrumentation as well as controlled fingerings with impeccable
ornamentation. This was a style that we could consider as being from Ferrol.
In the mid-1980s, after patiently mulling over the idea, I took a decision
that was to be of great importance in my life: I left Bazán, a public service
company, emblematic of my town where it was based, where I was an electrical
engineer; I decided to dedicate myself entirely to the gaita. The first step for this
new project was to participate in a bagpipe-making course with master maker
José Seivane in Chao de Pousadoiro, a small village in one of the valleys of the
Meira mountains on the banks of the Eo river, in the municipality of Ribeiras de
Piquín in the Galician region of Lugo. Over the course of a year, I acquired the
technical skills required for the instrument-making profession.
In 1989 I opened my own workshop, equipped with a lathe that had done
many a job in Ferrol Vello, one of the original areas of my native town. With this
lathe, I forged with tenacity and perseverance my own style as an artisan. I tried

26
to maintain the links with tradition through aesthetic features and the design of
the instruments, links that had been broken through the death of the bagpipe’s
last artisans, rooted, albeit at times tenuously, in the region of Ferrol. The shape of
the drones, especially the silhouette of the bell, which gives its personality to the
drone or the pedal of the instrument, and the opening of the chanter are elements
that I worked on, stylizing them in order to move away from the crudeness of the
previous instruments.
Little by little, I created a personal sound through the combination of the
conicity of the chanter’s bore, the diameter and the orientation of the holes,
ergonomic considerations to facilitate the fingerings, the thickness of the chanter
in order to achieve a specific vibration, the exterior aspect, the ornamentation... an
unending path following research and perfection that has accompanied me to this
day.
I never ceased to combine my work as a bagpipe maker with an ongoing
activity including performances, teaching, sharing the knowledge about the
instrument and participating in international events such as Saint Chartier, where
I travelled to every year for the last three decades, seminars, symposiums with
makers from other countries, concerts abroad... These are years of febrile and
diverse activities, of teaching and learning, of accumulating experiences, of
immersion in folklore and traditional music.
At the beginning of the 1990s, I went to a recorder-making workshop in
Lostwithiel, Cornwall, with master Michael Ramsley. Knowledge of a technique
that enables the creation of sound through something other than the vibration of
two bamboo reeds, as is the case for the bagpipes, allowed me to broaden my skill
set and I was able to start making instruments such as the pito gallego, a recorder

27
with the range of the gaita’s melodic pipe, or the silbato, a whistle from ancient
games. Every professional experience adds to and perfects the previous ones.

This was an intense period during which I diversified my instrument-

making projects alongside my practice as a performer. It was a period, which, a
few years later, led me to start an adventure that would open new horizons: the
group Os Cempés. This was a group that, beyond its versatile instrumentation –
bagpipes, recorders, clarinet, saxophone, accordion, bass, percussion and vocals –
and beyond its evolving number of musicians, was a breath of fresh air for public
performances, connecting with the audience’s emotional status and tuning in to
their mental vibrations. The pleasure of interpreting catchy compositions was
reinforced by the new joy of letting go of inhibition and creating space for
improvisation. This style transcended the stage and captivated the enthusiasm of
the audience; it was a magnificent and gratifying experience. These were years of
expansive and fruitful creativity, also from the album production point of view.
Os Cempés had for some years widened it repertoire with an informative session
on popular dances that usually happened at the end of the concerts, an initiative
that was well received by the public.

With Berros do Castro, a group with gaita, accordion, clarinet and percussion,
and much like with Os Cempés in its last phase, I am commencing a research
process, exploring the temporal space situated in the undefined sphere that can

28
be found between memory and history. Songs that were asleep in the memories
of our elders, distilled through the stimulus of paused conversations, hinting at
melodies to stimulate remembrance. These are tunes which, in many cases, come
from outside Galicia but that are, we now maintain, just as Galician as others
because the Galician people consider them as theirs, integrated into their
childhood and youthful memories. We are also plunging into lost archives of old
popular bands. We look for tunes, songs, verses, many of them in a language that
is between Galician and Castilian, with plebeian phonetics that are powerfully
evocative.
At this moment in my journey as a musician, I find myself going down
the path that, like many other young pipers in the 1970s and 1980s, I chose to
leave behind. I am reviving a repertoire that, at the time, felt improper,
illegitimate, colonizing and uniform, that put in danger the essence of Galician
folklore. I am returning to the beginning and following the opposite path.
Historical evolution has drawn a circle and I am once again engaged in the
starting blocks but this time with a more generous and understanding vision,
maybe less prejudiced and more able to give to each its authentic value. Thus I go
on, without forgetting what I did, for there is no other way to explain what I am.

The cover from Anton’s latest CD with

Carlos Beceiro (La Musgana) Anton has
very kindly made three tracks available to
Bagpipe Society members and they are
available in the online version of this
article on the website.

See YouTube recordings of this duo when

they visited the Blowout in 2013 - on the
Society’s channel. http://bit.ly/Chanter28

29
The Subgalaic Gaitas
This article is written with the help and advice of Alberto Jambrina Leal,
who has been researching, since the 1980s, the various bagpipes in the regions of:
Sanabria, Carballeda and Aliste (N.W. Spain); as well as bagpipes (gaita) in the
region of Trás-os-Montes (N.E. Portugal). This article will try and cover several
gaitas in a geographical area, which has been divided due to national borders, but
culturally are unified. To categorize these different gaitas from different regions
that share common features, Alberto has used the term “Subgalaic” bagpipes, as
he says this covers all the regions where these types of gaitas existed: (in Spain)
Gaita Sanabresa, Gaita Alistana, Gaita Carballeda, Gaita Pedrazales, and from the
province of León, Gaita La Cabrera; (in Portugal) from the village of Miranda do
Douro, Gaita de Mirandesa.
I will focus on three gaitas (as this is what the author has come directly in
contact with): Gaita Sanabresa, Gaita Alistana, and Gaita Pedrazales. What unites
these bagpipes is the individuality of the playing style, their use of different
modes (Dorian, Aeolian), as well as microtonal inflections in their division of
tones and semitones.
My introduction to the genre of these Subgalaic gaitas was when I was
playing in a concert in Zamora in 2013. I was introduced to Alberto Jambrina Leal
a researcher and head of his traditional music school in Zamora. The gaiteros
performing that night were from Alberto’s school and consisted of one gaita and
one drummer, occasionally an ensemble performed, but the gaitas would play in
unison, no harmonization was heard. These pipes are historically played with a
drum or tambourine; due to their tunings it was difficult to harmonize with other
instruments. These gaitas have not made the transition to the ‘Galician/Asturian’
type bands, with harmonized 2�ᵈ or 3�ᵈ part repertoires, but have kept their
traditional format of drum and gaita.
These pipes were not mass produced; even today there is no pipe maker
who produces them as a full time business. In the past these gaitas were from
rural areas, piping in religious festivals, for marriages, social events or for
enjoyment, singing accompanies the drum and pipes and often a piper would
sing a line or two while playing the chanter, this would be difficult to achieve if
the pressure in the bag was great. Some videos show the women playing the
drum and singing while the men play the pipes. These pipes are loud, are made
for the outdoors and a loud voice is needed to be heard. This adds energy to the
performance; they were reportedly heard in the neighbouring village.

30
 The villages were often remote, although not isolated from one another,
they were separated enough to develop their own individual style. If a village
had a piper he would play his style of music for dancing and social events, this
would differ from another village in the area. The village of Pedrazales is to be
found in the province of Sanabria and the gaita takes its name from that village.
One family in the village has constructed this gaita; it holds many of the
characteristics of the other Subgalaic gaitas, but the development of its tuning is
unique to that family.
The Subgalaic gaitas have been going through a transition recently and
are now being constructed and played in cities. This ‘coming together’ into an
urban environment has posed many challenges to the music and instruments.
This transition has happened with other pipes within northern Spain, and the
change has been rapid, but with the ‘Subgalaic gaita’ the transition has not been
collective; differences to tunings still occur.
The construction of these pipes
can be classified as having one drone
that sits horizontally over the player’s
shoulder. The drone is tied into the leg
of a goat (skin bag) and this lets the
drone to fall over the shoulder instead of
it sitting up in the air. Today synthetic
bags are used, but the shape still allows
for this position. The drone and blow
pipe are attached to each other by a
chord, positioning the blow pipe in a
comfortable position for the players
mouth. The drone has 3 segments, the
end segment with a “bell end” (a
hollowed out cavity). The neck of the
goat is for the chanter stock. The blow
pipe uses the other leg of the goat. The
chanter and drones were commonly
made from boxwood, but other woods
are used today (Santa Palo, ebony).
The reeds are made from cane
but plastic is used occasionally. The old reeds are wide and use a cane bridle;
modern reeds look similar to Galician reeds but a bit wider. The reeds are often
not made by the gaita maker, but are made separately.

31
 The chanter is conically bored and has 9 notes. The majority of Subgalaic
chanters resemble a tuning of a ‘minor key’. Historically this tuning existed in
other pipes in northern Spain, but for one reason or another it has been replaced.
Different pitches are to be found; mainly Bb and c. I will use the ‘C’ for
describing the types of modes used.

Subgalaic Chanters and relative modes in the pitch of C:

*Heptatonic Secunda Mode: Pedrazales (Melodic Ascending Minor); La Cabrera (Major Minor)

Alberto has presented 3 detailed readings of chanters using a Korg tuner:

The chanter of the Gaita Sanabresa in C of Luciano Perez, tested at 440Hz

The chanter of the Gaita Alistana in Bb of Jordi Aixala, tested at 433 Hz

Alberto's measurement of the (Portuguese) Mirandesa Gaita, pitched in C:

These examples show the diverse micro-tuning, which make it impossible

to harmonize with other melody instruments, and yet these regions are relatively
close together and share the same cultural musical environment.
None of the Subgalaic chanters play a 2�ᵈ octave, the thumb hole
produces a top C’ (it is not a flea hole), so when a top C is played one lifts the
thumb off the hole, as well as the rest of the fingers. I am not aware of cross
fingering on these chanters to produce semitones. A player would use the same

32
fingering on each of the chanters with one finger off at a time. I was also told that
the bag pressure increases slightly as you go up the scale, the top C using a
slightly higher bag pressure than the bottom C.
The Subgalaic gaitas are beginning to be tuned in a microtonal
standardized system, with a tolerance interval of 20 cents. The positioning of the
holes has never been based on harmonization. So the tunings have been different
from village to village from piper to piper. 440c and the division of the octave was
never an issue until recently, it was more to do with the harmonization of the
note in relation to the drone. But now a systemization has been achieved due to
the work done by Alberto, and bagpipe/reed makers making it possible to
harmonize with other melodic instruments.
Another characteristic of these bagpipes are the intricate style of the
ornamentation/gracing. Each note is approached by some form of ornamentation,
trills, cuts, snaps etc. Vibrato is not only made by one finger playing a lower note,
but by the whole palm flapping against the edge of the chanter. To a beginner the
overall sound is a ‘mass of notes’, and if you were not familiar with the root
melody it could seem overwhelming. If a 6/8 muñeria is being played, there is so
much ornamentation that it can be difficult to tell where the melody begins, but
this is its fascination of this music. There is something organic, something not
“polished and over refined”, yet it is intricate, and needs study. Its attraction is in
its micro-tuning and its colourful gracing. The accompanying drum forces a
structure.
The best place to hear this, of course is in its live setting, a CD does not
give it its true character. At an after-dinner party I attended, the tambourines and
drums accompanied the players of the ‘Gaita Alistana’; each one playing their
individual trills, vibrato etc., playing fast and loud, and above all of this the
gaitero breaks off from blowing to sing, cutting through the gaita’s melody.
Another musical event was Alberto playing the castanets, beating out a rhythm
over a solo gaitero, his arms waving in the air; it is a visual performance as well
as an oral one. In time, the gaitero was joined by others.
For the beginner, to buy a chanter can be difficult, not only deciding on
the type of chanter but finding the right type of reed to fit. Often the pipe maker
does not make reeds, this is done by a reed maker, and then the reed needs to be
fitted and tuned to the chanter. I decided to buy a chanter online and I found a
maker who advertised various chanters with various tunings. The problem was
deciding which one to choose and what was popular. And it is not as easy as you
think as these gaitas are played by different people for different reasons. I know
of two music schools that play different types of chanters and in different keys.
The Bb chanter was played in Madrid, and the C chanter was popular in the

33
Alberto’s school in Zamora; in Madrid the Alistana chanter was played, and in
Zamora a mix of the Alistana and Sanabrian chanters depending on the tune. In
the end I chose a Bb for the Madrid group, as that was my home.
In the major cities in Spain you can find various “Casas Regionales”
(regional houses) of the various regions of Spain, this is where the cultures of
those regions represented within one building. Madrid has Casa de Galicia, Casa
de Asturias and “Casa de Zamora” for the regions around the city of Zamora. As
I live in Madrid these Casa’s have been a valuable source of gaita learning for
particular regions. “Casa de Zamora” has a gaita band that had been playing
under the musical leadership of José María Climent, the one of the founding
members of the folk group La Musgaña; they adapted many melodies from the
area of Castile and Leon, as well as Sanabria, Carballeda and Aliste into their
repertoire.
Alberto and Climent had a different way of teaching and used a different
repertoire to teach their students, not in competition with each other, but
advancing the tradition in different directions. The chanter I decided to buy was
the Pedrazales chanter, as I was told, by the maker, that it
was used in the Madrid gaita band, but when I joined Casa
de Zamora’s gaita group, Climent said they do not use it as
a first choice, as it was not compatible with the majority of
chanters in the ensemble. One of the first things Climent did
when I showed him my chanter was to take a pen knife to
the chanter reed, scraping it and cutting off the tip, bit by
bit, until it was in tune with the other chanters. The top B
note was taped over to make it a Bb.
The whole point of this was to make it playable
within the group. A definite reversal of tradition from being
an individualistic, solo village instrument, to become an
ensemble, city instrument, compatible with 30 other Bb
chanters; an ensemble environment compared to a duet of
pipe and drum. Climent said if I had come to him sooner he
would not have recommended this type of chanter, instead
to buy a Bb Galician chanter (with Galician reeds) that are
easily available and replaceable, and a standardized chanter
that would play “in tune” with others. The minor scale
would be easily achieved by simply taping over half of the
D hole (3�ᵈ hole) to make it Db, thus obtaining a Pedrazales
tuning, even though the Galician chanter has a B note below
the tonic, instead of a Bb.

34
 The emphasis was on keeping the tradition alive not by preserving it in
its original village setting, but by adapting the tradition to a capital city and
making it compatible for everyone to play together. No messing around trying to
tune individual chanters, as the Galician’s had already achieved that with their
chanters and chanter reeds. It was a case of using what was available to produce
the sound. The majority of people were not regular musicians, and some had not
played an instrument before, others were very good musicians and were well
versed in a gaita tradition. Galician chanters are easily obtained in Madrid with
little or no waiting time, Galician gaitas and reeds (also Gaita Sanabresa reeds)
are bought there from “Tunumtunumba” music shop.
To achieve an overall sound, compromises needed to be made and in an ensemble
this was the quickest way to do it. In the group there was a mixture of Pedrazales
chanters, Alistan, Galician and Sanabresa chanters, adapted to produce an oval-
all unified sound. The melodies played had been collected from the villages and
been “simplified” for everyone to play, gracing was not marked on the music
sheets, the key signature of the notation was with three or two flats depending on
the region, (Alistana melodies using two flats, Sanabresa using three). An attempt
had been made to unify the instrument for the sake of the band.
When I was there, Climent was producing a CD for “Casa de Zamora”
featuring the gaita band. It was an ambitious work, often working with musicians
who had never recorded before. The result was a beautiful CD including
professional and amateur musicians, songs and instruments of that region. After
the CD was made Climent left Casa, but the band still practices on a Wednesday
evening about 8pm; if you are in Madrid they are very welcoming.
I had heard of other people who played music from Zamora, and I was
told I could find them at the Plaza de Toros in Madrid on Sunday mornings about
11am. I went for a few Sundays, and again I found a different type of chanter,
different tuning and a different maker, playing a different repertoire. There were
only a few musicians, older men from the villages, who had moved to Madrid
years ago; they did not go to Casa de Zamora either. They had their own way of
doing things, they played in C instead of Bb. ‘C’ gaitas are the most common
pitch in Spain, Bb is still used especially when singing; recently I bought a Gaita
Sanabresa chanter in the pitch of C, made from ebony.
For me, these ‘Subgalaic gaitas’ are very different to the other pipes in northern
Spain, as they have not achieved standardization to such an extent as the
Asturian/Galician gaitas have. The playing style, its timbre, its musical
interpretation is still individualistic, and not restricted to a harmonized “stylized”
big band format. There are benefits to standardizing the pitch and tunings, and
Alberto and Climent, are helping to promote these gaitas to a wider audience.

35
There are pros and cons in standardization these gaitas, this often means
preserving the instrument from extinction, but it can also mean ‘something’ gets
lost along the way; the ‘Subgalaic gaitas’ have kept something of the originality
and diverse characteristics of gaita playing in Spain, whether it loses its
originality depends a lot how things evolve.

Further Information:
Alberto Jambrina Leal is Coordinator for the School of Folklore, a Musical Promotion Consortium, in
the city of Zamora (Escuela de Folklore del Consorcio de Fomento Musical de Zamora). He is a
researcher and performer. Alberto has been transcribing gaita music from his teachers: Serafín and
Francisco Guillermo (Gaita Alistana); and Julio Prada (Gaita Sanabresa), "Tí Francisco” Baladrón
(Gaita Carballeda); these transcriptions are used in his music school.

CDs
Alberto Jambrina Leal, "Arbolito Florido"
Gaita Carballeda: “Rasgos, Ti Francisco, La Carballeda” (ethnographical recordings, booklet, notation)
“Urzes, de urzes y madroños” Grupo de Casa de Zamora, Madrid.
Selected La Musgaña CDs (featuring José María Climent former member of La Musgaña [1986-91]) “El
Diablo Cojuelo” and “El Paso de la Estantigua”
Web sites:
https://www.facebook.com/Jambrinamusic/
Iberian Bagpipes in the UK, http://www.facebook.com/groups/632064580272868
Los Gaiteros de Pedrazales, http://www.facebook.com/groups/129541473779255
A collection of videos of Gaita: Sanabresa/Alistana/Pedrazales can be found at my YouTube site under
“playlists” https://www.youtube.com/kevnsp/playlists Contact me at ethnopiper@gmail.com

The bagpipe has been

represented in iconography in
the Iberian Peninsula since the
eleventh century, frequently
depicted as a rural instrument
played by shepherds.
The ethnographic evidence
of the use of bagpipes in
Portugal and Spain goes back to
Sculpture depicting a bagpiper. Ourense (Galicia). Fourteenth the nineteenth century.
century. In Pablo Carpintero Arias, Os instrumentos Musicais na Variations of this instrument,
Tradición Galega, 2ª Edición. Ed. Difusora, 2010, p. 365.
36
designated gaita throughout the Iberian Peninsula, were documented in several
regions, like the gaita gallega in Galicia (Spain), gaita asturiana in Asturias (Spain),
or gaita-de-fole in Portugal, all situated in the North-West of the Iberian Peninsula.
The designation gaita-de-fole refers specifically to the bagpipe in contrast with
other wind instruments in the oboe family or in the flute and tabor family, also
designated as gaitas. The generic term gaita-de-fole now used in Portugal
corresponds to the original designation of instruments used in Terras de Miranda
do Douro (in the North-East of the region of Trás-os-Montes) and in the
bordering Spanish region of Zamora, considered as the most “archaic”
Portuguese bagpipes. Throughout most of the twentieth century, the Northern
regions of Trás-os-Montes and Minho, bordering with the Spanish regions of
Galicia and Zamora, have been well known for their bagpiping tradition, as well
as other areas of the North and Center of Portugal, including the regions of Douro
Litoral, Estremadura, and Beira Litoral. Bagpiping has been documented mainly
in rural areas, but also in the cities of Coimbra, Oporto and Lisbon (the capital of
the country) and their surrounding areas.
The gaita-de-fole consists of a chanter (a double-reed wooden pipe with
eleven holes, eight of which are used to produce the melody), and one single-
reeded large drone pipe that rests on the player’s left shoulder. Finally, through a

Parts of a gaita-de-fole, in http://www.gaitadefoles.net/gaitadefoles/elementos.html. Portuguese Bagpipe Society.

Author: Miguel Costa
37
blowpipe, the piper blows air into the bag, which is pressed under the player’s
arm to provide a constant air supply to the melody and drone pipes. The chanter
is played with three fingers of the left hand and four fingers of the right hand.
Although the general designation used in Portugal is gaita-de-fole,
regional designations are traditionally used (such as gaita transmontana, from
Trás-os-Montes), and the term gaita galega is commonly used to refer to the
bagpipes used in Minho, brought to different areas of Portugal by migrants from
the bordering region of Galicia, or manufactured emulating the instruments used
in that neighboring region of Spain. In some gaitas galegas a second or even a third
drone is inserted into the bag.
Bagpipes traditionally used in the North-West of the Iberian Peninsula,
including Northern Portugal, Galicia, Asturias, and Zamora, belong to the same
category according to the classification system established by Anthony Baines.
They all pertain to the Western European Bagpipes, which incorporates separate
pipes: the chanter (double-reed) and the drone (single-reed), the air being blown
by the bagpiper’s mouth. These bagpipes are also related to some of the most
“archaic” European instruments: those which preserve a conical chanter and
include only one drone, which Baines calls the “Atlantic” or “Celtic” bagpipes,
usually accompanied by percussion, like the ones used in Galicia, Asturias,
Northern Portugal, Scotland or Brittany.
The making of the gaitas-de-fole and gaitas galegas has changed through
time, but they were traditionally made out of goatskin (for the bag) and wood.
The tunings vary, usually hovering between A and C. The drone is tuned two
octaves above the chanter. The gaita-de-fole used in a traditionally agro-pastoral
society in Terras de Miranda do Douro was usually handcrafted with basic tools,

Gaita-de-fole from Terras de Miranda do Douro (Portugal). Photograph by the author.

38
evidencing the shape of the goatskin used as raw material for making the bag.
Front legs and neck were used to attach the chanter, the blow pipe, and the drone
pipe. The remaining skin was tied with a rope to close the bag in the opposite
side.
This bagpipe has a distinctive sound, which is often described by players
and scholars as “deeper”, and more “melancholic” than other bagpipes
traditionally used in Portugal. The scales tend to be diatonic, modal, and
untempered, including microtonal notes. The melodies produced by the
instrument are integrated within the traditional regional vocal and instrumental
style. The performance style is characterized by the use of tremolos and
embellishments in the melodies played on the chanter. Scholars, musicians and
enthusiasts value this gaita-de-fole traditionally used in Terras de Miranda do
Douro for its “archaism” if compared to the gaitas galegas or more developed
instruments in terms of making, shape, sonority, repertoire and playing, used in
other Portuguese regions and, above all, in Galicia and Asturias, where
bagpiping was highly professionalized throughout the twentieth century.
Having a powerful sound, the bagpipe has been mainly played in the
open air. In Portugal, one or two male bagpipers and a variable number of
drummers traditionally provided entertainment for feasts and celebrations.
Ensembles called gaiteiros integrating bagpipe, snare drum and bass drum
predominate. In the region of Minho, Zés-Pereiras include a larger number of
percussionists. Occasionally bagpiping provided accompaniment for singing or
coexisted with other traditional instruments, such as pipe and tabor, castanets, or
shawms.
In Portugal, like in
Spain, the bagpipe has
traditionally been performed
by professional or semi-
professional musicians rather
than by shepherds (depicted in
historical iconography). For
decades, each village had at
least one well-known
bagpiper, and genealogies of
hereditary bagpipers are still
perpetuated in some regions.
These musicians provided
Bagpipers playing at the festivity of Our Lady of Nazaré in Ribeira
de Frades, Coimbra (Portugal), in 1970.Photograph by music for religious and secular
MichelGiacometti. Museu da Música Portuguesa-Casa Verdades de collective events: to
Faria. Câmara Municipal de Cascais. accompany informal dancing,
39
at weddings, fiestas, rites of passage or other community rituals, and pilgrimages,
or to provide entertainment. Bagpipers also played a crucial role in celebrations
such as liturgical ceremonies, religious rituals, processions, and parades.

Historical connections
In Portugal, bagpipe playing is historically related to similar practices in
neighboring regions in the north of Spain, particularly in Galicia. This can be
explained by cross-border exchange of bagpipers, instruments and repertories in
the North of Portugal, and by the important presence in several regions of the
country of migrants coming from Galicia. In Lisbon, a number of musical
activities and feasts including bagpipes have been documented among Galician
migrants since the nineteenth century.[1] The “Centro Galego de Lisboa”
(Regional House of Galicia in Lisbon), founded in 1908, has promoted the playing
of Galician traditional music including bagpiping, singing and dancing to
reinforce the sentiment of attachment of migrant communities to their homeland.
The promotion of Galician bagpiping in Lisbon contributed to the revival of the
interest by the Portuguese community in their own bagpiping tradition, also
connecting the cultural heritage of both the Galician and Portuguese populations.
In the traditionally rural, isolated and underdeveloped area of Terras de
Miranda do Douro (Trás-os-Montes), cultural and musical practices like
bagpiping have been characterized by exchanges with the neighboring Spanish
regions of Zamora, Galicia, and Asturias. Bagpiping has been traditionally
cultivated in this area. It started to be promoted locally, nationally and
internationally as a
distinctive expression of
Portuguese culture in the
1930s. In that decade,
bagpipers started to
accompany formally
constituted folkloric
groups of stick dances
fostered by a local priest,
António Maria Mourinho.
These groups performed
ritual dances called danças
dos paulitos.
The frequent
exchange of musical
Stick dances accompanied by gaiteiros in Sendim, Terras de Miranda do
instruments and
Douro (Portugal) in 2009. Photograph by the author.

40
musicians in diverse celebrations between Galicia, Asturias, Zamora and
Northern Portugal is evidenced by the number of music and dance repertoires
associated to those regions played by Portuguese bagpipers, such as the laços (the
typical repertory of the danças dos paulitos), jotas, muinheiras (emblematic Galician
dance), carvalhesas, fandangos, alvoradas, or passacalhes.
A live tradition in different regions of Portugal during the first half of the
twentieth century, bagpiping in the rural milieu decreased between the 1960s and
1980s, owing to modernization, mass migration, and profound socioeconomic
and cultural transformations all over the country. The number of active local
bagpipers and craftsmen diminished, and traditional handcrafted gaitas-de-fole
started to be replaced with more sophisticated equally-tempered gaitas galegas
manufactured in Galicia. In some cases, bagpipers were supplanted by other
musicians and bands, or by recorded music. However, this musical tradition
started to be revitalized and, since the 1990s, it was quickly disseminated to new
rural and urban areas of Portugal, especially in regions of the North of the
country and in the Metropolitan Area of Lisbon.

The revival of bagpiping in Portugal

The revival of the bagpipe took place in Portugal in the 1990s. The
influence of similar revivals that took place decades earlier in other regions of the
Iberian Peninsula, particularly in Galicia, was significant in this process.
In Galicia, the first revival of the bagpipe started in the nineteenth
century, when this instrument was first vindicated as a regional emblem. A new
revival movement started in the mid-1970s and consolidated since 1981, when
Galicia gained its status as a Spanish Autonomous Region. A new model for the
representation of Galician identity, culture, and music was then configured.
Inspired by the transnational “folk music”, “Celtic music”, and later also “world
music” movements, it emphasized Galicia’s difference from the rest of Spain. The
bagpipe was widely popularized and projected as an iconic regional instrument.
A number of musicians who recreated Galician music using Breton, Irish and
Scottish models gained national and transnational reputation. The manufacturing
of Galician bagpipes was improved. New, more sophisticated instruments with
precise and diversified tunings were standardized, and the traditional ensembles
often consisting of one or two bagpipes, snare and bass drum[2] gave place to
new ensembles and bands including a variable number of bagpipers and
percussionists playing together, some inspired by Scottish military pipe bands.
In Portugal, the revival of the bagpipe was driven by a number of
individuals, groups, associations and institutions mainly in Trás-os-Montes and
in the Metropolitan Area of Lisbon. They conceived bagpiping as a means to

41
express themselves and develop their creativity, or to construct local identities
and serve political and socio-economic aspirations (essentially in Terras de
Miranda do Douro). The aim of the revival was, on the one hand, to preserve
traditional bagpipes and their playing as an important element of Portuguese
musical heritage, while claiming the incorporation of Portuguese expressions in
the transnational community of bagpiping. On the other hand, following
international trends and aesthetics, the aim was to explore the musical
possibilities of the bagpipe in music productions within the domains of pop, rock,
folk, “Celtic”, or “world music”.
In Lisbon, the Portuguese Bagpipe Society, founded in 1999, played an
important role in the revival of bagpiping in Portugal by researching and
disseminating the gaita-de-fole, promoting its construction and providing
instruction for players. The number of musicians and groups dedicated to the
preservation, making, playing and re-creation of the musical practice of the gaita
galega and the gaita transmontana, integrated in diverse music ensembles and
bands, rapidly spread in the Metropolitan Area of Lisbon and beyond thanks to a
number of activities in which this society partook, including the organization of
national gatherings of Portuguese bagpipers. Founders of the society were moved
by the idea that traditional music, and particularly bagpipig, is an “authentic”
expression of Portuguese culture that needs to be defended to avoid cultural
homogenization in the context of increasing globalization. Since the 1980s, Paulo
Marinho –on of the founders of the Portuguese Bagpipe Society- has been teaching
bagpipe at the Centro Galego de Lisboa and other institutions, promoting its
recognition as a traditional Portuguese musical instrument, contributing to its
dissemination.
In Terras de Miranda do Douro (Trás-os-Montes), a renewed interest in
bagpiping consolidated in the 1990s. The use of rural music and cultural
expressions to vindicate local identity and promote tourism in order to overcome
underdevelopment was then intensified, especially following the recognition by
the Portuguese Government, in 1999, of the local language, mirandês, as Portugal’s
second official language. Stick dances and the bagpipe, today taught in local
schools, have been widely supported by municipal and regional entities ever
since. Two local institutions, the Cultural Association Galandum Galundaina
(founded in 1996) and the Centre for Traditional Music “Sons da Terra” (founded
in 2002), played a crucial role in this area as mediators between the local
population and governmental institutions, collecting, promoting and reinventing
local cultural practices, organizing piping gatherings, contributing to the teaching
of the bagpipe and to the constitution of rural and urban groups that recreate
traditional music.

42
 Several bagpipers playing gaita-de-fole in a bagpiping gathering in Miranda do Douro (Portugal) in
2008. Photograph by the author.

The revivalist activities carried out in Terras de Miranda do Douro and in

the Metropolitan Area of Lisbon attracted Portuguese young people from urban
and rural contexts. At the same time, in order to respond to the necessities and
aspirations of contemporary musicians, instrument makers, and followers, the
revival of the bagpipe in these and other regions of Portugal was accompanied by
significant changes in the musical groups, instruments, instruction, playing
techniques, repertoires and
performance practice.
Similarly to the changes
introduced in the more
sophisticated Galician
bagpipes a few decades
ago, the gaitas galegas and
gaitas transmontanas now
used in Portugal are made
by professional makers.
Instruments used
nowadays are lighter,
more sophisticated, their
sound being improved in
terms of volume and Gaita-de-fole. Casa De L Pauliteiro. Sendim, Terras de Miranda do
Douro (Portugal). Photograph by the author.

43
timber, so different bagpipers can tune and play together, and the bagpipe can be
integrated in diverse music ensembles.
A number of pipe bands and ensembles inspired by bands founded in
previous decades in Galicia and other Spanish regions emerged in cities and rural
areas of Portugal since the 1990s, partly as a consequence of the need to play
together in piping gatherings and of the new methods of collective training at
schools and associations. Large bands similar to Galician pipe bands[3] that
partake in cross-border concerts, contests and celebrations were constituted in
localities in the north of Portugal since 1998.

Banda de gaitas de São Tiago de Cardielos. Viana do Castelo (Portugal). XXIII Campeonato da liga de Bandas
Galega, Santiago de Compostela. March, 2013. Photograph by Dulce Simões.

These bands are officially supported by local governments in an effort to

promote bagpiping as a shared musical and cultural patrimony of Galicia and
Portugal. They are regarded as innovative and prestigious music ensembles to
provide music for local feasts and official events. In Terras de Miranda do Douro,
while a number of new, larger ensembles emerged, the traditional gaiteiros
consisting of a bagpiper accompanied by a snare and bass drum has continued to
perform in religious and secular festivities and rituals, and to accompany local
folklorized stick dances.
Some Portuguese musicians that were in charge of promoting and
transmitting this tradition in their country in recent decades received training as
bagpipers in Galician schools, and used gaitas galegas. A number of Portuguese
instrument makers became specialized in the construction of gaitas galegas and

44
gaitas transmontanas, but many musical instruments were ordered from Galician
instrument makers or bought from their workshops. In Terras de Miranda do
Douro, the gradual replacement of local bagpipes with gaitas galegas, and the
search for more sophisticated musical instruments representative of local
tradition triggered a project that culminated in the official recognition of a
standardized gaita mirandesa by the Portuguese Ministry of Culture in 2007. This
process was also inspired by the previous standardization of the Galician
bagpipes.

Final remarks
Bagpipes used in Portugal have been conceived under two major
categories: gaita-de-fole and gaita galega. The latter category reflects the influence,
at least since the nineteenth century, of the instruments used in Galicia, a region
internationally renowned for the revivals of the bagpipe that started in the
nineteenth century and for the flourishing and development of bagpiping
throughout the twentieth century. Bagpiping as cultivated in that region became
a canonical model for Portuguese bagpipers. Cross-border exchanges, as well as
the presence of Galician diasporic communities in several Portuguese regions
promoted the connections of bagpiping in Galicia and Portugal. When the revival
of this traditional practice started to consolidate in Portugal in the 1990s in urban
and rural contexts, revivalists were inspired by previous processes which had
taken place in Spain, especially in Galicia, fostering transformations in the
instrument, its playing techniques, repertoires, and the music ensembles thriving
in diverse areas of the country. The influence of the Galician model of bagpiping
is also clear in Terras de Miranda do Douro (Trás-os-Montes), historically
considered as the area of Portugal with the most “archaic” and “authentic”
piping, where some of the “oldest examples” of bagpipes in the Iberian Peninsula
were preserved.
Susana Moreno Fernández, University of Valladolid (Spain)

[1] In the seventeenth century, a significant migratory influx from Galicia to Portugal, mainly to
Lisbon and Porto, began. Since the nineteenth century, there are several references in the literature to
the presence of Galicians in Portugal, and to their distinctive celebrations, including bagpiping.
[2] In Galicia and West Asturias some quartets and quintets including bagpipes are documented since
the nineteenth century. The Spanish army and other civilian institutions integrated this instrument in
brass bands or founded pipe bands, thriving in Galicia since the early twentieth century.
[3] This is the case of the bands of “Gaiteiros de Pitões de Júnias” (1998); “Gaiteiros de Lebução”
(2003); “Gaiteiros da Fundação Maestro José Pedro” (2000) and “Banda de Gaitas de São Tiago de
Cardielos” (2003) in the district of Viana do Castelo; and “Banda de Gaitas de São Bernardo” (2003) in
the district of Aveiro.

45
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Associaçao para o Estudo e Divulgaçao da Gaita de Foles (1999) Revista Gaita de foles 1. Lisboa:
Associaçao para o Estudo e Divulgaçao da Gaita de Foles.
Carvalho , Joao Soeiro de (2010) “Gaita-de-foles”. Enciclopédia da Música em Portugal no Século XX, Vol.
2, pp. 553-555. Lisboa: Círculo de Leitores.
Cauffriez, Anne (1989) “La cornemuse du Tras-os-Montes (Portugal)”, Cahiers de Musiques
Traditionelles 2, 165-182.
García-Oliva, Alfonso (1992) Museo de la Gaita. Catálogo de las cornamusas del Museo de la Gaita de Gijón.
Gijón: Fundación Municipal de Cultura.
Jambrina Leal, Alberto (1988) “La gaita en Zamora y Tras os Montes”, Anuario de la Gaita, 37-38.
Ourense: Escola Provincial de Gaitas. Deputación de Ourense.
Oliveira, Ernesto Veiga de (1982/1966) Instrumentos musicais populares portugueses. Lisboa: FCG.
Rodrigues, Juan-Gil López (2010) “Galiza em Portugal, música da”. Enciclopédia da Música em Portugal
no Século XX, Vol. 2, pp. 557-559. Lisboa: Círculo de Leitores.
Simões, Dulce (2012) “Entre a tradição e a modernidade. As bandas de gaitas no Norte de Portugal”.
Anuario da Gaita 27, 58-61. Ourense: Escola Provincial de Gaitas. Deputación de Ourense.

‘You must sing, / sweet piper girl, / you must sing, / for I’m dying from grief. /
[...] / To the sound of the pipes, / to the sound of the tambourine, / I ask you to
sing, / dark-haired girl.’
From Cantares Gallegos [Galician Songs] (1863) by Rosalía de Castro
(Translated by John Rutherford)
This article offers an overview of the tension between tradition and
innovation in the world of the Galician gaita in modern times with the aim of
showing the vitality of the gaita and the bagpiper as symbols of ever evolving
meaning. To do so, we must start looking at the age of nationalism. Spain was no
exception to the national movements that swept through Europe in the nineteenth
century. In several Spanish regions, two competing national movements
developed: that of the nation-state (Spain) and that of the region. Today, most
people only think of the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia, but there were
others, such as the piping region of Asturias, whose most well-known symbol is
the cider El gaitero. Most of these regional movements found the spirit of the
people in rural culture. Instruments associated with this culture, such as the gaita
and the hurdy-gurdy, were revitalised and promoted. In the article ‘Bagpipes and
Digital Music: the Re-Mixing of the Galician Identity’, the writer Xelís de Toro

46
explains how the gaita, made of wood and textiles, and the bagpiper, a member
of the rural community, ‘could represent perfectly the realm of the rural, nature
and landscape, the places where Galician identity was to be found’.
It must be noted that the gaita (and the hurdy-
gurdy, for that matter) is not only a rural instrument
of the lower classes. Its first representations are
found in the medieval manuscripts of the Cantigas
de Santa María [Songs of Holy Mary], dating from
the thirteenth century, and there are references to
duets of gaiteiro and tamboril [drummer] being
hired by all sort of civil and religious institutions
from the sixteenth century onwards. According to
the musicologist Casto Sampedro, these duets were
intermediaries between the popular and the
educated classes—they helped to popularise learned compositions.
Another key element of the Galician political project was the language.
Galician (or Galego), a Romance language in its own right, but which many have
considered a Spanish dialect, was revitalised. Traditional songs were collected
and writing in the language was promoted. Examples of the relationship between
the pipes and the language can be found in two foundational books of the
Galician regional
movement. The first
book ever published
(partially) in
Galician, A gaita
gallega [The Galician
Pipes] (1853), written
by Xoán Manuel
Pintos, is a collection
of poems heralding a
new age for the
language where the
protagonists are an
old gaiteiro and a
young tamborileiro
[drummer]. The
image of the bagpiper as an old, wise man is a common one. A characteristic
poem from the collection says: ‘Please God these well-played Pipes / bring
memories to the good Piper, / and may thousand more men, / where the first one

47
played, / also come to play the beloved Pipes.’ In this call to arms, ‘playing the
beloved Pipes’ also stand for using the language and for promoting Galician
culture.
Other examples can be found in the most famous Galician book of all
times, the poetry collection, Cantares gallegos (1863), by Rosalía de Castro, the
foundational writer of Galician literature and of the national movement called O
Rexurdimento [The Revival], an oddity among the ranks of foundational writers
of national literatures, who are overwhelmingly male. Two characteristic poems
are ‘A gaita gallega’ [The Galician Pipes], a political poem lamenting the dire
economic situation of Galicia, in which the gaita is said to weep not to sing, and
‘Un repoludo gaiteiro’ [A Dashing Piper], which introduces the well-known
image of the bagpiper as a Don Juan. The male soloist, the piper, has long
embodied elements of traditional hegemonic masculinities, especially
heterosexual prowess. In fact, gaita is a slang word for ‘penis’. The double
entendre between the instrument and the body part is present in a common
proverb that celebrates the luck of the bagpiper’s wife: ‘A muller do gaiteiriño,
muller de moita fortuna, ela toca dúas gaitas. Outras non tocan ningunha’ [The
bagpiper’s wife is a lucky woman, she plays two sets of pipes. Others don’t play
any]. He also became the hero of the popular classes. The image of the piper
generated by Galician nationalism in the nineteenth century is therefore an
interplay of notions of nation, class and gender.
It is common to assume that until recently all bagpipers were male but
this is far from the case. In the opening poem of Cantares, which frames the book
and also the Revival, the poetic voice addresses a ‘meniña gaiteira’ [a girl piper]
asking her to sing and make merry. This girl stands for the Galician community
and also for the female author of the book. One of the first female historical pipers
we know of is Áurea García of Os maravillas de Cartelle [The Wondrous Ones
from Cartelle], born in 1897. Since then, Galicia has singled itself out by its large
number of female bagpipers when compared to other piping nations. Some
elements that may have encouraged the presence of female pipers are the idea
that the gaita and the bagpiper are associated with the Celtic world and therefore
with lyricism, a trait widely considered feminine. They were also practical: the
instrument was played during rural and communal work such as the flax harvest,
often done by women. And, last but not least, quartets (two bagpipes, side and
bass drum) were often family businesses and in a society where many men
emigrated, women took over their roles.
Another crucial element of Galician nationalism was that of Galicia’s
alleged Celtic roots. Inspired in the discourses of the Celtic Revival, the thinkers
of the Rexurdimento argued that Galicia was a Celtic nation culturally closer to

48
Brittany, Ireland, Scotland and Wales than to Castile, a Mediterranean nation. In
Galicia, A Sentimental Nation: Gender, Culture and Politics (2015), Helena
Miguélez-Carballeira explains how the trope of the sentimental nation ‘has
helped sustain the unequal power relation between Galicia and the Spanish state’.
The overuse of adjectives such as ‘nostalgic’, ‘sentimental’ and ‘longing‘ to
describe gaita music have their origins in the Celtic discourse, but it was greatly
helped by socio-economic circumstances.
At the end of the nineteenth century, Galicia experienced a period of
mass migration towards Central and South America. For the gaita and the
bagpipers, it meant a new world full of opportunities. The quartets, the most
common formation at the time, organised their first international tours and gaita
music was recorded for the first time. As a result of this mobility, twentieth-
century Galician popular music incorporated Latin American rhythms such as
habanera and rumba. The acute experience of migration has made bagpipes and
their music closely associated with the idea of home and to the feeling of
nostalgia for the homeland, called morriña. Another image of the bagpiper is thus
as a figure who evokes the far-away home.
Since the fin de siècle the bagpiper was displaced from centre stage and,
as happened in other European contexts, by the 1920s they were either subsumed
within larger formations or replaced by bands which played other types of music.
Two political events of great significance contributed to the slow decline of the
bagpipe as a traditional instrument that was adapting to the new times. The
Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) and Franco’s Dictatorship (1939-1975) had a great
impact on the instrument and how it was played. Although the régime fought
against the Basque, Catalan, and Galician national movements, it was interested
in the promotion of regional dance and music from a folkloric point of view and
‘bagpipes were included in the official Francoist culture as a means to incorporate
an ambiguous and undefined Galician identity which posed no threat to Spanish
hegemony’, as Xelís de Toro says. It was during this time that the design of the
cover incorporated the colours of the Spanish flag (red and yellow). Despite their
presence, the gaita and the bagpiper lost their status and prestige.
During the Dictatorship, there were initiatives to preserve folk music. The
relentless work of Faustino Santalices, a bagpiper and a key figure in reviving the
hurdy-gurdy, materialised in the foundation in 1951 of an influential workshop
and school of Galician instruments. Groups and societies mainly devoted to
singing and dancing were also crucial. Women played a vital role in these groups
and the first female pipe band in Galicia dates from these years: the Grupo
Saudade [nostalgia], active between 1961 and 1966.

49
 The bagpipe also adapted to the new times. A timid mass production and
the use of new materials were behind a crucial structural change: the bag was no
longer made from goat’s skin but from a cheap synthetic material. After several
years, it was obvious to everyone that other materials needed to be found.
Among their many contributions to the world of piping making, Antón Corral
and Xosé Seivane, two fundamental names in the history of Galician folk music,
made great efforts to make tempered gaitas and to broaden the range of keys.
Symbolically many bagpipers starting holding the instrument differently: instead
of putting the bass drone over the shoulder looking up, they put it completely
horizontal to the ground, in a less conspicuous form. The bagpipes quartets con-
tinued livening up the popular festas but they no longer appeared in the posters
under their own name but under the generic grupo de gaitas [bagpipe band] and
they became the supporting act.
There were bands and groups who succeeded in maintaining the dignity
of traditional Galician music and transmitting it to new generations who had to
take over that responsibility in the years of transition to Democracy, from 1975
onwards, but it was far from easy to reconcile the ideas about the bagpipe as an
instrument from the past with those that associated it with the promotion of folk
music by Franco’s régime. Nando Casal and Xosé Ferreirós, the bagpipers from
Milladoiro, a key band in the Galician Folk Revival of the late 1970s and early
1980s, alluded to the different meanings of the traditional bagpiper when they
said: ‘we were on dangerous ground, we were people who also fought for
freedom, politically committed, but who also wore the traditional bagpiper dress,
which was seen as folkloric in the worst meaning of the word, and many liberals
were not able to understand our role’.
The gaita has been a common presence at institutional events since the
sixteenth century but, since the creation of the autonomous government in the
early 1980s, it has become a contested political symbol at the inauguration days of
the President of the Galician government. The tunes played are always the same,
the March of the Old Kingdom of Galicia, the Galician Anthem and Muiñeira of
Ponte Sampaio, being among the most important, but the number of pipers and
their formation are political statements. In 1990, at the first inauguration of the
conservative Manuel Fraga Iribarne, there were 1,500 pipers and, in 2001, after 11
years in power, there were 6,000, some of them from the Diaspora. The following
president, from the socialist party, promised to avoid such extravagant
statements and organised an inauguration day that was a metaphor of the
political change: there was a single piper playing with a symphony orchestra. In
other words, instead of promoting a martial Scottish-like piping formation, the

50
new administration went back to the piper as a soloist, a mediator between the
essence of the rural nation and classical music.
Yet the bagpipe has also
been a key instrument in political
protest. In 1995 the folk-rock band,
Os Diplomáticos de Monte Alto [The
Diplomats of Monte Alto], released
their single ‘¡Eu quero ser gaiteiro!’
[I want to be a bagpiper!], which has
become a war cry of sorts. In the
words, several people including an
Anarchist leader, Bakunin; the left-
wing Portuguese musician, Zeca
Afonso; a football coach, Arsenio
Iglesias; and a mother are described
as ‘gaiteiro/a’, meaning ‘hero’. A
good example of this use of the
instrument was the Marea Gaiteira
[Pipers’ Tide], organised in 2002 as a
political protest for the government’s
mismanagement of the ecological
disaster caused by the spillage of the
oil tanker Prestige. More than 20,000
people attended this march and the
bagpipe and the many pipers who
attended were used as symbols of an empowered Galician community. Another
example is the Piper Pussy Riot from the 2010 Women’s March where the image
of a female bagpiper was used
to protest in favour of
women’s rights.
From folk music, the
pipes have worked their way
into other genres such as
contemporary music, pop and
rock. Two influential rock
bands founded in the early
1980s, Os Resentidos [The
Resentful Ones] and Siniestro
Total [Beyond Repair], used

51
bagpipes as symbols of
their Galician identity.
The former were the
first rock band to have a
bagpiper. The latter, the
enfants terribles of
Galician music, alluded
to the cover of The
Clash’s ‘London
Calling’ when they
chose, for the cover of
their maxi single ‘Me
pica un güevo’ [One of
my balls itches], a
bagpiper wearing the
traditional dress
smashing his pipes into
the soil or digging the
soil with his pipes.
Once again, the instrument and the player are associated with a rural community
but in the context of innovative musical genres.
The solo bagpiper regains the centre of the stage when Carlos Núñez
releases his first album in 1996: ‘A Irmandade das Estrelas’ [Brotherhood of
Stars]. ‘Nostalgia for the future’, as the writer Manuel Rivas wrote for this CD
booklet. A few years later two female bagpipers launched their first albums:
Cristina Pato and Susana Seivane. Here begins the great time of the solo bagpiper.
All of them went from having more wholesome images on their first albums
(highly skilled, wild or sensitive) to a more sophisticated and sexualised
appearance on the following ones.
Since the 1980s, Galician media began making a wider use of the bagpipe
and the bagpiper. So much so, that the Galician Regional TV station is negatively
known as Telegaita. It is worth mentioning the successful Christmas campaign
organised by a major regional supermarket chain, Gadis. Year after year, with a
mixture of irony and praise, Gadis calls upon feelings of Galicianness, especially
morriña, and uses bagpipes to convey an epic mode and bagpipers as
superheroes: the supergaiteiro and supergaiteira [the Super Pipers], both of them
with a sexualised image that echoes the image of the Scottish hero William
Wallace in the Hollywood film Braveheart.

52
 The tension between tradition and innovation is best seen in the type of
instrument that bagpipers want to play. On the one hand, the tradition is closer
than ever. The most significant historical recordings are now available thanks to
the praiseworthy work of the label Ouvirmos. There are makers and pipers who
work to bring back the sounds of the past, making and playing period gaitas. On
the other hand, there are pipers who want to stretch the possibilities of the
instrument. A well-known case is that of Xan Míguez González (1847-1912), the
piper from Ventosela, who promoted the use of keys in the chanter. This line of
research came under such severe criticism that it was soon abandoned. Since
then, the changes to the chanter have been much more subtle. For example, some
bagpipes have a new hole at the back of the chanter to achieve a semitone
between the root and the second major. The makers are still working to improve
the instrument, but they are careful to maintain its traditional look and shape.
More recently, these efforts have been directed towards the piper’s playing
technique—the extended technique is now applied to broaden the range of the
repertoire.
The gaita and the bagpiper are everywhere we look. As images, we can
find them in medieval stone carvings and manuscripts but also in modern
souvenirs and supermarket commercials. From old wise men to young sexy (male
and female) pipers, their image evokes ideas of longing and wisdom but also of
heroism and playfulness. As literary motifs, they populate nineteenth-century
writing but also pop and rock songs. From popular festas to official events, for
centuries the gaita has been a fixture for all occasions. Regardless of they being
traditional or innovative, the gaita and the bagpiper are uncontested symbols of
Galician identity—their adaptability promises a bright future.

I would like to thank the Museo do Pobo Galego (Santiago de Compostela) and
Clodio Gozález Pérez for their help with some of the images.

Cited sources
Castro, Rosalía de. Galician Songs. Trans. Erin Moure. Sofia: Small Stations Press, 2013 [1863].
Miguélez-Carballeira, Helena. Galicia, A Sentimental Nation: Gender, Culture and Politics. Cardiff:
Wales University Press, 2015.
Toro, Xelís de. ‘Bagpipes and Digital Music: the Re-Mixing of the Galician Identity’ (2002)
http://bit.ly/Chanter20
Pintos, Xoán Manuel. ‘A gaita gallega’ [1853], Trans. John Rutherford, from Breogán’s Lighthouse: An
Anthology of Galician Literature. Ed. Antonio Raúl de Toro Santos. London: Francis Boutle
Publishers, 2010, pp. 122-123.
Gemie, Sharif. A Concise History of Galicia. Cardiff: University of Wales, 2006.
Campaign ‘Vivamos como galegos’ [Let’s Live Like Galicians] http://bit.ly/Chanter21
Supergalegos [Supergalicians] http://bit.ly/Chanter22
O escuadrón Malo será [The Brigade ‘It Will Be Fine’] http://bit.ly/Chanter23 http://bit.ly/Chanter24
http://bit.ly/Chanter25
53
I've been playing Galician bagpipe
in London for eight years. After
studying bagpipes in Galicia, I came
to the UK from a very small village
in the Galician northwest to a huge
and cosmopolitan city like London,
where everything is possible and
where people from every culture of
around the world coexist with their
custom and musical traditions.
For me, as a bagpiper, it
was something amazing coming to
this city. I soon started to work in a
Galician restaurant belonging to a
social club, the Centro Galego de
Londres, where they want me to
play my gaita accompanied by
percussion every Friday and
Saturday nights. It's a very special and magical show with Celtic music,
queimada and conxuro, a bit of Galicia in the heart of London, loved by
everybody that enjoys it, I can proudly say.
In London I have also had the chance to play with people from very
different cultures such as participating in Irish sessions, in Scottish parades or in
Arabic weddings, and I'm also playing with other musicians in other kinds of
styles, like flamenco and Latin music, using the gaita and the Irish whistle. What
I found amazing was how, in London, how interested people were in me and my
bagpipes, and how easy was to get performances once you got known. Here I
found that bagpipes can be used in all types of music, not only in the Galician
tradition, but the sound of the gaita can also be adaped to play flamenco If and
other rhythms. I have a project called Spontaneous, with features a guitar player
from Orihuela, in the southeast of Spain, and he is influenced by the jazz and
bossa. Also in the group is a girl from the south of Spain who plays guitar and a
very peculiar kind of three-holed flute typical in Huelva, called "gaita" as well in
that area, even when it's not a bagpipe at all.

54
 I'm also proud of
collaborating with the
"Centro Galego de
Londres" bagpipe band,
leaded by Rafael Porro,
and I've been offered to
lead it due to the actual
teacher retirement. I
want to take the chance
to say that everybody is
welcome every Sunday
noon in the Centro
Galego restaurant for
classes of playing
Galician bagpipes,
tambourines and drums.
Please, understand me, bagpipers, I'm a lover of the tradition in which I
was born (and all others too), and I understand traditional musicians. For me it is
very important that the pure interpretation of the traditional tunes are preserved
exactly how they were composed, but there are other people doing this very
important work. However, I'm a free musician, I can play the tunes I play in the
traditional way but I rarely do and I enjoy playing in my own style. So whilst I
love and respect traditional bagpipers, please, respect me as well even if I change
some notes in your favourite tune, or if I use bagpipes to play other styles outside
of the Celtic cultures.
If you wish to contact David, then he can be reached at davidcarril@yahoo.com or
via Facebook https://www.facebook.com/david.carrilcastineira

Born in Ferrol in 1985, Daniel has always been interested in music, especially the
music of Galicia. He is probably one of the most highly revered bagpipers alive
today with over 40 major prizes under his belt and he has performed across
Europe and the US. He plays saxophone as well as gaita for ‘BellónMaceiras’. In
2010, he co-founded BellónMaceiras Music School alongside Diego Maceiras
(accordion) in Fene, Galicia.

55
 His playing career
started whilst still at the
Music Conservatory in
Ferrol when he formed the
bagpipe group Airiños de
Fene (1995) but he went
on to record a number of
solo CDs such as
“Identidade”. He is a
founding member of the
groups Roquementroque
and Venela, and also plays
with Xaloucos, a bagpipe
quartet. As a soloist he
has won numerous
significant awards
throughout Spain and
France and in 2001 he was
selected to participate in
an exclusive course for
bagpipers led by Carlos
Núñez . He has also
served as a judge and composer for Galician music contests since 2007. He has
been involved in many groups and musical collaborations. For more information,
videos and recordings http://www.danielbellon.com/

What bagpipes do you play?

I play Galician Bagpipe

What led you to take up piping?

I started playing bagpipe because one of my school teachers said to my
mother that I played the flute very well, so she decided to send me to a traditional
association for playing bagpipe.

Which pipers do you most admire?

A Lot!! Carlos Núñez, Edelmiro Fdez, Fred Morrison, Callum
Armstrong… and more!

Name three, non-piping-related musical influences:

Fusion music, jazz music ( I play saxophone ), folk music.

56
What three albums are top of your playlist right now?
From Billie Holiday to Edit Piaf ( Richard Galliano & Wynton Marsalis ),
CMS Trío, Nova Galega de Danza ( Tradiccioón )

If you had your life again, what instrument would you play?
Bagpipe again!

Name your favourite music festival.

Piping Live (Glasgow)

What three words describe your piping style?

Soft sound, variations and flexible.

Bellows or mouth-blown?
Bellows

Cats or dogs?
Dogs

Do you prefer playing, dancing or both?

Playing

Cane or plastic reeds?

Always Cane

What’s your greatest musical achievement?

Maybe being the bagpiper with more awards in Galicia, but in fact for me
the most important thing is that I make a living from what I like doing.

What’s your most embarrassing bagpiping moment?

When I lost the “chion” ( little drone ) during a concert because it flew
away….

What’s the most annoying question you get asked about the bagpipes?
Nothing especially, I have always been very lucky with the interviews I
have had.

What advice would you give a novice?

I would tell him to enjoy his learning every day like a game without
worries.

I love bagpipes because...

Its sound is the greatest in the world.
As told to Andy Letcher

57
Tools of the Trade
Diego Piñeiro was born in Santiago de Compostela in 1978. Since 2004, he hs been
making Galician gaitas and Mallorcan xeremies. A carpenter by trade, he taught himself
the instrument making skills by visiting many artisans, sharing advice and methods. He
currently combines his bagpipe making practice with the construction and repair of metal
wind instruments after a few years of specialised training in Bremen, northern Germany.

The shape, size and material of the rings that decorate a bagpipe are, in
large part, elements that differentiate and identify each particular sort of bagpipe.
In different bagpipes we can find rings of very different types and materials, from
silver to wood, horn, bone, synthetic materials... However, the main function of
the rings in bagpipes is not decorative but to reinforce those weak parts from
blows or breaks due to changes in
pressure or temperature. This
function is performed with
special efficiency by metal rings.
In the world of bagpipes
there are different ways of using
metal to make rings, which we
could basically separate into three
categories: ordinary tube pieces;
rings made specifically for
bagpipes, carved and decorated,
that, once finished, are placed on
the instrument; or rings that are
integrated into the instrument
when it is made, adapting the
metal to the shape of the wooden structure. This third type is the one used in
Galician bagpipes, and I find it interesting to talk about.
These rings are traditionally made from a sheet of brass, nickelsilver or
silver from which a rectangle is cut out and soldered with silver, forming a ring.
This ring, once well rounded, is worked in two ways: in the case of lace rings, one
adjusts the diameter of the wood until we have a good fit, leaving a groove
somewhere, usually in the middle. When placing the ring, the metal is pressed
with a steel roller, inserting the metal into the groove. At this point, one only has
to stretch the straight parts to the either side of the groove, thus achieving a

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perfect fit. This type of ring is
completely integrated in the
wood and is impossible to
extract. Additionally, the
pressure on the weak part of the
socket is even, there is no slack,
so the reinforcement function is
perfect. On top of this, the
molecular structure of the metal
was stressed by be deformed on
the wood, so the result is a
beautiful ring, hard and with a
perfect fit.
In the case of chanter
rings or drone ends, the
moulding is different: on a hardwood mould, the metal is worked until it forms
the middle of the curve. Then the wooden element is adjusted and the metal is
bowed over it. It is a relatively complex technique, which requires skill and
experience. Some makers do this work with steel rollers, rejecting the lathe, others
in the traditional way, use a hammer. In either case, the result is a ring completely
integrated in the piece, forming an inseparable unit.
The combination of these two techniques, along with the use of other
materials of contrasting colors, opens an unlimited range of aesthetic options,
which makes each instrument unique, and allows to expand the creativity of the
builder, making this on of the most beautiful jobs to have.

Where next? Well, I hope this edition of Chanter has whetted your
appetite for finding out more about the music and culture of Iberia and its
instruments. There are some established groups and sessions in the UK which
feature Iberian music and are featured below. Also, Cassandre has selected her
top picks of CDs and recordings for you to search out and listen to. We’re also
going to be treated to some historical Iberian piping at the forthcoming Medieval
Music in the Dales. But if you want to get your pipes out and start playing now,
then you need to go directly to this site:

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http://www.folkotecagalega.com/pezas A site well worth exploring where you
will find lots of tunes for you to listen to and music notation to download. Many
thanks to Society member Jean-Louis Caussé for this link.

Music Recommendations from the South

Portugal
Galandum Galundaina – This band is one of the first to bring Northern
Portuguese traditional instruments to the forefront. Working extensively for the
revival of their music, the musicians of Galandum Galundaina are key figures in
Portuguese music and a good starting point for any exploration into the music of
this part of the Iberian Peninsula. http://www.galandum.co.pt

Galicia
Bellon Maceiras – Whether you go for the duo or the quintet formation, these are
some of the finest musicians in Galicia. Dani Bellón really dazzles with his
interpretation of Galician tunes on the pipes and Diego Maceiras is his equal on
the button accordion. My favourite album is Union das Terras, but all of them are
fantastic. https://www.bellonmaceiras.com

Anxo Lorenzo – Another Galician star (others include Susana Seivana and Carlos
Nuñez). He plays his acoustic pipes like an electric guitar... Check him out!
Os Cempés – Anton Varela’s band and still a classic today! (Check out Luar na
Lubre and Milladoiro as well if you haven’t heard of them). Their discography is
listed on Wikipedia: www.gl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Os_Cempés

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Habelas Hainas – An all-female quartet
performing powerful Galician music
with pipes, accordion, singing and
percussion. They performed at the
International Bagpipe Conference in
2014 and truly stole the show. No
album yet but plenty on YouTube and
a brand new collaboration called A
verbena das irmandiñas (launched on 6
May 2017).

Asturias
Hevia – Asturian born Hevia is the star of the Asturian bagpipes, awarded first
prize for solo piping at the Festival Interceltique de Lorient in 1992. His first
electronic fusions might sound a bit dated today, but I still love it.
http://hevia.es/en/
Tejedor – originally a family band founded in 1995, the band has expanded and is
still going strong, featuring Asturian bagpipes, tunes and songs.
http://tejedorweb.blogspot.co.uk

Aragon
Nertam Folk has put up many
historical recordings of gaita de
boto online, all available for free on
YouTube:http://bit.ly/Chanter31.
Amongst these you will also find
videos of the annual bagpipe
gatherings and hear the different
pipers performing live.
Catalonia
Matta Rouch duo: Featuring two
major musicians and bagpipe
makers from Southern France,
their latest album Pireneus (2013)
features music from the Pyrenees
from both sides of the border. Not
an album to miss!

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Mallorca
Mallorca is full of bands with traditional music. Some musicians even go and play
for Catalonian bands such as Mesclat. I chose five bands but there are many
more!
Boc: This fusion band with Mallorcan traditional instruments and much, much
more features original compositions by Juan Frontera Luna, pianist and
traditional musician. http://bocmusic.cat (most of the music is on YouTube as
well).
Xeremiers de sa Calatrava (1988): One
of the first recordings of the Mallorcan
revivalists. A classic with repertoire for
the colla played all over the island. Full
album on YouTube:
http://bit.ly/Chanter29
Germans Aloy (2011): Recordings of the
last players of one of the most famous
bagpiping families of the island. It also
features whistled tunes that the men
learned from their father, one of the
island’s xeremier legends.
http://bit.ly/Chanter30

Al Mayurka: One of the main Mallorcan bands, ongoing since 1994, with a strong
political and cultural message: http://www.al-mayurqa.cat
Música Nostra: Another great Mallorcan band. Founded in 1981, this band was
essential to the revival of Mallorcan music, encouraging dancing in the streets
and general participation in the celebrations: http://www.musicanostra.com

Medieval Music in the Dales has an Iberian theme this year, and we’re
delighted to welcome Spanish bagpiper Raúl Lacilla to provide workshops on the
medieval bagpipe, or musa.
The musa is commonly depicted in Spanish and French gothic
iconography, having its golden age in the thirteenth century. The main feature of
the medieval musa was the double chanter, that is to say, either a double melodic
chanter or a melodic chanter with a parallel drone made from a single piece of

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wood, both operated by single reeds. Thus, drones were used, just not the
shoulder-drone characteristic to many modern bagpipes.
Raúl Lacilla has been working on
the historical evidence for the musa for
more than three years, with the aim of
reconstructing the performance practices of
the medieval musa. His own pipes are
designed by himself and constructed in
collaboration with the Obradoiro de Gaitas
Seivane and with the support of the
International Course on Medieval Music
Performance of Besalú. It is a double
cchanter musa consisting of melodic chanter
and a movable drone D-C.
Raúl will be leading a two-work-
shop course at Medieval Music in the
Dales, open to players of intermediate level
or above. You are welcome to bring your
own instrument – the most suitable
instruments are closed-fingering bagpipes
in D or G (in either case with F natural), or boha-like bagpipes. The workshop will
focus on articulation according to the treatises, Pythagorean tuning, solving
chromatic problems and playing a piece from the Las Huelgas codex.
This is a unique chance to get to grips with an historical bagpipe style
and repertoire. Limited places – early booking advisable!
NB: Medieval Music in the Dales also includes a Beginner Bagpipe
Workshop with Paul Leigh, Eduard Navarro’s presentation of traditional and
historical reed instruments in Spain and bagpipe music in concert from Eduard
Navarro, Blondel, and Raúl Lacilla. So plenty to choose from…
Booking online at www.medievalmusicinthedales.co.uk Thanks to The
Bagpipe Society for their sponsorship of Medieval Music in the Dales 2017.

The Cumbria Gaita Band was formed in 2014 and it currently comprises
four pipers and three percussionists, playing authentic Galician instruments, and
members live in Kendal and Lancaster. Bandleader Colin Blakey first discovered
Galician music when he lived in Galicia for eight months in 1983. “Whilst on my
travels in Iberia I was delighted to discover a thriving piping tradition in Galicia.

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I joined a band there, exchanging traditional music from my native Scotland for
some Galician tunes.”
He continued his interest in Galician music, investing in a Seivane gaita
in the late 1980’s. Settling in Kendal in 2006, he and his partner Philippa were
both using gaitas in their ceilidh band (The Macaroon Ceilidh Band).
Through the Cumbrian traditional music scene Blakey met Bill Lloyd,
who has had an abiding love for Galician music since his father returned from a
trip to Galicia in the late 1980’s with a gaita and some recordings of Galician
music. When they realized that they had a mutual interest in Galician gaita
music, they recruited some other players, and the Gaita Band was born.

Blakey explains: “Our sound is based more upon the smaller-scale

‘folklorique’ bands, than on the much larger ‘Bandas de Gaitas’ that have
emerged over the past 20 or so years. There is a sweet, rustic quality to the music
played in this smaller format, that to me is lost when played by larger groups”.
The Cumbria Gaita Band plays arrangements of tunes from the Galician
repertoire. Gracings used are mostly for purposes of articulation, rather than
embellishment, and harmonies are used frequently in their arrangements. The
percussion used consists of bombo (bass drum), tamboril (snare), and pandereta
(Galician tambourine). They play at local street festivals and gala days and they
recently hosted a full day of Galician music and dance, inviting Galician piper
Gerardo Albela González (who runs the Cardiff Galician session) to perform and
give a workshop, and dancer/percussionist Marnie Kaputstinski to give a Galician
dance workshop.
To find out more about them and where they are appearing, go to
www.cumbriagaitaband.co.uk and at www.facebook.com/cumbriagaitaband

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 The Galician Session at Oxford, organised by the Galician piper Mano
Panforreteiro, has been running since May 2012. It takes place every last Wednes-
day of the month at the James St Tavern, James St (Oxford), between 8.30pm and
11.30pm. In the words of one of the regulars, the musician Edwin Pritchard:
‘There is no pub folk music session quite like it, and the things that distinguish it
from other sessions are the sheet music/song lyrics that Mano provides for every-
one who wants them, the (very) loud gaitas, the tambourine-bashing choir, and
the excellent Galician cake! The pub is always full on Galician night with musi-
cians, singers, and people who have just come to enjoy the ‘craic’. The music can
be quite challenging. It is often in keys like C minor that are unfamiliar to English
players used to G and D and some of the tunes go very fast – not for the faint
hearted, but providing a great adrenalin rush!’

The Caerdydd Galician Sessions are a monthly gathering of Galician and

non-Galician musicians who meet to play the traditional music of the north-west
of the Iberian peninsula.

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 The sessions were started by my friend Roberto Carracedo and myself,
and are still run by me, having been inspired by a group that was being run by
my good friend, Mano Panforreteiro, in Oxford. I used to live to live there and
was a regular at the meetings, so when I moved to Cardiff I ended up taking the
idea and applying it in my new home. Mano was actually instrumental on those
first stages, providing us with lots of material that we could use for the sessions.

The session is held at The Albany, in the Roath area of Cardiff, and
usually take place on the third Thursday of the month. All instruments are
welcomed and at any session there are usually Galician gaitas, clarinets, whistles,
recorders, hurdy-gurdies, fiddles, uilleann pipes, percussion of all sorts (from
Galician tambourines, or pandeiretas, and drums, to bodhrans, cajón...), guitars
and/or bouzoukis, traverse flutes... We've also had the occasional double bass and
bass guitar, piano… So, as you can see, all are welcome to play this fantastic
music. We always provide both the scores of the tunes that are going to be
played and the lyrics of the songs to be sung on the sessions and they are also
available online so people can become familiar with the music beforehand.
However, anybody can start their own Galician tune/song, though, and we'll all
just go for it.
One of the "offshoots" of the sessions has been the Welsh-Galician folk
band Maelog (http://www.maelog.com/, https://www.facebook.com/Maelog),
where I play and which is currently working on its first album.
So if you live near Cardiff or are passing my, please do come and join us
to play, sing, dance... More details are on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/groups/caerdyddgaliciansession/
Gerado Albela González
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Many thanks to Dave Rowlands for sending in a wonderful selection of photographs taken during his
travels in Iberia and Madeira. I’ve selected just a few of his images to share with you. Top left:
From the monastery at Poblet, Catalunia. Top right: Decoration on a park bench in Madeira. Bottom
left: Toledo Cathedral. Bottom right: On the church of San Jeronimo in Madrid (restored 1880)

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Front Cover: Anton Varela Rear Cover: Ivory Panel in the
Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon,
Portugal. Dated to circa 1300

is the quarterly journal of The Bagpipe Society and is edited by Jane Moulder. Contact
details: 30 King Street, Leek, Staffordshire, ST13 5NW. Tel: 07812 645460 or e-mail:
janethepiper@gmail.com. The next copy deadline is 1st August, 2017. Articles submitted to Chanter
will also be archived on the Society website.
All membership queries should be directed to George Swallow, e-mail:
membership@bagpipesociety.org.uk. His address is Beech Cottage, Chapel Lane, Westhumble,
DORKING, Surrey , RH5 6AJ Current subscriptions are £20.00 per annum.

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