Are bagpipes the most anti-social instrument ever?

[ScottishHeather77]

I say this as a Scot!
Have just moved to a new build estate which is not even completed yet. There is someone who has been playing bagpipes (badly) for the last week every day for about an hour. The sound is carrying clearly right across the estate, I'm pretty sure its coming from quite far away but its still very loud and noticeable when sitting in the garden. I feel bad for their direct neighbours!
I can't imagine ever thinking that playing bagpipes is acceptable when I know people are trying to relax in their gardens etc. Do you think instruments like bagpipes should be played at home or in a setting like a community hall etc? I know they need to practice but they are just so LOUD (and annoying when badly played). Sorry to anyone who plays the bagpipes!

Played well they are great, played in a mass piped band even better. However a violin or bagpipes played badly are unnatural torture.

Any noise that you don't have control over can be annoying - at least he is restricting it to an hour a day, and as you don;t mention it, presumably not at antisocial times.

Having lived, at different times, above a good cellist, and next door to a professional violinist, both were bloody irritating when they practised endlessly.

Beginner violinists can sound bad

Can?

I love the bagpipes. Love hearing them.

Bagpipes are unreasonable, but nothing makes my heart sink faster than someone whipping out a guitar at a party.

Completely agree@ScottishHeather77 Urgghhh bagpipes-what an utter waste of time/money ranking alongside barking dogs and jackhammers on the annoyanceOmeter..ive been forced into silicone earplugs with a sizey pair of noise-cancellers over the top in a former home so maybe go that route. Incredibly anti-social of these idiots though isnt it. Fortunately we have no immediate neighbours now-i feel your pain.

I can't get wound up by bagpipes. At least the person playing them has the gumption to learn an instrument.

What I do hate is sub-bass from hi-fi used by people without that gumption. I knew a person whose neighbours had a drunken party until late in the night - and he got his own back and more by playing his bagpipes the next morning!

They beat my neighbour who has decided to do karaoke outside my window every Saturday pm.

You can buy quiet practice versions of most instruments/fashion a muffler in some way. I appreciate it’s not quite the same but at the early stages of learning a piece it’s sufficient. There’s no excuse for daily crap practicing that your entire neighbourhood can hear.

There's no such thing as a quiet bagpipe. They are practiced in doors and even with our windows shut they can be heard - nature of the beast. They're not played late (except at Hogmannay) or very early and if you don't like it, tough. Close your windows. Echoing what was said above, they've taken years, determination and skill to learn. We love it.

I think the chanter is worse.
Or the recorder.

Enjoying the replies on this thread

-- but bagpipes can truly serve their purpose, at certain funerals.
If played well, very emotive.

@JudgeRindersMinder -- sorry for your loss.
That will be lovely.

My neighbors 8 year old has been learning the Violin and the Flute for the last 3 years.
It’s now not as much of a cat in a glass blender screeching more of an occasional stepped on the poor things tail... it’s been a long few years of practice though.

Drums (drum kit not marching band). Used to live close to a teenage drummer. It was hellish.

Live close to a piper now, it’s not great but it’s ok compared to the drummer.

Also Scottish...

Bagpipes are awful, even when played well... played badly it’s almost painful.

Every good piper started off as a bad piper and had to practice to get there. They are not an indoor instrument, I remember once being in a pub where a piper decided to play and the noise was unbearable. So one hour a day outside isn’t that unreasonable.

I'm rabidly against inconsiderate noise in residential areas, so YANBU on that score.

But I do like bagpipes. I find the sound so stirring and emotional. I'm English. DH is Scottish and hates them.

A true Gentleman can play the Bagpipes.

But doesn't.

Well any instrument played badly is annoying, but obvs people have to practise to learn , the young boy in my street is learning to play the drums also badly at the moment.

I wouldn't think to put the drums are anti social, I just thought someone is learning to play in the lockdown, good on them! but obvs my tolerance is higher than yours!
However when played beautifully there is no sound to beat it , at a wedding or funeral its would make even the coldest heart emotional.

The only instrument declared as a weapon of war

the most soul-stirring and hair-raising music, absolutely beautiful sound... - I only have a chanter, but would happily buy the full set at some point... the wife is not so keen!

I live them, played well. But I could live with them
Played badly an hour a day.

As others have said - I'd take a couple of hours of that (even next door) to 5 minutes of someone else's commercial music.

The girl over the back fence has 'learnt' various instruments over the years. Notably the recorder whilst bouncing on the trampoline (Her parents didn't seem to tell her that it was a really stupid thing to do, but they were probably just glad she was DOWN my end end if their garden!!) She has tried many instruments, but gives up as soon as it doesn't sound quite so dreadful.

Still - I've coped, but we may well fall out if they allow her to play 'music' in the garden. They already have a trampoline, pool and very bloody annoyingly a table tennis table - all my end if the garden.

Neighbour in his 70's has just taken up the guitar. The same few chords over & over. I admire him taking it up, but I wish ya fuck he'd do it INSIDE with the door shut! But it's better than his choice of commercial music I suppose.

As a scot they are fine at a wedding/funeral/competition/Highland games etc.

They are not fine when you’re walking along a street in Glasgow or Edinburgh and a busker starts up with no warning next to you and you shit yourself.

I have a neighbour who plays bagpipes, he usually practices in a field in the middle of nowhere. One of my other neighbours who is a know it all pain a out everything whose son can do no wrong even when caught, has bought a full size drum kit for him to learn on. The same pattern of beats over and over and over and over again. The lady the other side of him sing karaoke (badly).

My middle DC plays violin, she's not bad it's copeable for her practice times. Currently learning for grade 4.

I have headphones and gin

We've been hearing bagpipes in the garden. The player is reasonably good. Just rather unexpected in rural Lincolnshire.