Dan Grollman MSc'05 GS knows his audience well.
Standing by the flagpole outside Rhode Island Hall, the computer science Ph.D. candidate arranged the arm strap of his instrument - a hefty bagpipe - over his shoulder and nudged his case to the side. Suddenly he exhaled into the blowpipe. A moment later, music burst out of the drone pipes, rushing into the air and out over the Main Green.
"I never play before noon," he told The Herald. "It is Sunday, after all - and these are college students we're talking about."
Grollman is not afraid of performing - he plays on the Main Green most weekends, where anyone passing by can hear him.
"You look at their response while you're playing," Grollman said, indicating nearby students reading, relaxing and flicking Frisbees. "And some of them are like, 'What's that? Why is someone playing bagpipes?' "
Bagpipes - or simply pipes, as players more commonly call them - are aerophonic instruments that rely on a constant reservoir of air that enters the bag through a number of internal reeds. Although historians trace the instrument's origins to the Roman Empire, the bagpipe only gained popularity in the British Isles in the thirteenth century. It is now the official instrument of Scotland.
Grollman said a family trip to Scotland while he was in high school was his original inspiration to take up the bagpipe. His parents took his brother and him to the annual Edinburgh Festival, where they saw the famous Edinburgh Military Tattoo, a show featuring military bands and display teams. "The general awesomeness of bagpipes - just the sound of them - really caught my attention from the get-go," Grollman said.
Still, though he wanted to learn to play the bagpipe almost immediately upon returning home, his parents weren't as keen on the idea. "They didn't want me playing while I was living in their house - the pipes are, you know, pretty loud," Grollman said, smiling. "The neighbors weren't too keen on the idea, either. I was yelled at a number of times."
That problem was solved, of course, once Grollman headed off to college. After learning to play in his freshman year at Yale, Grollman spent the following summer in Edinburgh, playing at every opportunity he had outside of his classwork. Practicing as much as possible, he developed the passion he continues to have for the bagpipe today.
Grollman said he plays a pretty standard collection of bagpipe melodies, though he tends toward "piobaireachd," a classical style of music native to the Scottish Highlands. But he said he finds inspiration in a wide variety of music. "Recently, actually, I've been listening to a lot of Celtic folk music," Grollman said. "A lot of types of music influence me."
Other musicians often join Grollman on the Green, including fellow bagpiper Andrew Bower, a tenth-grader at the Wheeler School. Though Grollman practices every day on his own, he said he often joins up with Bower and other musicians, including fiddlers and harpists, to "jam out."
"In a way, we sort of have to play outside. Otherwise, the sound doesn't carry nearly as well," Grollman said. "The winter presents problems, obviously. We'll probably head into Sayles so our fingers don't freeze off."
Most Brown students, Grollman said, seem tolerant or appreciative of the pipe music that has graced the Green almost every weekend this fall. He said he often gets scattered applause at the end of a song. "Some have even offered to pay me!" Grollman said, laughing. "Of course, I can't accept."
Regardless of their opinion of bagpipe music, Brown students traversing or studying on the Green can't help but listen to Grollman's music. "Before now, I'd really only heard bagpipes at funerals and my high school graduation," Jon Hillman '09 said. "It's interesting to hear them in a different context."
Jessica Gebhard '11 and Melissa Tsang '11 were more enthusiastic. "I love it!" Gebhard said, working on an assignment near the flag under which Grollman regularly plays. "It's a great idea, though I'm probably in the minority liking bagpipe music." Tsang also said she enjoyed the piping. "It's nice music," she said. "It goes really well with autumn."
Grollman said he would love for there to be a Brown pipe band at some point - and hopes that his playing will stir interest in the instrument. "Not enough people play," he said. "In all of Providence, actually, there are only two professional pipe bands. There are so many extracurricular groups at Brown - why not a pipe band?"
In the meantime, Grollman said he plans to remain a fixture of the Green on weekends, if the weather permits. "I hope it adds something to the atmosphere of the place," he said. "I started playing in the first place because I loved the way they sounded, and if other students love them, too, I'm always glad to make their day a little brighter."
