Fred Lewis is still talking bagpipes
Had it not been for a piece broadcast by CMU Public Radio last week we might have missed a very special day. Last Sunday was, we were told, Bagpipe Appreciation Day.
Those of us who grew up in St. Johns during the 1950s already had a special awareness, if not always appreciation, for the bagpipes. And more than a few children had their own chanters, the part of the pipe used to finger the notes, in anticipation of the day when they might take up the bagpipes themselves.
So we were not too surprised when one of the people interviewed on the radio was none other than St. Johns’ own Fred Lewis, the man who had introduced a couple of generations of us to the instrument.
In the piece Fred said:
Well, in World War II I got involved with the Cameronians by mistake over in Burma and they had two bagpipers with them. That’s the first time I heard it.
People who like bagpipes we get chills in our backs, still do. And I decided if I got out of that mess I would take up bagpiping, so I did.
Fred did make it out of World War Two, and he made his way to Alma College to find someone who would teach him the bagpipes.
He played his first competition in 1950, and he played for years with the Glen Erin Pipe band out of Lansing.
Fred now lives and teaches bagpipes in Muskegon.
