used bagpipes Ebay

[OC Richard]

On another thread a potential new piper was concerned about bagpipe prices.

One resource often overlooked is picking up a fine used instrument on Ebay for well under what a new bagpipe would cost.

Right now, doing the following search

-bagpipe
-all listings (Buy It Now and Auction)
-all categories (because many sellers post things in odd categories)
-worldwide
-sorted by Highest + Shipping First
-used

I came up with the following instruments in the under $1,500 range (what you would pay for a decent student/stepup flute, sax, or horn).

All are fine handcrafted Scottish-made African Blackwood instruments. Any would do you for many years if not your lifetime of playing.

Grainger & Campbell $1,450 BIN

Robertson $1,000 17 hours

McCallum $900 10 hours

Pettigrew $600 4 days/ $860 BIN

Grainger & Campbell $410 1 day

Hardie $500 1 day

Hardie $300 5 days

Kintail $213 5 days

I myself would be most interested in the Grainger & Campbell pipes, a fine maker in the 2nd half of the 20th century. The prices reflect the current fairly low esteem that Hardie and Kintail pipes are held in, yet I've heard great-sounding Kintails. If that Kintail goes for around $500 it's a steal.

The curious one here is the Robertson set, an extremely highly-regarded mid-20th century maker. This set is mounted in real ivory which makes it illegal to transport across international borders, and illegal to possess in the USA. These legal issues might be the cause of its ridiculously low price.

I perhaps should point out that the McCallums are made in a modern factory-like shop using sophisticated CNC machines. Some look down on McCallum pipes for that reason, but you'll see plenty of McCallums being played in Grade One circles which speaks for itself.

A couple notes for non-Ebayers

-when you sort by Highest Price + Shipping First, any item listed with Shipping Not Specified drops to the bottom of the last page

-searching Used will mean that you miss seeing used instruments which the seller hasn't listed as Used for no apparent reason. It happens all the time.