It just dawned on me how odd it probably seems to most X Markers that every year I'm hired to play uilleann pipes for an hour at a Burns Night Dinner, and for this gig I wear what I usually wear to uilleann gigs: orchestra black.

Now when I'm hired to play Highland pipes I always wear Highland Dress, except when it's an Irish function and the people specify "no kilts" up front.
I feel a bit odd playing Highland pipes in trousers, though Cape Breton pipers did it for generations.

But I strongly dislike wearing kilts when playing uilleann pipes, especially if I'm to be up on a stage (for obvious reasons!)

But not wearing kilts on Burns Night of all nights...

What do X Markers think? Should I wear kilts, even though I'm playing uilleann pipes? I'll be at ground level, so the "sitting in kilts up on a raised stage" thing isn't an issue.

Actually this brings up an entire issue, that of the lack of any sort of traditional "piper's dress" amongst uilleann pipers.

Uilleann pipers perform in suits, and have going back as far as we have photos. There did exist, back in the 19th and early 20th century, something called "a suit of the Irish cut" which was a swallowtail coat, kneebreeches, stockings, and oftentimes buckled shoes. This was worn with either a bowler hat or a top hat, and it's the suit we think of as being a Leprechaun suit. These Irish cut suits were often of green baize. But no piper in the last 70 or 80 years has performed in such a thing, I don't think.

I've often thought about trying to come up with some sort of Irish uilleann costume, perhaps something as simple as wearing kneebreeches instead of trousers.

My Irish trad trio for years has worn a vaguely "Far and Away" type outfit with collarless shirts and tweed vests and caps. This is absurdly hokey to most Irish trad musicians, but clients love it.