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Crime & Safety

Baldwin Borough Police Chief, Detective Receive Honor as Bagpipers

When they're not fighting crime, Chief Michael Scott and Detective Anthony Cortazzo are donning kilts and filling the air with the sounds of pipes.

Pennsylvania State police Captain Sheldon Epstein presented a letter of recognition to the Pittsburgh Police Emerald Society Pipes & Drums at a meeting at the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge #91 on Tuesday, Feb. 8.

There to receive the honor was Chief Michael Scott, Pipe Major for the group.

"This is the kind of recognition I'd rather not receive," Scott said, "because it means we are playing for a lot of funerals."

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Scott's group was recognized by both state police and fire officials at the Feb. 8 meeting for the many occasions that they've played for, most of which were in honor of police officers and firefighters killed in the line of duty.

"This past year," Scott said, "we played for six officer funerals in Philadelphia, one in Cleveland and many others in smaller communities throughout the state."

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"The group formed in 2001," Drum Sergeant Joe Smith said, "just after 9/11.

"After [the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks], we sensed a need for a group like this. About 85 percent of the group's members are police officers."

Smith entered the police force with Scott 25 years ago, and the two have been friends ever since. While Smith trains the group's drummers in percussion fundamentals, Scott has many responsibilities as Pipe Major, including booking all events, scheduling practices and hiring a teacher.

The group's current bagpipe teacher is Nick Hudson of Carnegie Mellon University. Hudson is a Grade 1 piper – the highest skill level in the piping world. He was trained by the Emerald Society's former teacher, Alasdair Gillies, former Pipe Major of the Queen's Own Highlanders in Scotland. A 22-time world-champion piper, Gillies was called the "best piper of the 20th century" by Piper and Drummer Magazine.

Trained by the best of the best, the Pittsburgh Police Emerald Society Pipes & Drums makes appearances at such high-profile events as National Police Week, to be observed this year from May 15-21. A host of events will occur in Washington, D.C., from May 13-16 in honor of National Police Week, including a time when Scott's group will play on the steps of the U.S. Capitol building for the President of the United States.

The group uses a standardized repertoire of song arrangements from New York City Police pipers. "One of the reasons for this," Smith explained, "is because we play in mass funerals with many other pipers from New York, New Jersey and Cleveland. We all are playing the same tunes."

The group's repertoire includes such songs as "Amazing Grace," "Blue Bells of Scotland," "The Bells of Dunblane," "Highland Cathedral" and "Honor Our Fallen."

The group rehearses for two hours every Wednesday.

Because accepting engagements depends on the availability of his group's members, Scott is always recruiting. One of the band's newest members is Baldwin Borough Police Detective Anthony Cortazzo.

"Cortazzo is a jack-of-all-trades," Scott said. "When he took the job [with the Baldwin Police], my question was, 'Is there anything you can't do?'

"He knew juvenile [law enforcement], fingerprinting, child-abuse law. He's even a certified weather observer."

Scott is confident that Cortazzo will also apply his gifted intellect to learning the pipes.

Learning to play a bagpipe is no easy feat. While Scott was a former trumpet player, he admits that bagpipes "are like no other instrument."

"It's a primitive instrument," Scott said. "It takes you back to another time."

Beginners start by learning to play just the chanter – the part of the instrument that looks similar to a wooden recorder and sounds the melody.

"But after you learn to play the chanter," Scott said, "you put it with the rest [of the bagpipes], and it feels like a completely different instrument. Then comes memorizing, and after that, marching."

One of the biggest challenges in playing the bagpipes is simply tuning the instrument. The three pipes at the top, appropriately called "drones," are tuned first. Then, the chanter is tuned.

"But weather affects tuning too," Scott said. "You can get perfectly in tune and then [the weather changes], and it's all out of tune."

While funerals account for most of the group's performances, it also plays for other events and occasions. You can hear and see the group for yourself at Pittsburgh's St. Patrick's Day Parade on March 12, starting at the Greyhound Bus Line station at the intersection of Liberty Avenue and 11th Street at 10 a.m.

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