Fiddling and Piping (bag pipers). In time fiddling and piping were left mostly to the lame and the blind, pipers and fiddlers were thought of as beggars.
Fiddlers, like pipers, made a living as best they could. Sometimes a pastor disapproved of things that went on at a ceili. Then the fiddler or piper would be blamed for stirring people up with his music.
Among the motifs on St. Patricks's Day party napkins and greeting cards are dancing couples, circles of dancers, pipers and fiddlers. For the Irish have long loved dancing. And for a long time, they have danced to the music of pipe and fiddle.
Today, ppipers and fiddlers are an important part of St. Patrick's Day celebrations in the United States. In parades, bands of pipers, some of them dressed in kilts, march to the wail of bagpipes.
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