Here's the deal. I have a friend who's originally from the DC area and is now shacking up with a woman in Tennessee. His religious beliefs are Wiccan/Pagan whatever that shit is (all religion is shit if you ask me) and they wanted to hire some bagpipe players for their Halloween wedding (why is beyond me). When they inquired about price the bagpipers emailed them back with a quote and inquired if it was a Pagan wedding due to date. When my friend replied back in the affirmative the bagpipers then told them that they refuse to work the wedding.
I told my friend that I while I'm no lawyer I think the bagpipers are in the right to refuse to play the wedding because doing so could infringe on THEIR (the bagpipers) religious beliefs (I repeat, religion is bullshit). It may suck and be shitty, but they are probably within their legal rights to do so.
So I thought I'd leave the question to you guys. What do you think? Do the bagpipers have a right to refuse to play the wedding, or does my friend have a legit descrimination case?
Well, Jim, here's how I see it: this bagpipe band is probably a private organization. I mean, I couldn't just show up at one of their rehearsals with a battered, out-of-tune bugle— not knowing any of their music— and expect them to let me play with them in public, especally at a paying gig. So, it's up to the band to decide on repertiore, performance venues, and personnel.
Why anyone would want to listen to a lousy bagpipe band in the first place, much less have one at their wedding, is beyond yours truly. Bagpipe music is the
only music I've ever heard that sounds the same whether it's played forward, backward, or sideways. Turn the scores upside down, play them that way, and it would probably still go unnoticed by the audience (all six of them, thus outnumbering the band).
Except at weddings and funerals, where a captive audience has to listen to a flatulent "performance" on armpit-squeezed sheep bladders and crude reeds, from beginning to end.
The good news is that, at least in the Roman Catholic church, sitting all the way through a bagpipe concert gets you out of 5,000 years of Purgatory! Putting up with that much headache-inducing drunken racket is an Automatic Indulgence (see Papal Encyclical XXXVIIMCMQRS, ss. E, 1768, by Pope Suburban IV, 1690-1771).
For that opinon, I'll probably get kilt, och aye!
This is the one and only bagpipe band recording I've got... and one is
enough! [attachment deleted by admin]