Amazing Grace

There is a new movie out under that title. If you watch the preview (available here) you'll note that it appears to be about the British anti-slavery campaigns.

It also features "Amazing Grace" as a good bit of the background music, winding up with a lush version of the tune played in unison by an early 19th century military band and pipe band. The movie has had wonderful reviews. But the pendantic piper who writes this page has a problem. The piping aspect is a collossal anachronism. There is no recorded instance of a pipe band that early. We need to wait for the mid-19th century, or perhaps a little later, for that. There are no recorded instances of pipe bands playing in unison with military bands until the 20th century. No pipe band anywhere appears to have played "Amazing Grace" until 1971 when the pipe major of the Royal Scots Greys and the band master of the 3rd Carabiniers arranged it to be played at the amalgamation ceremony of those two regiments. And the pitch the pipes are playing at is way too high for that period.

FWIW, "Amazing Grace" refers to the words of the hymn. It has been sung to many different tunes. The tune usually called "Amazing Grace" these days is "New Britain".

[And a tip of the caubeen to Mark, whose post on George McDonald Fraser started me off on this little rivulet of my stream of consciousness. Anyone interested in piping and/or Scottish regiments might want to get hold of Fraser's "The General Danced at Dawn" and "McAuslan in the Rough", slightly disguised (in order to protect the not -quite-so-innocent, one assumes) memoirs of his days in the Gordons. Excruciatingly funny.]