NJ teacher’s bagpipes comfort mourners during pandemic – My Central Jersey

The instrument Mike Glackin plays at graveside funerals is ideal for social distancing.

“When we play at a funeral, we rarely stand next to the grave,” explained the bagpiper, who positions himself about 50 yards away to create an ethereal effect.

“It’s a more interesting sound from far away.”

An Edison High School history teacher, who also co-moderates the school newspaper and Model United Nations, Glackin moonlights with three pipe bands, playing in parades and other social functions, but usually performs solo at funerals.

Despite maintaining a half football field of separation, Glackin has been able to touch mourners while playing his bagpipes in cemeteries left nearly deserted over the last two months amid COVID-19 restrictions.

Family members who lost loved ones have appreciated the kilted-Glackin’s presence, taking solace in the moving melody of his instrument, which mellifluously permeates the solitude of a sparsely attended graveside funeral during the coronavirus pandemic.

Having played at more than 500 services over two decades as a bagpiper, the death of strangers has left Glackin understandably desensitized, but something moved him during one of his first COVID-19 funerals last month.

“You have to treat it as a job,” Glackin said of playing at funerals. “If you get emotionally attached every time you go, you will never want to do them. I’ve stood at gravesites and chatted with funeral directors as if I was in a park somewhere. I don’t want to say death is part of the job, but if you are playing at a funeral, you understand why you are there. I don’t want to say it’s a moral obligation, it’s just the right thing to do.”

READ: 86-year-old grandmother of 19 wins 41-day life-threatening battle with coronavirus

‘There was no one there, which is profoundly sad’

On a beautiful but chilly April day that also happened to be his wedding anniversary, Glackin stood beneath a cloudless blue sky at Fairview Cemetery in Westfield. He positioned himself on a slight slope above alternating rows of neatly manicured boxwood hedges and headstones. A desired 50 yards or so away, Glackin watched two women join a priest and a funeral director to lay their grandmother to rest. The service was live-streamed through the camera lens of an iPhone to friends and relatives.

Glackin breathed life into his instrument multiple times throughout the service. The bagpipes cried when the casket was taken out of the hearse, when the granddaughters arrived at the burial ground, and when flowers were placed on the gravesite. His performance culminated with the playing of “Amazing Grace,” a classic funeral hymn Glackin repeated while exiting the cemetery.

“It takes a lot for a funeral to strike me these days because I’ve been doing it so long,” Glackin said. “But I guess this one was a little more poignant because there was no one there, which is profoundly sad.”

At the end of the service, the granddaughters, unable to audibly express their gratitude through protective face masks, said “thank you” to Glackin with subtle waives as the bagpiper walked away, making a path toward mourners parked in nearby vehicles.

“Going back to my car there were other friends of the granddaughters who had driven there and were told they couldn’t get any closer,” Glackin recalled. “So, sitting with their windows open, two people, I remember, said (of his playing), ‘It was very beautiful. Thank you very much.’”

Glackin later texted one of the granddaughters to offer condolences and say he hoped she and the other mourners were able to take some comfort in his musical tribute.

“It was perfect,” the woman replied. “You made a difficult and unusual service more normal and for that we are forever grateful.”

“That struck me,” Glackin said of the woman’s response. “Bagpipes at a funeral service are normal, and to have that returns a sense of normalcy in what’s a very abnormal time. I kept the text message specifically for that reason.”

‘It’s a service that you never thought about’

The new normal for Glackin began around St. Patrick’s Day, which was the day after Edison Township Public Schools commenced distance learning and the day before Gov. Phil Murphy mandated all schools statewide be closed due to the pandemic.

Glackin, who has taught at Edison for 13 years, traditionally plays his bagpipes inside the high school’s main lobby on St. Patrick’s Day.

He also usually joins members of any of his multiple pipe bands – a musical ensemble consisting of bagpipers and drummers – to perform in St. Patrick’s Day parades around that time of year.

All the events at which Glackin was scheduled to play this spring, except for a parade in Woodbridge, were canceled because of the pandemic.

Following the cancellation of Union County’s St. Patrick’s Day parade, some of Glackin’s friends in Scotch Plains asked if he would be willing to be a festive one-man band for their children. He graciously obliged, following a crooked green line residents painted down the center of the street for a parade route. Glackin’s bagpipes blared majestically that St. Patrick’s Day afternoon as neighbors stood outside their homes applauding his holiday music.

Upon returning to his own Cranford residence that day, a group of neighbors, adhering to social distancing guidelines, stood outside Glackin’s house for an encore performance. Lily and Gavin, the beautiful young children of Glackin and his wife, Jen, joined in the fun.

“Who thinks about bagpipes in a quarantine?” Glackin asked with a chuckle. “It’s a service that you never thought about.”

READ: Graduating class among NJ’s first to have last day of high school amid COVID-19 pandemic

‘It’s the right thing to do’

Opportunities to play funerals and memorial services in Garwood, Jersey City and West Orange ensued.

At the latter, Glackin stood on the front porch of a residence as mourners returned from a funeral home, playing “Amazing Grace” when a limousine pulled into the driveway. Glackin moved out toward the street and continued to play for another 10 to 15 minutes as a procession of cars slowly drove past the house.

Earlier this month, Glackin performed at a funeral service in Jersey City for a Korean War veteran. The service was live-streamed to relatives in Ireland, which struck a chord with Glackin, who is of Irish descent. Glackin’s father, Matt, a police officer in Elizabeth for 31 years, taught him how to play the bagpipes.

Glackin began playing the bagpipes when he was in the first grade but took a hiatus for about six years. He picked up the instrument again and became a member at the age of 13 of the Kearny-headquartered St. Columcille United Gaelic Pipe Band. Glackin’s first gig was at an uncle’s wedding rehearsal dinner, where he learned his grandfather, Joe, also played the bagpipes.

“I was a teenager and could barely get a sound out,” Glackin recalled, noting that while performing he saw his grandfather slide his fingers along a cane, mimicking the same movements Glackin was making on the bagpipe.

“Grandpa, do you play?” Glackin asked. Joe went on to rattle off some piping tunes and movements before informing his grandson that the bagpipes Mike had been playing that day were once his. “You’re holding mine,” Joe said. “That’s my set.”

Glackin has become so accomplished, not only does he perform with the Homeland Security Investigations Pipe Band and the Essex County Emerald Society Pipes and Drums, but he also serves as an instructor for both law-enforcement bands.

With the former, Glackin once performed at Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia. The pipe band played while the remains of a Homeland Security Investigations agent who died in the line of duty were removed from a Black Hawk helicopter for transport home.

After performing, Glackin did not return to New Jersey until around 3 the next morning. He showed up at Edison High School a few hours later to teach his history classes.

“I can’t shirk my responsibilities as an educator,” Glackin said, “but to do my bit for my hometown or people around me, this is my bit.”

“Ever since I was a kid, my dad always talked about doing the right thing,” Glackin continued, referring to a life philosophy that now applies to playing the bagpipes at funeral services during a global pandemic.

“It’s the right thing to do.”

Email: gtufaro@gannettnj.com

Greg Tufaro is a national award-winning journalist who has covered scholastic and college sports at MyCentralJersey.com for 30 years. For unlimited access to MyCentralJersey.com, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

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