Hauptmann has a hurdy gurdy that he (tries to) play in camp and that's pretty fun (when he gets it tuned).

Bagpipes are very Medieval - everywhere ! Carvings of pipers in stone, on miseriecords, and in painting appear from Cornwall, through England (I'm ignoring the obvious Celtic countries), France, The Netherlands, Northern Spain, Brittany, Germany, and Poland - they probably go father east, but I haven't seen the documentation.

One of our members is a modern piper, and he is looking in future at obtaining a Northern French set from 'Ancesteral Instruments'. I can hardly wait ! I am a guitarist, although out of practise, and I have always been interested in studying one of the early stringed instruments. It will have to wait until I've fininshed arming fully, gotten warsaddle, and the basic completion of wardrobe & tent! I had been a student of the clarinet, and I have also considered picking up a small woodwind ( a bit on the cheeper side than a lute or that ilk).

My research has suggested that the rauschpfeifes are appropriate as well, and you can buy them with recorder fingerings which is a helpful thing to me .

and of course, there's always singing! Isaac RULES!

Actually I wasn't so much asking about alternative instruments as asking if the specific examples I cited would be considered intrusive....
The six holed pipe (penny whistle), fife, and pipe and tabor, are all clearly shown in illustrations from the 12th and 13th centuries onward.
The Crumhorn was also known in the 15th century. David Monrow, in his 'Instruments of the Middle ages and Renaissance' states: "The earliest and by far the most common of the reed cap instruments is the crumhorn. The name first occurs in 1489 as an organ stop in Dresden suggesting that the instrument had already been in use for some time".
The recorder, while of a somewhat later provenance than the others, but it can be reliably dated to the end of the 14th/beginning of the 15th century.
The oldest extant example was found in the moat of a large fortified house in Dordrecht, Holland. The house was only occupied from 1335 to 1418, when it was sacked. This same area was completely submerged by flooding in 1421, remaining that way until it was excavated in 1940. So the date at which this recorder was discarded is pretty reliable. In the 'Cambridge Companion to the Recorder' (ed. J.M. Thomson) Anthony Rowland- Jones Writes: "The recorder may have been discarded at the time of the assault as metal utensils which could have been part of a soldier's kit were found in the excavation". Nice tie in to groups like this, no?
There are also quite a few 15th century paintings which show the recorder in use.
One of the best, by 'The Master of the Lyversberger Passion', is "The Coronation of the Virgin", which shows a trio of "Renaissance style" recorders (which look a lot like mine:-) being played by three angels.
There is also a pretty good article with info on the surviving examples of early recorders online, complete with pictures of them at: http://members.iinet.net.au/~nickl/torture2.html
....Although I think he got confused and dates them a little to early.....(he uses 13th century to mean 1300's, I think:-)
There is even a fellow (John Hanchet, if memory serves) who makes replicas of the surviving pieces for about $500-$800 each:-) That's why I was hoping the instrumnets I already have might work,$$$<sheepish grin>:-)
I have seen the 'Ancestral Instruments' site, and I love his stuff. Getting sa set of his pipes is definitely on my list of things to save up for. His prices seem to be (relatively) reasonable too.
And for anybody looking for good plausible, secular, music which for the period I highly recommend 'Medieval Instrumental Dances' By Timothy McGee, Indiana University Press. The Author states that "This edition contains all the compositions known or suspected to be instrumental dances from before 1430." There is also a section on Performance Practices.
Sorry for the 'lecture', but I'm kind of passionate about early music:-)...and Issac, Dufay, Landini, Obrecht, Power, Dunstable, Binchois, Busnois, von Ghizeghem, Ockeghem, and especially Josquin ALL rule, only you don't want ME to try and SING any of Their stuff:-)
Crispin

WOO HOO! I happily stand corrected!!!

I'd seen a jillion "ambiguous" pictures of some sort of pipe like object, but nothing that made me happy and convinced that the recorder was really appropriate (I need LOTS of evidence that puts something in the middle of that bell shaped curve, you know?)

But Crispin has now pointed me to several photos of EXTANT recorders! yay!

My campmates were ready to revolt when I borrowed a rauschpfeif to play with (sounds like a VERY loud kazoo oboe hybrid)but a recorder....

obviously I need to play a renaissance one rather than my baroque instruments (save those for SCA events ).

was there any indication what voice the extant examples were? the shape of them suggests soprano, yes?

oo! Josquin on a recorder consort! nice mellow renaissance recorders!

I wish there were more of us up here

A.M. Asked: was there any indication what voice the extant examples were? the shape of them suggests soprano, yes?

Again, sans references I can't say for sure, but I believe that both the Dordrecht and Gottingen recrders are of soprano size. The guy who makes the copies produces them in soprano and alto. If you get a chance, look them up (great pictures) on the Antique Sound Woorkshop Site... the makers name is John Hanchet.

AM writes: oo! Josquin on a recorder consort! nice mellow renaissance recorders!

My trio just performed at a local Early Music festival, and we did several pieces by Morton, Dufay, and Obrecht....they sound possitively haunting on recorders!

AM writes: I wish there were more of us up here

I know the feeling! It is hard to find like minded folk... musically or historically! I wish there were more of YOU guys out here in Denver!
Crispin

See my comments about the music Jordi Savall did for the French Joan of Arc movie "Jeanne la Pucelle".

Glorious, gorgeous and haunting..... *sigh*

I got to spend three hours being tutored on various points of recorder technique with a lot of emphasis on Renaissance technique, phrasing, and ensemble playing.

For a musician, this was one of those moments that really helps build one's sense of the period. Being instructed by recognized experts in their field who are from the home of Renaissance polyphony: this is about as close as you can reasonably get to getting a private lesson from Des Pres or one of his contemporaries

No need to apologise - ressurect away!

They are fantastic! They are doing a concert here in Denver tonight, "The Art of the Fugue, From Medieval to Modern Music" and another in Colorado Springs (60 miles south of here) tomorrow, "English Consort Music", which I'm going to have to try to make it down to.

One of their performers, Bart Spanhove, has also written an excelent book on consort technique (I forget the title but I'll try to let you know).

OK, the book is "The Finishing Touch of Ensemble Playing" published by Alamire Press, 2000. ISBN 90-6853-144-1

And WOW what a show! They played for just over 2 hours and did 15th, 16th, 17th century music, a lot of Bach, and one 20th century piece.

One of the real treats was getting to see and hear the intsruments they brought along; amongst other things they brought a full consort of Renaissance recorders copied from examples from Sebastian Virdung's 1511 Basel Manuscript and a rare (one of three in the world) Sub-contra bass recorder in F, which is about 7 feet tall....wow what a sound!