Derek Simmonsen, The Stuart (Fla.) News/Port St. Lucie News
The mournful wail of a bagpipe fills the evening air while the strains of “Amazing Grace” lift up from behind the St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office.
It isn’t some ghostly Scots playing but Sgt. Don Spivey, internal affairs investigator by day and occasional ceremonial bagpiper, who practices several evenings a week behind the building.
Piper is an honorary role that Spivey, 53, has slowly taken on since he started teaching himself to play the instrument about seven years ago. It culminated in his playing in five ceremonies Sept. 11, 2002, to mark the anniversary of the terrorist attacks and led to him being honored as the “administrative deputy of the quarter” Nov. 21 in a ceremony at the sheriff’s office.
“My wife and I were up visiting Disney in Orlando, when I saw a musical kit with a chanter, a book and a tape,” he explained from his office. “I said to her ‘It would be so neat if we had someone who played bagpipes for ceremonies.’ It wasn’t long after that that the kit appeared underneath the Christmas tree.”
A chanter is where would-be bagpipe players start. It looks a bit like a clarinet or a recorder and is played with a reed to allow musicians to get the feel for the instrument before the full pipes and bag are attached.
Spivey played the cello some when he was younger but hadn’t touched an instrument since his youth.
“I started all over again,” he says. “I taught myself how to read music ... it was a de-stresser for me.”
The book he learned from says it takes about seven years to make a piper, Spivey says.
One of the trickier parts of playing the pipes is learning grace notes the peeps, squeaks and other sounds that occur briefly between tones.
“I still get nervous,” he said, noting that he’s been playing in public for several years. “You want everything to be exactly right.”
He has played at several funerals - including those for Capt. Tom Greco and Deputy Matthew Lombardo - and regularly dons full Scottish garb, kilt included, for special ceremonies.
Picking up the bagpipes does not seem to be out of character for Spivey. He is on his third career, having started out in the military as a helicopter pilot.
He entered the Army at 19 - having never flown on a plane before - and emerged more than seven years later trained as a helicopter pilot and a veteran of two tours of duty in Vietnam.
The next part of his life was in the construction trade, supervising everything from the building of a small restaurant to a 22-room hotel, he said. Warm weather drew him and his wife, Debbie, to Fort Pierce in 1988, where he took an open position with the St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office as a helicopter pilot.
He has steadily moved up the ladder at the sheriff’s office - from pilot to road patrol to his job in internal affairs.
“It’s probably the toughest job I’ve had in the sheriff’s office,” he said. “I’m a cop’s cop ... you’re investigating people you’ve known and trusted.”
To reduce job stress, Spivey brings the pipes to work and waits until most people have gone home before playing melodies behind the station.
“I’m getting more comfortable playing all the time,” he says. “They’re loud. Very, very loud.”