Bagpiper plays her heart out in Royal Oak cemetery on Memorial Day

Bagpiper's craft is special on Memorial Day

Christine Gutt goes through a lot of emotions when she's playing the bagpipe. Often times, during periods of memorial and services, she sees people tear up.

ROYAL OAK, Mich. (FOX 2) - During Memorial Day at Oakview Cemetery in Royal Oak, a bagpiper accompanied those that visited the headstones that dot the landscape.

Her playing fills the silence, spurring some people to tears, she says.

"It’s meaningful for me to give back," said Christine Gutt. "I think it’s important to give back."

For Gutt, the day is a special one. She's been a bagpiper for 25 years and admits cemeteries are some of her favorite places to play.

"They kind of give bagpipers as a gift to their families who came out on a day like this. Memorial Day, Veterans Day, things like that," she said.

And the day goes deeper than that for Gutt. Her father-in-law who served in WWII would call the commemorative day by its original name.

"To the day he died he always called this decoration day," she said. "That was the original name for Memorial Day. I still think of it that way - it's decorated soldiers."

And the decorated soldiers, both those that come home and those that don't, hold a special place in her heart.

"When I see them in the store, I always say thank you for your service and they always say it was worth it and then we go on our separate ways but it means a lot to me to actually hear that."