Northern Winter School in Germany Comes to a Successful Conclusion

So that is the third annual Northern Winter School over and we are now travelling home, writes the Editor. I think it would be fair to say it has been a success and Principal Ronnie Bromhead has already booked his premises for the next few years ahead. The picture above shows students and instructors.
Many of the students have expressed a wish to have a weekend refresher course a few months hence and that is something Ronnie says he will consider seriously.
The school is on the north German plain and only a few miles from the Bergen-Belsen camp memorial which unfortunately we had no time to see this time round.

We had a couple of successful students sitting PDQB exams and next year the NWS will be introducing its own series of small exam certificates.

It was great to see Barry [Donaldson] back in action teaching once more in Germany. He was, as ever, an immediate hit with his students many of whom had been taught by him at various schools over the past ten years. His contribution to piping education in Germany is significant. Of that there is no doubt

Another instructor colleague was Craig Munro. Craig is a busy man. He heads to Chile on Tuesday for the South American Pipe Band Championships in Santiago, Chile. Amazing, isn’t it? Pipe bands are everywhere these days. Drumming judge is the well-known tenor maestro Tyler Fry.
Craig’s stories about the incredible success of the Red Hot Chilli Pipers left us all very impressed. He is a regular performer with them though due to business and family commitments he no longer takes part in the big eight-week long international tours (who can blame him). The band must have introduced thousands of people to the bagpipe even if you think their music is too pop scene. They sell out major concert halls wherever they go and have a fully professional team of management and light and sound engineers to back them up. The only time the ‘After the Worlds’ concert has been sold out is when the Chillis have taken the stage at the Fruitmarket in 2011 and the Glasgow ABC in 2016.
Before going I want to mention instructor Jim Semple, a six time Worlds winner with Strathclyde Police and now a respected adjudicator for the RSPBA. Jim was great company on the outward and inward journeys and such was the gratitude of his class that they presented him with a lovely glass covered group photograph. Thanks for making the travel arrangements Jim.
Anyway, that’s it from Germany and thanks to the students and teaching comrades for making it such an enjoyable week.