The 2022 Florida Pipe & Drum Academy registrations are now open, writes Administrator Chris McKeown. Dates are 21/2/22 to 25/2/22.
Students and instructors will join up at 5pm for a meet and greet on the 21st. Thereafter classes will run each day from 8am to 4 pm
Event Address: 618 Stockton St., Jacksonville, Florida 32204. Contact us at 904-334-5472 or FL.Pipeanddrumacademy@gmail.com
Instruction available to all levels of students in bagpipes, snare, tenor, and bass drumming.
Confirmed Instructors: Robert Wallace, Barry Donaldson, and Stephen Creighton. More instructors to be added as class sizes dictate. Tuition: $500USD
Payment can be made via PayPal. The FPDA is a non-profit charity. Refund policy: If the school is cancelled for any reason such as covid or otherwise, refunds will be issued in full.
Updates: Text @flbagpipe to 81010 and follow the school on Facebook at Florida Pipe and Drum Academy. Register here.
Northeast Florida Scottish Games and Festival are on the Saturday following the Academy, February 26. The games will be held at Clay County Fairgrounds, 2497 State Road 16 West, Green Cove Springs, Florida, from 9am. Click here for more.
For Sale
Piping Press library has a few excess items for sale. They are an original copy of Book 2 of the Edcath Collection (now out of print), and the following seven editions of the Piping Times: December 1974, July 1974, April 1975, January 1976, April 1976, November 1997 and July 1991.
The items are available as one lot priced £12 + p&p. First come first served. The second Edcath book is a classic with tunes such as Tam Bain’s Lum, P/M Sam Scott, Donella Beaton, Dr EG MacKinnon, Miss Lily Christie and many more high level compositions.
The available editions of the Piping Times are worth it for Seumas MacNeill’s Editorials alone. Here he is in the Decemebr 1974 number: ‘Without any doubt the two most important innovations in the piping world in the last ten years have been the introduction of piping as a subject leading to ‘O’ Grade certificates in schools, and the Piobaireachd Society annual conference which started at Minard in 1972.
‘The effects of the ‘O’ Grade are already being felt throughout all Scotland, but even so the major impact is still to come. If Captain John MacLellan and your gentle editor are remembered for nothing else, their mutual, but otherwise unaided, efforts to establish piping as a certificate subject in schools ensures them a place in the piper’s hall of fame….’
And from the January 1976 edition: ‘Every year is of course a time for looking forward, with hope in the heart and resolution in the spirit, to brighter and better things…..1976 is going to be – for piping at least – a great deal different from any of its predecessors.
‘This is the year of the emancipation of women….On December 29th last year the Sex Discrimination Act officially came into force. As a result it is now illegal to treat women less favourably than men in almost all possible forms of human activity. (Most men welcome the Act because it also means that it is now illegal to treat men less favourably than women.)
‘The places which will be affected most in piping are Oban and Inverness where traditionally women have been debarred from competing….’
Click here to purchase.
Oban and Inverness
Further reminder: those wishing to play at this year’s Argyllshire Gathering (August 25/26) and Northern Meeting (September 1/2) must apply for eligibility by January 30.
Entries can now be submitted online at each of their web sites. Here are the relevant links:
To repeat, entries for the open competitions (Gold and Silver Medals, March, Strathspey and Reel A and B) must be lodged according to the published timetable, the critical date being 30 January.
All of those entered will then be subject to a ruling on eligibility from the Joint Committee for solo piping which represents the promoters, judges and competing pipers.
Both of these competitions, the two most important in world solo piping, have advised that late entries will not be accepted.