The Scottish Pipers’ Association have set the date for their 2025 annual professional contest: April 12.
The venue is the Piping Centre, McPhater Street, Glasgow. The SPA is the first open professional contest of the season. Pictured above is Ben Duncan, one of the big winners at the 2024 SPA. The competition has enjoyed substantial sponsorship from the Piobaireachd Society.
The Uist & Barra, an invitational contest, is on March 8 in the Piping Centre, Otago Street.
Talk Piobaireachd
Tonight (Dec.18) sees the second of the Piobaireachd Society’s popular Talk Piobaireachd sessions for winter 2024-25. The speaker is Mike Cusack, Texas, the time 8pm GMT.
A student of John MacFadyen and Jimmy McIntosh, Mike has won all the major awards and is recognised as an outstanding teacher of ceol mòr.
The tunes he will be discussing are MacFarlane’s Gathering and Lady Margaret MacDonald’s Salute, both set for the major competitions at Oban and Inverness next year.
Talk Piobaireachd runs throughout the winter. Sessions to follow are:
January 22, Robert Wallace: Salute to Donald/ Prince’s Salute
February 19, Jack Taylor: Lament for the Departure of King James/ Duke of Atholl’s Salute
March 19, Alan Forbes: Chisholm’s Salute/ MacLean’s March
April 23 Jack Lee: Munro’s Sal./ Lament for Ronald MacDonald of Morar
These talks by some of the leading experts in world piping, are available to members of the Piobaireachd Society. If you are not a member it is easy to join and costs only £18 per annum, or £7 if you are a student. Here’s the link: join.
All talks are recorded and placed on the Members Section of the PS website for future reference.
EUSPBA
Bill Caudill has been re-elected President of the Eastern United States Pipe Band Association. In a statement to his membership Mr Caudill wrote: ‘I’d like to thank everyone for your participation in our recent elections, as well as thank you for your confidence in re-electing me as your President for the next two years.
‘The first two years went by very quickly, but thanks to the help of an outstanding Executive Committee I feel that we have been able to accomplish a lot – most importantly our #1 goal of 2024 – to re-vamp and re-envision our webpage.
‘That will be a work in progress over the coming weeks, but we are finally “our own masters” in terms of control of the site, its content and ability to add to it. This is a huge step forward and a tremendous cost-saving move for the Association. We have a lot to look forward to in 2025 and beyond and I appreciate your support…. if needed and you can count on me to be a voice for you over the coming two years.
‘I also thank the candidates who also ran for office… contested elections demonstrate interest and engagement in our Association…. we are all on the same team and working for the same things.’
