The Pipe Major Donald MacLeod Memorial Competition took place on the last weekend in March and was hailed a great success with piping fans travelling from far and wide to listen to eight of the world’s best pipers playing the music of the legendary piper and composer from Stornoway.
By Katie Laing
Long-time competitor Angus MacColl took the top honours in the invitational senior competition on Friday, March 28, and Micheal Maclellan from South Uist won the junior competition that took place the day before.
17-year-old Michael, from Cille Pheadair, is Pipe Major of the Sgoil Lionacleit Pipe Band. He stood out in all categories, triumphing in the Piobaireachd, March, Strathspey and Reel, and Hornpipe and Jig.
Other junior competitors with top three finishes in the categories were from the Southern Isles too. Mairead Galbraith, Rachael Sinclair and Calum MacNeil all play with the Castlebay pipe band that won the Freestyle competition at the recent Scottish Schools Championships, while Padruig Maclean competes with Sgoil Lionacleit Pipe Band.
The other juniors playing were Alexander Macleod from Lewis and Isabel and Calum Beaton from Benbecula. All were invited to take part in the competition based on their performances at the Lewis and Harris Piping Society’s junior Western Isles competition last year.
Judges for the junior competition were Cameron Drummond and Alasdair Henderson, who both competed in the senior event, with both events taking place in Stornoway’s Caladh Hotel.
Cameron Drummond said it had been ‘a high pressure situation’ for the junior pipers, given the formal staging of the whole Donald MacLeod competition and it being ‘a big event’.
Although ‘there was definitely a standout competitor’ he praised all the youngsters for having such an impressive repertoire of tunes at this stage in their development.
After his win, Micheal said the competition was ‘good craic’ and his mum, Olivia, said: ‘I don’t know how they can place the players because they are all brilliant, and the best thing with these guys across the islands is the incredible camaraderie they have.’ She couldn’t believe Micheal had won and was ‘immensely proud’.
In the senior event, Angus MacColl’s win was his fifth at the Donald MacLeod, coming 25 years after his first. He previously won in 1999, 2002, 2011 and 2018.
Angus won due to his aggregate score, narrowly beating 2024 winner Alasdair Henderson who placed above Angus in the March, Strathspey and Reel and Hornpipe and Jig but behind him in the Piobaireachd, which has extra weighting.
Speaking afterwards, Angus said he was ‘very happy’ to win, adding: ‘You’re only playing against yourself. I’m just pleased to get through everything with no complete disasters.’
Dr John Smith, chairman of competition organisers Lewis and Harris Piping Society, said both events were ‘very successful’ and they were pleased that people had travelled to it from places including Germany, London, the Borders and all over Scotland. New Fear an Taighe Cailean Maclean had performed admirably.
One first time visitor was David McAdam, recently moved to Inverness after 30 years in California. When there he would get up in the middle of the night to watch the livestream of the competition. He was sold on it because the competition was ‘the only place in the world’ where the audience would sing along to a Gaelic air on the pipes.
It was extra special for him, too, as he knew Angus MacColl from his school days. To experience the competition in person was, he said, ‘every bit more that I imagined’.
Well done Angus you are a master piper