Author: Gilbert Cromie

The 2020 Season in Northern Ireland and Major Concerns Regarding 2021

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In normal times as we come to the end of August here in Northern Ireland, our competing pipe bands would have been reflecting on a season-ending trip to the seaside resort of Newcastle which would have hosted the NI Branch Champion of Champions contest beneath the magnificent Mountains of Mourne which, as the song says, ‘sweep down to the sea’. Sadly this has been anything but a normal pipe band…

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Irish Pipe Bands Were Divided – but Also United by the All-Ireland Championships

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We conclude the article on the oprigins of pipe band associations and competition on the island of Ireland. Pictured below are the Robert Armstrong Memorial Pipe Band in 1966. The band won the All-Ireland Championship nine times – 1966, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1976 and 1977. Almost certainly the contact that the Fintan Lalor and the other Dublin based bands such as St Laurence O’Toole had with the…

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Ireland’s Engagement with the Newly Formed Scottish Pipe Band Association

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We continue with our look back at the founding of the modern pipe band competition system on the island of Ireland. After the SPBA was formed in 1930 the North of Ireland Bands Association (NIBA) began to engage experienced piping and drumming adjudicators from its top bands having previously used experienced Army pipe majors in this role. It is my opinion that the merits of the SPBA, and its way…

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The Origins of Competing Pipe Bands in Ireland

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I was very interested in the recent item regarding the article by Donald McIntosh, an early advocate for the then SPBA, which appeared in the November 1935 issue of ‘Piping and Dancing Magazine’ and particularly the aspect relating to the ‘…..proposed extension of the SPBA into Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland’. I thought I would pass on some research that I have done regarding the history of Northern…

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Pipe Sergeant Robin Swann – Leading Northern Ireland’s Fight against Covid-19

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Many pipers and drummers throughout the world are working in the front line of this worldwide fight against Covid-19, but I don’t know of too many (although I stand to be corrected) who are in what must be the most unenviable position of leading a government’s fight against this cruel virus.  Here in Northern Ireland our Health Minister, Robin Swann, is at the centre of such decision making and in normal…

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