Entries for Oban and Inverness Open/ Film Premier Reminder

The Argyllshire Gathering and Northern Meeting advise that entries for next year’s competitions can now be submitted online at each of their web sites. There had been a problem with the Gathering registration form but that has now been resolved. Here are the relevant links: Argyllshire Gathering  Northern Meeting  Entries for the open competitions (Gold and Silver Medals, March, Strathspey and Reel A and B) must be lodged according to the…

Donald Morrison Archive: A Letter from Seton Gordon and Donald’s Part in ‘Whisky Galore’

We continue our excerpts from the archive of the renowned Gold Medallist and composer……… Wednesday evening, August 30, 1972, Upper Duntuilm, Isle of Skye….Dear Donald Morrison, I have just been listening to the wireless recording of the ‘Silver Chanter’ and it has confirmed my feeling that your ‘Iain Garve’ [John Garve MacLeod of Raasay’s Lament] was the best tune of the evening. I think John MacDonald [Inverness] would have agreed…

Online Premier of Acclaimed Pipe Band Film to Go Ahead Next Weekend

I released a DVD some years ago (title above) about some beginner bagpipe players from around Europe coming together to enter the World Pipe Band Championship. It’s a great tale and the film received some acclaim at the time. I’ve now decided to make it available to everyone online. Following the maxim that ‘the best way of learning is doing’, piping tutor P/M Barry Donaldson enters a band of beginners…

John MacFadyen and Fair Hill Games / Archie Kenneth Quaich Entries Open

An Editor’s Notebook item last week featured results from around the Highland games in the US in 1968. One of the prizewinners mentioned was former professional piper and now senior adjudicator Al McMullin. He writes…. There are always interesting ‘stories’ that are not reflected in results. I offer the following about the ’17 and Under Piobaireachd’ noted in the 1968 results at Fair Hill, Maryland. The late, great, John MacFadyen…

The Transformative Sound of the Great Highland Bagpipe

This reader contacted us after we published the article from Scotland’s History magazine ‘The Meaning of Bagpipe Music on the Western Front During WW1‘ My name is Robyn M Pio. I am a 70-year-old American woman raised by a German great-grandmother (who was born in Bremen, 1878). I now live in Chicago, Illinois, but my first language was German. I became a Catholic Francophile whilst living in France years ago. I am…