Category: Blog

Editor’s Notebook: PPBSO Archive/ RSPBA Chief/ Donald Cameron/ Finlay Drynan/ Captain John

Posted on      by      3 Comments

New President Michael Grey has certainly rejuvenated Ontario’s Piping and Pipe Band Society. There’s now new archive material from the Society’s archives available, his latest Newsletter tells me. Above is film of the innovative Vale of Atholl band under P/M Ian Duncan from the North American Championships at Maxville in 1988. The blurb reads: ‘This is the last of nine bands to play on Saturday, July 30, 1988. The Vale…

More Editor’s Notebook: PPBSO Archive/ RSPBA Chief/ Donald Cameron/ Finlay Drynan/ Captain John

South Africa’s ‘100 Guineas’ Solo Piping 2022 – Part 2

Posted on      by      1 Comment

This was a good renaissance weekend of piping, in an excellent venue, with slick stewarding, and a somewhat larger audience than usual – all this helped to produce a sense that things are getting back on track at last after the pandemic.  Like me, I am sure the organisers, the Scottish Piping Society of Southern Africa, were particularly gratified that four of the competitors in ‘100 Guineas’ were quite well…

More South Africa’s ‘100 Guineas’ Solo Piping 2022 – Part 2

South Africa’s ‘Hundred Guineas’ Competition, 2022

Posted on      by      Leave a comment

South Africa’s pre-eminent solo piping competition took place in Johannesburg at St Benedict’s College over the weekend of 26 and 27 March 2022. On-line competitions have been a wonderful way of providing pipers and drummers with a competition outlet over the last couple of years. A major advantage of these contests has been the opportunity for pipers to compete, even on an international level, without leaving home – and several…

More South Africa’s ‘Hundred Guineas’ Competition, 2022

Thirty-two Long Months and the Pandemic Nighmare is Finally Put Behind Us (Updated with Full Results )

Posted on      by      2 Comments

It fell to the Kilbarchan pipe band to sound the first note played in anger on a pipe band contest field for almost three years. With that first introductory E this band of 17 pipers swept away months of moribundity and declared ‘the pipe band movement is back’! The occasion was the Gourock Highland Games contest held at the weekend at Battery Park, Greenock. I arrived early just as tents…

More Thirty-two Long Months and the Pandemic Nighmare is Finally Put Behind Us (Updated with Full Results )

Donald Cameron, Inverness 1841 and a Letter from the North

Posted on      by      1 Comment

By Duncan Watson Hello Robert the Editor. Amidst all this stuff on the Northern Meetings of past years I’ve been reading on Piping Press, I am wondering if you could cast your memory back to about 1841, one of your earlier attendances there? The results were interesting. Piobaireachd: 1 William Smith , Gordon Castle, Piper to The Duke (Macdonald’s Salute) for which he was awarded a set of bagpipes valued 10 guineas. …

More Donald Cameron, Inverness 1841 and a Letter from the North