Most people have been very pleased with the RSPBA’s decision to opt for Paisley as the host for next year’s British Pipe Band Championships – and for 2017/18. What it does mean is that three of the major championships on the RSPBA calendar are now being held in west-central Scotland: the Worlds at Glasgow Green, the Scottish at Dumbarton and now the British at Paisley. Belfast gets the UK Championships…
Champion piper Gordon Walker will be in Northern Ireland this weekend for the ‘Piper of the Year ‘ competition. Kenny Stewart of the organising committee has sent this: ‘The annual Piper of the Year competition will be held in the Adair Arms Hotel, in Ballymena, on Saturday 10th October 2015. The Piobaireachd competition will commence at 12.30pm with the MSR and Jig & Hornpipe resuming at 7.00pm. The adjudicator for…
Anyone who thought the prevalence of girls in today’s pipe bands is a relatively new phenomenon should have a look at the above picture of the Woolmet Colliery Juvenile Pipe Band. It’s from a 1949 edition of the Piping, Dancing and Highland Dancing Journal. The story reads: ‘The Woolmet Colliery Juvenile Pipe Band, one of the young bands of the Lothians and Borders Branch [of the RSPBA] was founded in…
A manuscript sample of the well-known tune Lament for the Viscount of Dundee, aka Cumha Chlaibhers or Lament for Claverhouse, has been forwarded by Dr J David Hester PhD of the Alt Pibroch Club website. (There is new a letter from Mr Hester in our Letters column.) I believe the sample may have come via piobaireachd analyst Barnaby Brown and has the comment ‘We’re playing it wrong’ attached. The music…
The October 2015 edition of the RSPBA’s ‘Pipe Band’ magazine is now available from the RSPBA website. Readers might also like to download the issues of the magazine from April and July last year which has a full interview with former Glasgow Police P/M Duncan Nicolson. Click on the back numbers option on the RSPBA site. I think it a brave decision by Duncan to stand down after three years in…
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