Category: History

Putting the Record Straight on Our World Pipe Band Champions

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I am grateful to reader Trevor Clydesdale for forwarding this list of winners from the first Cowal Championship in 1906, writes the Editor. These bands were considered the World Champions of their day and deserve to be showered with the same accolades as the champions of today. Yet they feature not in the official RSPBA Worlds programme produced for that championship each year. Perhaps these winners did not have the…

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Editor’s Notebook: Clan MacRae and the Worlds/ Donald’s Fingers/ Bellows Pipes Sale/ PS AGM

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Kenny Macleod has responded to this week’s story on the Clan MacRae band. Kenny: ‘My uncle Alec Macleod was the P/M of the Clan MacRae when they won the Grade 1 Worlds in 1953 [left of the trophy, facing], and my father Jimmy, pictured third from the left, was the pipe sergeant. ‘He left the band in 1968 and started the Glasgow Skye Association band along with Eddie MacLellan, who…

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Review: Donald MacLeod Memorial Senior and Junior Competitions

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Top honours at the P/M Donald MacLeod MBE Memorial, held in the Caladh Inn, Stornoway, last Friday, were taken by Dollar Academy piping instructor Callum Beaumont. Callum was first overall and won both the ceòl mòr and MSR events, writes Katie Laing. James Duncan Mackenzie, a piping instructor in Lewis and Harris schools, was second overall and second in both these categories. He was the first Lewis piper to qualify…

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Editor’s Notebook: Clan MacRae PB/ Set Tunes/ Band Gradings/ Jimmy Hood/ Iain MacPherson’s Pipes

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Reader Rona Launders writes: ‘There’s an image of the Clan MacRae Society Pipe Band which was taken in the 1950s on your website. My father, William Turnbull is one of the drummers in the photograph and I would very much like a copy and of course I’m more than happy to pay for the image.’ I take it that’s the picture above Rona. Please feel free to download/copy it or…

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History: ‘Scotch Piper and the Dancing Girl’ – Part 3

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We conclude our interview of an itinerant piper, originally from Peterhead he says, and formerly of the 93rd Regiment. Given his references to the MacGregors, it is possible that he was one of that clan. See more here. This interview is dated 1851 and is by journalist Henry Mayhew. In this concluding excerpt the piper avers that the Lowland Scot is tight with his money when compared to the Highlander….

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