Category: Piobaireachd

Editor’s Notebook: Hogmanay/ Stuart Liddell/ Queen’s Comment/ Grading/ Royal Bagpipe

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I hope everyone had a good New Year. The Hogmanay celebrations augured well for piping. Television channels BBC Alba and BBC2 had the pipes welcoming in the midnight bells (the latter featuring the Scots Guards P&D) and Buckingham Palace even put out a video showing Paul Burns, Sovereign’s Piper, piping down the steps at Buckingham Palace playing Auld Lang Syne (best to finish on high A with that setting Paul!)…

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2022 – A Year of Rebirth for Piping and Pipe Bands

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It was the year when we finally shook off the fear and loathing of the pandemic and the brutal authoritarianism of lockdown, now thoroughly discredited. Piping came back with a bang – but only just in time. We lost many potentially good young players, and bands and societies have all suffered a fall off in interest (and on the writing front the ever-popular MacStig is no more). By the Editor…

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The Pinstripe Highlanders – an Amateur London-based Piping Society

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Given the scale and scope of its journalism, readers of Piping Press must surely have their finger on the pulse of most parts of our piping world, but there is one small historic corner that has stayed largely under the radar since its inception in 1971. That corner, in London’s West End, is occupied by the Pinstripe Highlanders who have been meeting and playing their pipes together for 51 years….

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Editor’s Notebook: Iain Murdo/ SPA Entry/ SPA Vets/ Glasgow Transport Band

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A little more on Iain Morrison may be apposite following yesterday’s piece by Alastair McInnes. Iain was the finest light music player I ever heard and I know I am not alone in that. The lift he gave to his tunes set him apart from others playing in the ’70s and ’80s and I include such great names as P/M Angus MacDonald, John MacDougall, John Burgess et al. He certainly…

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Pipers Gather to Share Memories of Iain Murdo Morrison’s Visit to Australia

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A dedicated group attended Castle Dangerous (Murdo MacLeod’s manor) in Maclean, New South Wales, last week to acknowledge the passing of Pipe Major Iain Murdo Morrison two years ago, the virus having torpedoed last year’s initial anniversary.  In 1987 the local Scottish Society opened the purse strings and ‘brought out’ an unforgettable touring party: Iain, singer Kathleen MacDonald and accordionist the late Tommy Darky who died in 2021. All were…

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