Reports in the national press have indicated that face to face piping lessons can now be conducted in areas of Scotland where Level 2 covid restrictions and below are in place. This means that all areas of the country, with the current exceptions of Glasgow and Moray, can have piping classes in schools. The Scottish edition of the London Times said children would be able to sing and play instruments…
Andy McCartney reports…….. Friday 13th may be superstitious for a lot of people, but not for the families and friends of the youngsters who attended a week-long Summer School at SRUC Barony Campus near Dumfries. The South West of Scotland Piping and Drumming Academy (SWSPDA) had just completed its 5th Annual Summer School and this was the end-of-school concert. Thirty seven young pupils attended, and this was the time for them to…
Disturbing information has reached me from Australia via a well known piper and acquaintance of mine, writes the Editor. It concerns the late Donald MacPherson’s bagpipe, that glorious instrument which in Donald’s hands made him the most successful competing piper of all time. It was a pipe I had the good fortune to hear many times. We have several fine instruments on the boards today but none that quite captures…
We are now well into the week at the New England Pipe & Drum Academy. Small but perfectly formed, with friendship, wonderful food and hard study the unfailing mix for a successful week. Tonight Tommy (Johnston) and I are off to the Stuart Highlanders band for a workshop. This is the band which recently had a Grade 1 standing but who are now down in Grade 5. How things can…
The absorption of the College of Piping into the National Piping Centre behemoth is well underway as the above picture shows, the new signage appearing shortly after the official takeover on May 1, writes the Editor. The College is now referred to as ‘The NPC Otago Street’ and work is underway to combine the two shop websites. For the moment prices are being standardised up or down (usually slightly up)…
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