Category: Tuition

Piping Live’s 2024 Line Up

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This year’s Piping Live! programme highlights for Worlds Week 2024 were announced by Director Finlay MacDonald. He said: ‘We are proud and excited to be able to bring the 21st edition of Piping Live! To the city of Glasgow. We are thankful to our supporters, performers, participants and funders who have continued to support this event through some challenging times for the creative industries. ‘There are opportunities for pipers of all…

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John MacKenzie’s Book Now Available in Digital Edition

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Fifty plus years after it was first offered to the public, the P/M John MacKenzie collection of bagpipe music is now once more available as a digital download. John composed tunes all of his life, but it was in 1973, a time when new publications were infrequent to say the least, that he produced his ‘Collection of Bagpipe Music’. It was very well received, containing as it did outstanding music…

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Editor’s Notebook: Bands Get Ready/ RSPS Results/ Tune Search/ NPC Logo/ Norway Query

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Up at Oban last weekend fellow judge Robert Barnes was telling me his Methil band are struggling to make the first Major at Forres in a month’s time. They’ve lost their drum corps. This is a story we’ve all heard before – and all over the country. There is a real need for some structured teaching programme for drummers (and pipers) that helps a band like Barney’s. Maybe it is…

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History: Famous Composer John Balloch

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My great grandfather was John Balloch [above], the composer of such popular tunes at the 25th KOSB’s Farewell to Meerut and Auchmountain’s Bonnie Glen. His son Donald, my grandfather, was also a piper. Auchmountain’s Bonnie Glen is a well known beauty spot near Greenock where P/M Balloch settled before WW1. There may be other unattributed tunes of his in the Royal Scots Collection by James Robertson. By Stuart Herron His…

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Revisiting the Past: 2/4 Marches and a Letter from Archibald Campbell

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Until the advent of recordings, music was ephemeral. Performances faded from memory, save for occasional outstanding examples imprinted on our minds. Memories become clouded in time, however.  Historic recordings can remind us of what we heard in the past. I am old enough to detect that march playing has arguably deteriorated, even at the highest level.  I can assure readers this is not just a personal view – it is shared…

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