Florida Pipe & Drum Academy/ Items for Sale (Update – Sold!)/ Oban and Inverness Reminder

The 2022 Florida Pipe & Drum Academy registrations are now open, writes Administrator Chris McKeown. Dates are 21/2/22 to 25/2/22. Students and instructors will join up at 5pm for a meet and greet on the 21st. Thereafter classes will run each day from 8am to 4 pm Event Address: 618 Stockton St., Jacksonville, Florida 32204. Contact us at 904-334-5472 or FL.Pipeanddrumacademy@gmail.com Instruction available to all levels of students in bagpipes,…

Editor’s Notebook: Imminent U-turn Will Save Early Pipe Band Season/ Piping in Pitt Street/ Piobaireachd by the Sea/ Ottawa Games 1976

Twelve hours after Tuesday’s blog suggesting the 2022 British Pipe Band Championships should be moved from Scotland to England, Sir Ian McGeechan proposed the same for the forthcoming Calcutta Cup rugby match. Newcastle would be the perfect spot for the battle with the auld enemy, a max crowd permitted and guaranteed, said Sir Ian. Twenty-four hours later our football pundits were suggesting the same for Scottish Premier League matches. The…

Piping During WW2: The Founding of the College of Piping, Dunkirk and ‘Mad’ Jack Churchill

The College of Piping was founded early in the 1940s as part of a youth organisation named ‘Fianna na h’Alba’, writes Jeannie Campbell. The Fianna activities included the study of Scottish history, the Gaelic language and literature, Scottish crafts, Highland dancing and all outdoor pursuits.  Another important feature of their activities were ceilidhs and piper member Seumas MacNeill (pictured above) would of course play at these. The result was that…

Piping During WW2: Scottish Societies Keep up the Good Work But London Badly Affected

The third excerpt from Jeannie Campbell’s history of piping 1939-1945 ……. The Royal Scottish Pipers’ Society in Edinburgh held their AGM in November 1939 and it was decided that meetings of the Society would continue. Officials were appointed for a period of six months to fill the gaps caused by members away on service duty. Eighteen members of the Society were killed during the war. On 30th September 1939 the…

Restrictions Pose Threat to British Pipe Band Championships

Welcome back folks and right away I must apologise for being the bearer of un-glad tidings. If we are to believe what the Scottish Government and its medical apparatchiks are saying, we need to start worrying about early season pipe band contests. Just look at the front pages from Monday’s Times newspaper (above). In England (r) we had talk of a lessening of restrictions whilst in bonnie wee benighted Scotland…