I was sorry to learn the other day of the passing of Pipe Major Archie Cairns. Archie was aged 87 and throughout his life piping was central to everything he did. An obituary in Canada’s ‘Your Life Moments’ reads: ‘Peacefully at home on 1 April, 2016, at the age of 87 with daughter Fiona at his side. He was a loving and devoted son, brother, husband, father, and grandfather. Archie…
Two senior pipe band adjudicators who recently resigned their positions within the RSPBA’s Adjudicators’ Panel Management Board (APMB) have written to Piping Press to clarify their position. Former Convenor John Wilson and Vice Convenor Joe Noble resigned following a decision by the Board not to re-instate newly qualified adjudicator Ian Duncan. Mr Duncan had resigned after a series of correspondence between the board and himself. Mr Duncan is now taking legal advice as…
One fact that emerged from yesterday’s story concerning the RSPBA’s Adjudicator Panel was this: the passion and concern everyone involved has for the pipe band art. The judges themselves are dedicated to trying to get their results correct and to have in place the best system that allows that to happen. It is inevitable that there will be clashes of personality and disputes over how this should best be done. In…
Two leading office bearers within the RSPBA’s Adjudicators’ Panel have resigned over a dispute involving another member of the Panel. Convenor John Wilson (left) and Vice Convenor Joe Noble, both senior and widely respected figures in the pipe band judging community, stood down following disagreements between the Panel’s Management Board and one their newest judges, P/M Ian Duncan. Details of what the disagreement is about have not yet been made public…
We are indebted to Breton piper Patrick Molard for supplying two outstanding recordings for the PP Audio Archive today. They are of two giants of the post war piping world, Hugh MacCallum and John MacFadyen Both were made at the Argyllshire Gathering, Oban, in 1971, and whilst for the ceol beag there is some interference from the announcer’s loudspeaker, one gets the true atmosphere of the games and one of…
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