9 posts tagged “pipe band”
Last weekend the folks from my band, Panama City Pipes & Drums, hosted a farewell party to get rid of me see me off. I had an awesome time. Like most of our parties, there was lots of awesome friends, great food, good drinks, and some fair music. While I am generally excited to be moving back to Canada, leaving these pipe band friends will be the hardest part of the move for me. I have had such a great time with these folks.
When the pipes and drums started playing my boys went crazy. They both spent a good amount of time with all of the instruments.
After our traditional jam session, being my last chance to lead the band, I was treated to the band's performance of a new tune: "David Brown's Farewell". Not only did the band play the new tune for me, they also sung the song for me. Ernie, one of our pipers and a very gifted musician, wrote the tune and lyrics. The tune is a 3/4 Retreat march and is very catchy (I couldn't get it out of my head all week long).
The band presented me with a framed copy of the music and a band photo. Also, I received the band traditional departure gift: a quaich (traditional Scottish two handled drinking bowl). We filled of the quaich with some good single malt and enjoyed a few good toasts.
I'm gonna miss these guys and gals.
<slight anger>
What a load! The Royal Scottish Pipe Band Association (RSPBA), the hosting/governing association of the World Pipe Band Championship (WPBC), will never allow the WPBC to be located outside Scotland. This 'bid' process is just a bunch of smoke and mirrors for the local media.
</slight anger>
As a piper who has travelled three times to the WPBC from "across the pond," these wankers in the RSPBA seem not to care about the time, effort, and money required to set up such a trip. For truly competitive oversees Grade 1 or 2 bands, it is necessary to do this trip every year to even be considered.
Don't even get me started regarding the fact that there are no North American qualifying competitions for Grade 1.
Last Saturday my Pipe Band, the Panama City Pipes and Drums, hosted a BURNS SUPPER fundraising dinner and dance. A Burn's Supper is a celebration of the life and spirit of Scotland's national bard, Robert "Rabbie" Burns (wikipedia link). This was the band's inaugural hosting of such an event. It was pretty successful; not allot of money raised but I think everyone enjoyed themselves.
While not a particularly traditional Burns Supper, our event did have all the important stuff: haggis to eat, highland dancers dancing, the reciting of the Address to the Haggis, a few performances from the pipe band, good food to enjoy, some scotch at the bar, and an overall great night.
I've done a great number of Burns Suppers since I started playing pipes and this one was one of my favourites.
My home town favourites, Simon Fraser University Pipe Band, did pretty well again this year and placed second. Although I haven't heard any stories yet, it seems that the drum corp of the 78th Frasers (Toronto) had a series of great performances and may have been the drummers performances that lead to the band's fourth place finish.
It was a partly cloudy and warm day for the 15th Annual Panama City Highland Games. This is our little local Highland Games run by the Grace Presbyterian Church. I always find it surprising how many vendors and clans actually come out to these games seeing it is rather small.
My band was on parade with one of the largest bands in our history. We had a total of 25 band members with 16 of these pipers. It was pretty exciting to playing with a big band again although it does take more effort and time to tune up a band of that size. We were able to add five additional folks to our ranks thanks to the Emerald Coast Pipe Band coming out to enjoy the day.
As with every year, we were forced to compete against the performers on stage during our performances. It seems every year that no one bothers to deconflict the performance schedule :-( I'm sure we'll try to fix this again next year.
It's time to starting getting lots of rest and drink lots of water in order to be prepared for next weekend's St Pats Day!
I spent last weekend at the Central Florida Highland Games in Winter Springs, FL with the rest of my pipe band. Overall it was a great time. Like most highland games, the main premise for our attendance was to compete in the pipe band competition. We played in Grade 5 competition (the lowest level of competition) and did pretty well...we came out in fourth place out of seven bands. I played a pretty large band and we had a pretty confident performance but a sloppy beginning and a less-than-perfect sound left us out of the prize money.
The highlight of the weekend was the Simon Fraser University (SFU) Pipe Band concert and workshop. Being the four-time world champions, SFU Pipe Band is one of the best bands to hear perform. While not the best concert I've heard them perform, it was still phenomenal. The individual proficiency level of the players has definitely increased over the past 15 years. The Sunday morning workshop was also a great event, as the workshop was rather small and Terry, Jack, and Reid continue to be very personable. I will admit that being from British Columbia and that I've had a few friends play with the band over the past decade helps makes these guys my favourite pipe band.
The only drag for the weekend was the fact that I was being stalked by the Southern US Pipe Band Association (SUSPBA) President. It seems that SUSPBA has some arcane rule that precludes non-SUSPBA member bands from collecting travel money for more than one SUSPBA sanctioned event and Sandy Keith, the SUSPBA president, wanted to inflict this information onto me personally. Gotta love politics.
Since it's time to review the past year, here is a rather long photo-montage summary of 2006 for my Pipe Band, the Panama City Pipes & Drums. Enjoy!
I spent the weekend over in Gulf Breeze, FL, participating in the SUSPBA Fall Pipe Band Workshop. What a great experience. For the workshop SUSPBA brought down Ken "the Captain" Eller (pipes) and Tom Foote (snare) as instructors.
Apart from seeing him playing in the circle with the 78th Frasers or drinking a beer across the beer tent, this was my first opportunity to meet the Captain. All the great things that I have previously heard about him were proved true. In a mixed class of beginner pipers, experienced pipers, and everyone inbetween; Ken was able to provide quality instruction for everyone and at the same time! He's a pretty good guy to share a beer with as well.
I hope we are able to have this workshop again next year.
Since my tag lines state that this blog will contain bagpiping related posts... here is my first piping related content >>>
Although I'm nearly a week late, it's worth reporting that Field Marshal Montgomery Pipe Band (Northern Ireland) took this years World Pipe Band Championships on Glasgow Green. I will admit that FMM is not my favourite band but they certainly know how to play in front of the judges. It is their concert performances that I do not care for.
Two of my favourite bands came in 2nd and 3rd: Simon Fraser University and Shotts & Dykehead. The 78th Frasers managed a sixth place showing again; one would hope that they could get in the top three sometime before Bill eventually steps down as P/M. A full listing of all results can be found on the RSPBA website.
It was nice to see that more New Zealand and Australian bands are starting to make the trip but it seems that fewer North American Bands traveled over the pond this year.
I'm pretty sure that I will purchase this year's DVD since I really enjoyed the one produced for the 2005 WPBC.
