p|d Hot Stove League: Boghall’s Walker and Brown at 2012 Pipes+Drums Recital

Our second installment of videos from the 2012 Pipes + Drums Recital at the 2012 Piping Live! Glasgow Festival of Piping features Pipe-Major Ross Walker and Leading-Drummer Gordon Brown of the Grade 1 Boghall & Bathgate Caledonia Pipe Band of Bathgate, Scotland.

The recital, free to all who wanted to listen, was put on once again by the nonprofit pipes|drums, with an aim to feature several of the world’s top pipe band leaders to showcase the styles that they bring to their bands.

Walker and Brown kicked off the 2012 event, requesting to perform first because they had to get away as quickly as possible to prepare for Boghall & Bathgate’s “Forte” concert a few blocks away at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall.

These are two pipe band leaders performing at the very top of their talent, at a point when they had been preparing all year for a pressure-packed concert with the ears of the piping and drumming world upon them. The concert was a triumph, and the band enjoyed one of its best competition seasons ever.

In addition to his corps leadership, Gordon Brown is of course well known as a two-time winner of the World Solo Drumming Championship. While Ross Walker has been Pipe-Major of Boghall & Bathgate for more than 20 years, his solo playing is not often heard.

Of all of the performances at Pipes + Drums, it might have been Walker’s that caught the attention of most people who never fully realized just how good a piper he is, and here he presents an immaculate and robust pipe with deft execution and terrific phrasing.

Accompanied by Brown’s sympathetic treatment of scores, the duet shows where the musical power of Boghall originates.

We hope that you enjoy these high-definition videos of two of the most talented leaders in the pipe band world.