Archive

We continue with the sixth installment of 10 “Castle Recordings” piobaireachds in our exclusive series of performances captured on reel-to-reel tape at Edinburgh Castle in the early 1960s by the late Captain John A. MacLellan MBE. “The Battle of the Pass of Crieff” “Black Donald’s March” “The Groat” “Isabel MacKay” […]

We check in with Ben Duncan to see what makes his instrument go with such military precision, and the following is every single thing he could find in his pipe case.

The Grade 1 City of Dunedin of Florida has officially appointed Ben Elkins as bass drummer. Elkins had been filling the role for the first few competitions of 2024, taking over from Taylor Tibe, who had succeeded Christina Henry after the 2023 season. Tibe was previously the bass drummer for […]

Avoiding the complications of most piping recordings today, Brittany’s Xavier Boderiou is going back to basics with a new album that, if crowdfunding goes as planned, he hopes to launch in October. “Most of the tunes on the album are composed by me,” he said, “but the repertoire sticks to […]

We continue with the second of our two-part interview with David Hilder, vice-president and Music Committee chair with the Britsh Columbia Pipers’ Association. In Part 1, Hilder discusses some of the BCPA’s more recent work and highlights achievements. In Part 2, he discusses how associations can work better, the importance […]

pipes|drums is pleased to bring readers, viewers and listeners videos of the Grade 2 Medley performances from the 2024 Chicago Highland Games, held on June 15th at DuPage County Fairgrounds in the city’s northwest. The event saw a total of 38 bands compete across all events sanctioned and organized by […]

Blair Brown was the winner of the Reid Maxwell Medal and the Pacific Rim Championship for Open Solo Sare Drumming; Alan Bevan took the overall Open solo piping prize; and Robert Malcolm Memorial 3 was first overall, winning the aggregate Grade 3 prize in the top contested band event at the annual ScotFest BC Highland Games. Twelve bands and 110 solo contestants participated.

pipes|drums is pleased to bring readers, viewers and listeners videos of performances from the 2024 Chicago Highland Games, held on June 15th at DuPage County Fairgrounds in the city’s northwest. The event saw a total of 38 bands compete across all events sanctioned and organized by the Midwest Pipe Band […]

Tickets for Peoples Ford Boghall & Bathgate Caledonia’s “Cabar Fèidh” concert at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall on Wednesday, August 14th, have sold so fast that organizers warn that there are only about 25 seats left to see the 2023 World Pipe Band Champions in all their glory. Most consider […]

The Ottawa Highlanders ended the Peel Regional Police Pipe Band’s two-year-long string of consecutive victories on the Ontario circuit by winning the four-band Grade 2 competition at the remodelled “Northumberland Highland Games” in the small town of Port Hope on the shore of Lake Ontario. The event continues from the Cobourg Highland Games.

Wheaton, Illinois – June 14-15, 2024 – St. Thomas Alumni of Houston were the big winners at the 2024 Chicago Highland Games, winning Grade 1 against Florida’s City of Dunedin in warm and sunny weather at DuPage County Fairgrounds on the north side of the city. A total of 38 […]

Artificial intelligence (AI) is poised to impact just about everything humans do whether we like or want it or not, and Canadian Scott Haynes, an accomplished pier who’s been a member of bands like Boghall & Bathgate Caledonia and the 78th Fraser Highlanders, might be the first to apply AI […]

The British Columbia Pipers’ Association was officially started in 1932, making it one of the world’s oldest piping and drumming organizations. With roots dating back to 1905 with the Pipers’ Society and the Vancouver Pipers’ Society in 1921, the BCPA today has about nearly 500 members and almost 20 competing […]

Forty-one bands across all grades and nearly 550 solo piping and drumming competition performances are on tap for Friday, June 14th, and Saturday, June 15th, for the annual Chicago Highland Games, a relatively young event that is already one of the largest in North America. A feature of the competition […]

The new European Knockout Bagpipe Competition, with the tagline “Bringing Europe’s Best Pipers Together,” is scheduled for March 22, 2025, at a location to be determined in Germany. According to piping impresario Eric Stein, who’s organizing the new event, the European Knockout Bagpipe Competition is being modelled after the Eurovision […]

Pipe band drumming legend J. Reid Maxwell received his official honourary degree for his lifetime of service to the art today by Simon Fraser University at the university’s convocation ceremony in Burnaby, British Columbia, along with nine other individuals with a similar level of accomplishment in research, writing, music, cultural […]