A friend from South Africa who does not play the pipes asked me recently why the whole scene is built on competition. We offered a few guesses: that people are simply competitive by nature; that prizes and prize money may once have been a way of getting more people to take up the instrument, and of keeping them learning and playing — an incentive that helped foster the continuation of the tradition itself; or that pipers themselves want to know who is playing the music at its highest level. Or perhaps the reason is something else entirely? That conversation sent me back to this editorial by Seumas MacNeill, then editor of Piping Times, written fifty years ago in September 1976.
Piping Times Editorial
All of us, in Scotland at least, no matter how old or how young, have lived our piping lives almost totally immersed in an atmosphere of competition. If we do not (or did not) take part as contestants then we are involved as audience. And certainly most news items and topics of discussion relate themselves invariably to the winning or losing of prizes.
As we have so often mentioned before, never in the history of piping has the competition system been so active and flourishing as it is at present, and there can be few complaints on that score. There are of course those who deplore the competition system, or at least regret that it is a dominant feature in our piping lives. They would much prefer that piping were treated as an art, like violin playing, rather than an athletic pursuit like fiddle playing, and there is no way we can disagree with that point of view. These people tend to advocate recitals of piping rather than competitions, and theoretically this is fine, but in practice recitals are only successful outside of Scotland.
There is however some indication that an element of the recital is creeping into some of our competitions, and we welcome this whole-heartedly. The Silver Chanter was perhaps first evidence of this, when only the very best were invited to perform in what must be the perfect setting for a piper – Dunvegan Castle. There, nine years ago, serious prizes in depth were offered for the first time, together with appearance money and expenses for all competitors. A piper in fact had only to finish his tune to pick up more money than was being offered for a first prize in most other competitions.
Grants Championship in Blair Castle is another place where the competition has almost become a recital. The setting and the facilities befit artistes of the highest rank, a startling contrast to the treatment pipers receive at many of the other contests. Members of the audience are interested as much in the tunes themselves as in the decisions of the judges, and the newspaper reports on the whole treat the gathering as an exposition of the highest art of piping.
It is to be hoped that more functions of this nature will appear, and that the crummy contests of crowded halls and insulting tuning facilities will be given the polite raspberry by our top pipers.
There is however one aspect of our piping life which is shown up very badly by these recital contests. Our pipers have not yet learned how to present themselves on the concert platform. Sad as it is to report, most of the competitors in Dunvegan Castle and Blair Castle still behave as if they were army corporals in 1910 competing at Gartmore Games before a bench made up of a retired colonel and the local laird, for a prize of ten bob. The military salute continues to keep the level of our classical music down to the barrack square. The right about turn at both ends of the platform is a gratuitous insult to the audience, but to be fair, the gesture is probably made in ignorance. Even the dress of our leading competitors leaves a great deal to be desired.
Now that the piobaireachd competition at both Oban and Inverness are always held indoors, the necessity for good platform presentation is even more important.
With one notable exception nobody seems to be making an effort to develop the platform presence which we see in even moderate artistes in other fields of music. The attitude at the average Highland Gathering of “Here I go to try to win a fiver in front of this bunch and I don’t care whether you listen or not,” is not good enough for these premier contests. If the status of pipers and piobaireachd is to continue to rise then our top players must make an effort to rise with it.
Jeannie Campbell MBE published an article on the history of the competitions of the Scottish Pipers’ Association over the last 100 years.