It was, was it not, pleasing to learn that the Irish language – Irish Gaelic – has received full status as an official language of the European Union? What a tremendous boost for the language of that fine country. Language is the principal method of human communication and this time […]
It looks like this winter will be a long one. COVID-19 is on the rise again throughout Europe and beyond. Statistics a fortnight ago revaled the UK as the leading region globally for new cases yet this wasn’t mentioned by the country’s state broadcaster, the BBC. There seems to be […]
I have never been in any branch of the armed forces. I wasn’t in the Boys’ Brigade or the Boy Scouts either. Other than playing in a pipe band I didn’t grow up with any connection to any sort of military tradition. I have friends who serve currently and have […]
In the eight years since I moved to Scotland from Pittsburgh, many of the spoils of life in this new place have long since gone from novel to normal. No longer must I wait until a highland games to purchase piping goods in person; I can pop into a wide […]
November is invariably upon before we know it. For those of you in the southern hemisphere, temperatures are starting to ramp up and summer is approaching. Here in Scotland, though, the clocks went back in late October; it’s dark and dreich. A chap feels dolorous. Desultory. Meteorologists reckon November is […]
Day 1The drive from my home in central Perthshire was sublime. By the time I reached Killin, the morning mist cleared and the sun shone brightly. There was not one cloud in the sky. I stopped briefly at the Green Welly Shop in Tyndrum, the quintessential ‘tea and a pee’ […]
Well, readers. What’s up? “It’s an adverb!” I’m aware of that, thank you. What I mean is, how is the COVID-19 situation in your part of the world? From what I gather, the picture globally remains quite inconsistent yet. In some places, such as Australia, where we in Scotland had […]
It may be a cliché to say this but lockdown has been hard for everyone. Our struggles and experiences will have differed greatly but for most people reading this, the common struggle has been the lack of social gatherings that revolve around our instrument. The stoicism that the world has […]
The medley has now been a feature of pipe band competitions for 50 years. Prior to this, it was MSRs all the way. Today, the pipe band medley at the top level is far removed from those early years – and even from fairly recent years. Listen to most Grade 1 […]
I became a Piping Times subscriber in 1974 although I had bought occasional copies before that whenever I was in a piping shop. I joined the College of Piping’s evening classes in 1976 after playing in a band for six years and was soon helping with the enrolment of pupils […]
