By Jeannie Campbell The MacRae family was originally from Kintail but Christopher MacRae, who was born about 1807, moved to the island of Harris some time prior to 1840. Christopher married Isabella MacKenzie and had a large family. The 1851 census shows them living in Obbe, Harris: Christopher (40) a […]
Our third member of the Competition League for Amateur Solo Pipers (CLASP) to be profiled is Mariko Arimoto. Where are you from and how did you get into piping?I am from Japan and I started learning the pipes when I was 20 while I was studying at the University of Stirling […]
Our second member of the Competition League for Amateur Solo Pipers (CLASP) to be profiled is Dagmar Pesta from Germany, pictured. CLASP is the National Piping Centre’s circuit of graded solo piping competitions for adult amateur pipers. There are now 107 members worldwide – a record – and its latest […]
By Niall Graham-Campbell Many of the famous and successful pipers have much written about them. As a change, I thought that I would like to try to create a favourable impression about a lesser figure in the piping world, Willie MacDonald or Black Will. In part, the reason behind this […]
By Jaco Koster It was a rainy Sunday afternoon in Scotland last summer [2018] when my girlfriend and I decided to pay a visit to Blair Castle near Pitlochry. We had visited the ruins of Caisteal Dubh – the Black Castle of Moulin – that morning, where I played my […]
Transcribed by Norman Matheson We conclude the interview the late Dr John MacAskill conducted with Angus MacPherson, Invershin, in 1970. You were telling me that your father composed a few tunes. How many piobaireachds had he composed?I can’t tell you that; the only piobaireachd I got a copy of was […]
Transcribed by Norman Matheson We continue with our interview with Angus MacPherson, Invershin, conducted by Dr. John MacAskill in 1970. So he [Calum Piobair] played light music too, not only ceòl mòr?Yes, of course. He went to Paris on one occasion for a competition and got first for strathspeys and_ […]
For many years, each issue of Piping Today featured a profile of a member of the National Piping Centre’s popular Competition League for Amateur Solo Pipers. (CLASP). With the magazine ceasing publication, we resume this series on Bagpipe.News. Our first piper to feature is Matthias Kühn. Q. Where are you […]
Andy Tasker is a piper with an impressive piping lineage. The retired banker from Leeds can trace a direct lineal descent to two of our most important piping families, the MacKays of Raasay and the MacKays of Gairloch – and also Captain Malcolm MacLeod of Raasay. But before we get […]
RODERICK CANNON sent this article to the Piping Times in late 2014. It is an update on an article he had written elsewhere on the life and career of the legendary John MacDonald of Inverness, focussing on his personal and professional aspects rather than his music John MacDonald was born […]
