Great Piping: P/M William “Billy” Gilmour

I’ve known about Billy Gilmour and his marvellous musical abilities for almost as long as I’ve been piping. Early on in my musical education I luckily found myself in the orbit of The 48th Highlanders of Canada. Through my lessons with my great first teacher, George Walker, I landed in the band – yes, for a little while, but a great while.
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Màiri Mhòr nan Òran at The Northern Meeting, Inverness

When in Inverness, Scotland a couple of weeks ago to take in The Northern Meeting solo piping competitions (meaning, to judge a couple of the events). I found myself, in advance of the contests, with some time on my hands. Even the most piping-mad people need a break from the gathering’s fine piping sounds. And, so, I did.
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1970 World Pipe Band Championship Programme

You may have heard of the 1970 Worlds tribute band that has been formed to perform at this year’s World Pipe Band Championship in Glasgow, August 12-13. Rab Wallace has provided the back story on his site, Piping Press.
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Worlds Week Beckons: Rottenrow, Glasgow 1992

The World Pipe Band Championships in Glasgow, Scotland, is looming large. Its set to go August 12-13 – just days away. Starting around now pipers, drummers and their supporters from outside of Scotland have begun making their way through what we’ve heard to be an unpleasant steeple-chase of under-staffed airports and, likely, less-than-smooth travel experiences (an aside: I’ve travelled from YYZ to GLA twice since October of last year: all has been fine – touch wood – so good luck to all, there’s hope).
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Angus MacPherson, Invershin: A 1957 visit with a great tradition-bearer

An interesting recording found me not so long ago. A buzzy interview (as in sound distortion) with Angus MacPherson, Invershin from 1957. I thought the near-half hour talk inspiring. This surprised me. On reflection: Here was a man in his ninth decade talking about life – and piping (of course) – imbued with the earliest echoes of the piobaireachd and the culture of that time.
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Uncle John & D-Day, 78 years ago today

Today marks the 78th anniversary of the historic D-Day operation. On June 6, 1944, in the midst of World War II, Allied forces stormed the beaches of Normandy in Nazi-occupied France

My dad’s brother, John, was a sergeant in the Sherbrooke Fusilier Regiment, known in WWII as the 27th Armoured Regiment.

I have in my possession a number of Uncle John’s souvenirs and war-time artefacts. A couple of pages of one is shown here from a slim, cardboard-covered, 10 by 16 centimetres “Soldier’s Service Book”.
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Full Concert: Live in Ireland 87 in HD (from Glasgow Royal Concert Hall)

A recap here for context for people not aware of this project:

Reid Maxwell and I were judging, September 2013, at Canmore Games in Alberta, Canada. In between bands Reid spoke of an Eagles concert he’d recently seen on Netflix and in that, the thought was triggered: wouldn’t it be great to play that 1987 “Live in Ireland” recording again: reprised and live – a sort of tribute band thing, a celebration of the music.
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Scenes from Cambridge Highland Games (1989!)

I’ve just had a bag full of old VHS videos digitized. They’ve been kicking around collecting dust for years; after having sourced a place for a digitization job for The Pipers’ & Pipe Band Society of Ontario, I thought I’d get my lot done at the same time.
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Mr. Donald Shaw S.S.C. (a very good person)

While Shakespeare’s Juliet Capulet thought names were mostly irrelevant as “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet” I’ve come to see that like most things in life, such things – names, for one – are seldom cut and dried. I’d have to think, for example, that it’s a good thing that your doctor understands the importance of noting the correct names in their script writing. To mix up, say, Viagra with Allegra might see stiff consequences: a potential hardship case for a person with a chronically runny nose. No. Names can matter.
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In Praise of Ear Learning

It dawned on me as I waded through the day’s Duolingo French exercises: learning a language is easiest by immersion; that is, to be constantly around the sounds of the language. To live it, to learn what the sounds mean, what they represent. In childhood, for instance, I’d have to think it’s often the things done wrong that prove to be the speediest way to ingrain words. As goes the old axiom: we most often learn best from the mistakes we make: “Mon Dieu! Idiot! Le poêle est chaud ! Tu t’es brûlé la main !”.
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