2009: A Great Year to Be in the CRPB
The end of the calendar year is upon us, and 'tis the time for reflection on the year just past. I usually venture down this blogging path alone, and this time I asked the current band "What about 2009?" I have my own thoughts, of course, and I was happy hear that band members agreed: it was a great year to be in the band.

I have been pipe major of the band since the fall of 1992, and in that time, I have played with some amazing people in this band, had a wide range of great people come and go as members, and had many happy and successful times with the band. I would have to say, however, that 2009 stands out as the most satisfying year so far, from my perspective. In part, that likely has to do with the seasons just before—not competing in 2007 due to a lack of members, and just barely competing—with no success—in 2008. In large measure, though, this is due to the great mix of people we have in the band at this moment, and how much they are willing to do to make the band fun and successful.

2009 saw the band steadily develop, starting with some fun music at the Mid-Winter Celtic Festival, and then a performance at Winnipeg that held some promise, but was far short of what we needed to get past another Grade 2 band. Throughout the early part of the season, the band was not able to deliver the sound that was there, and we paid in the results. The first time that turned around for us was at Selkirk, Manitoba in June, We had two pretty solid plays, and it was no longer "straight 2nds." The coolest part of that was that the band members understood immediately that we came close, and rather than saying "cool, let's keep doing this" they said "can we add another night of practice?"

The days of practice in Maxville ahead of the big day were the best I have experienced with the CRPB. We had good sound every day, and it got better, and the playing was getting tighter, and then...something came loose at Maxville, and we gassed the medley. Badly blown, mistakes, etc., and the band's "big day" inexperience showed. We were so downhearted after the medley, that we dropped the ball getting ready for the MSR, and showed up at the line not in tune, and not really excited to play.

Montreal, as the record shows, turned out to be a pretty good play for the band, and hearing the band announced "Best Pipe Section" was many band members' favourite moment of 2009. For others, the beer tent and the bus ride back to the hotel was a key memory. One of the best moments for me was that we decided play some tunes in the beer tent before massed bands, just to have fun and blow off steam. Ot turned out to be THE medley performance of the season, and we heard nothing but positives afterward.

September long weekend, a smaller band went to Calgary/Canmore games weekend, where we played well both days, delivering the sound we had set-up, and finishing the season with a performance in the Canmore Beer Tent, and then hours of fun to follow.

We've been working hard all fall, and have learned new music, worked in some new members, and are planning some big things for 2010. But before we get there, good to look back on a superb year for the band. Here's what some others thought:

Karen's Highlights:
- Getting lost in Minot following the Google map to the lodge
- The Pouring rain in Montreal - deciding not to leave and have fun playing in the beer tent then a good performance
- Then Ruaridh missing the bus
- Racing to catch the plane in Montreal with Pat and Stacy (lesson learned)
- Getting new tenor drums and the Bass drum just at competition (after the head mishap)
- and just working hard, getting out there to competitions and the improvement we made throughout the year.

Scott:
Best pipe section in Montreal was the highlight of the year for me

Richard:
being a "part time member" seeing the tremendous improvement from Winnipeg in February to Canmore in September

John LL:
This piping thing, like this life, takes hard work. And just like this life, giving up is simply not an option. For me, it's one of the wonderful things about Regina and CRPB. It's great to be in a place with a really good organisation of really nice people who genuinely enjoy the hard work, and a beer afterward. I remember Barb mumbling some crap about the pursuit of excellence (I'm just kidding, it's not crap), at Maxville 1 1/2 years ago, and that's how I felt about this year. I am still in the pursuit of excellence in piping, and I enjoy it, even with it's setbacks. I feel that the nicest thing about this year for me in the band has been the feeling that we are all in this pursuit together, and it's good to feel that you're good at something that you enjoy (or at least improving, growing, learning), and a part of something bigger, the competitive piping world. I guess I've always been in the world of piping, although on the peripheral edge in a sense as a non competitor. That said, playing the solo at police funerals is still a great honour, and to me central to what the piping world is, or should be, but I wanted at this point in my life tro get closer to the other world of piping and improve my playing for the uniform world, too: To pursue excellence. As Pipe Major Sam Scott said, "Practice has it's own reward - Find it!". This year has helped me find that reward.

Graham:
2009 was definitely a highlight just to be able to play back in the ranks again.
- First Selkirk performance, gave that instant feeling that we're definitely competitive and can produce a good sound. Plus everyone was a solid performer
- Maxville practices...producing consistently solid sound
- Montreal result...winning best piping was probably the best result I've ever contributed to while in the band.
- Montreal bus ride/hotel after party...can never go wrong making up new song verses to the tune of booze!
Overall, was a great experience to come back to the band after an absence playing in Scotland.

Stacy:
High: Hanging out with the band in the Canmore Beer Tent
Why: The people - the realization that the entire band enjoys playing together as well as hanging together at the end of the day.

Meg:
I really loved the band practises leading up to events-those were the biggest laughs throughout the year and where the best ideas came from. I hope for even better times in 2010!

Aaron:
One of the best moments was hearing the results in Montreal. It wasn't first place, but it was exciting nonetheless to be in the top three of a bigger competition. The even more exciting moment of course was getting first in piping. Another great time was in the Canmore beer tent. An awesome end to an awesome season.

Sienna:
I'll start with one downer so I can end with the positives:
1. Playing the medley in Maxville: marching off the field with a general sense of "what the hell" because our practices leading up to that moment were great, especially the one the night before the big day. The dissappointment of knowing we blew it (or more specifically under-blew it) during and after that set. : (
2. Our split decision on whether or not to play in Montreal: go back to the hotel, play for a bit in the beer tent, or just go for it? After most of the band threw back a pint in the beer tent, the sun made its first appearance of the day and before we knew it we were tuning up for what would become a great win of the season.
3. Standing in massed bands in Montreal and hearing our name come in 3rd out of how many? And then months down the road finding out not only did we place 3rd, but 2nd due to a disqualification. Again another ironic twist of fate that inspires our members to believe we are competitive.

Jordan:
... getting straight firsts in drumming at Calgary/Canmore

Blackwood Cracks in the Cold
The weather has been frightful here on the Canadian prairie in the last couple of weeks, and it seems like "not" bagpipe weather. In fact, it's the perfect time to play. If you don't, you can almost hear blackwood cracking in the boxes. Despite the cold, we've been having good practices, and have had a couple of excellent band weekends.

A couple of weekends back, we had trouble getting a regular location for practice, and we ended up renting the hall at the First Presbyterian Church which has been the home of the Fraser Pipe Band in Regina since the 1960s. So, it was "deja vu all over again" for a few of us, pictured [L-R]: Alex Rasmussen, Pat (Clemence) Luchenski, Iain MacDonald, Barb (McDougall) MacDonald, Arlene (Clemence) Kary and Karen (Hastings) Hala—all former members of the Fraser Pipe Band. We all spent a lot of time in that church hall, and it was fun to be there.

It was also at that band weekend that the members decided on a contest and travel schedule for the 2010 season. Despite some strong interest to return to Maxville and Montreal games, we did not have enough members who could make it that weekend, so instead we have launched a much more ambitious project: returning to the UK in August 2010 for competitions and events. This is a far cry from a couple of years ago, when the band had neither the members or the ability to make such a trip happen. So, 2010 should be an exciting year [again] for the band.

Watch for the band to make a major uniform upgrade in the new year, and we are also going to soon have some [more] exciting news about the Mid-Winter Celtic Festival. In the meantime, if you live in Regina, come out to Arthur Guinness' Birthday Party at O'Hanlon's Pub on December 23rd. We'll be there.

What Can You Learn from Football?

If you live in Canada, you are likely aware that this past weekend was the annual Grey Cup game in Calgary, the championship game of football for the Canadian Football League. And if you live in Saskatchewan, or are one of the many fans of the Saskatchewan Roughriders, you will be painfully aware of their near-victory, and the stunning loss with no time on the clock.

The painful story of the loss is that Saskatchewan took a dumb penalty on a last-second field goal attempt, which the opposition team had missed. The "too many men on the field" penalty allowed the team to re-kick, and they scored, putting them ahead by one point, and giving them the Grey Cup Championship. Across media of every type, fans and commentators are moaning about or rejoicing those last few seconds of the game. I think that the game was lost much earlier.

In piping and pipe band competitions, it is common knowledge that if you leave the door open in some way [note error, missed attack, saggy D, over-blown F/G, missed break] a fellow competitor—or maybe a judge—will walk through it, and you will lose. It doesn't always happen, but you approach the massed bands thinking it's quite likely.

So, when the Riders missed that field goal in the first quarter of play, I wondered if those missed three points would come back to bite them. And, after Montreal's last touchdown, and the missed two-point conversion, all the Riders needed was to move the ball for a couple of first downs, and they'd have won. They didn't. With the game in hand, they failed to get the yards they needed, and really [it has to be said]: Montreal deserved a shot at a last-minute field goal.

And even after all that, the Riders had the chance to win because the Montreal kicker shanked the ball [again] and missed, giving the Riders the last-minute win...until the penalty was called. My point is: that game could have been won by the Roughriders at several points before the last-second kick, and had they executed fully, Montreal would not have had the chance for that kick, or if they had, it would not have been enough points to win.

Contests, be they football or bagpipes, are about controlling all the things you can, as well as you can. When you make mistakes, you shouldn't expect to win. Don't blame this one on the 13th man, the game had slipped out of the Riders' grasp already.

This has two important "take aways" for piping. First, prepare for competition by focussing on all the things in your control, and not thinking about the things you can't control. And second, when things go wrong, think about the things that you could have done differently, rather than all the other stuff that might have affected the outcome.

Tough stuff. At the end of the day, the "near wins" are the hardest losses to take.

Farewell to the Old Guard

Today was the annual Remembrance Day performance for the bands here and everywhere, and more than ever it underlined for me the fact that the old veterans of the wars are disappearing. One of the tunes I published in Along the Road was "Farewell to the Old Guard," a tribute of sorts to the parade of veterans that takes place each Remembrance Day. The parade is getting smaller each year, and while it's the natural order of things, it makes the day that much more meaningful for the remaining veterans, and for the new veterans of recent conflict.

The band looked and sounded well, and we had a fair turnout of members from both the City of Regina Pipe Band and the Conservatory of Performing Arts Pipe Band. Following the televised ceremoney at the Brandt Centre, the bands retired to the Legion for tea and a sandwich, and then played a few tunes in each of the rooms at the Legion. As always, the band was appreciated greatly, and gratifying to see people moved by [even] our music.

The day brings back many memories of my Dad, seen here ready for the road during the war, and also my Mom, recently departed, for whom this day was a strange mixture of happy and sad. For many years it was my practice to visit the parents on this day. When my Dad was alive, we'd get his medals out of the closet and polish them, and talk about those things he chose to discuss. After he died, we'd visit Mom, and she greatly missed Dad on this day, and also fondly remembered the many great times they had at the "Armistice Ball" and other events.

Lots to remember on this day, and much to appreciate. Thanks to all the band members for being such a huge part of that over many years.

Be Sure to Thank Your Mother

When my Mom was young, she desperately wanted to play the bagpipes. As a girl in Regina in the 1930s and 40s, there weren't a lot of options. Some of the guys in the local militia band did some teaching, and later on, the Regina Boys' Pipe Band taught students, but no one would teach girls. You could only be a piper if you were male. So, she put it off, and in later years, with family of her own, looked into lessons for her kids. In 1965, a junior pipe band was formed in Regina after having been disbanded at the end of WW2, and I was eight years old.

There was no chance I was going to go to play bagpipes, because I understood that you had to wear a skirt. The band was formed in September 1965, and it took my Mom until December to convince me to give it a try. She told me later she filled my head full of stories of great pipers, and downplayed the whole K-I-L-T thing. A few lessons in, I was hooked, and despite a few bumps over the years, it has been great.

As pipes|drums editor Andrew Berthoff stated so eloquently not that long ago, I owe a lot to piping. He was talking about himself, but it's true for me, too. I met the majority of my longest and best friends through piping. The places I have lived and travelled were most often connected to piping, and of course my wife is a piper, and my kids are all involved. My Mom's persistence, and then years of encouragement and support, played a key role in whatever enjoyment and success I've had.

In more recent years, she enjoyed our daughter's piping and our son's drumming, and was often a fixture at Burn's Suppers, ceilidhs, Highland Games and band concerts. If she could be there, she was. This interest and support extended to her grandson Alex, himself a fine piper, and long-time member of the band. He used her house to practice, and in fact he and I have both been known to sneak over to Mom's for a late-night tune when kids are in bed.

Of course, as a mother, she was equally passionate about all the things her kids did: piano, violin, Highland dancing, piping and much more...but piping, and all it brought to us both, was something we shared, along with the same birthday. Over the years, she commanded many performances: for relatives, friends, St. Andrew's parties, Burns, fundraising, school and more.

The one gig I didn't really want was the one that I'd been told about since I began piping, and the one I did recently. Mom died September 29, and as she requested, she had "Lord Lovat's Lament" in the church [Helen Fraser before marriage] and "The Flowers of the Forest" at graveside.

The past couple of weeks the regular teaching at band and private lessons has reminded me that there are lots of mothers, fathers, and others out there doing those same things for their kids. They shoulder a lot of things in the day, and show up with their kids to ignite or feed that passion for music. If you're one of the parents, thanks for all you do. If you're one of the kids, find a way to say "thanks" for the tremendous gift you've been given.

A Post-Season Bonus!

This week the band received a nice post-season bonus from the Pipers and Pipe Band Society of Ontario when we found out that they have adjusted the final prize list from the Montreal Highland Games. On the day, the PPBSO disqualified the Glengarry Pipe Band after they performed because an official thought that bands had to have two tenor drummers [that rule had already been changed]. After the fact, Glengarry's points were counted back into the mix, but they forgot to adjust all the points. Glengarry's 2nd and 3rd in piping [behind our two 1sts] pushed a couple of bands down, giving us 2nd prize overall, rather than 3rd.

The final result was:

1. Fredericton Society of Saint Andrew Pipe Band [Best Drum Corps]
2. City of Regina Pipe Band [Best Pipe Section]
3. St. Andrew's Society of Winnipeg Pipe Band
4. Glengarry Pipe Band
5. St. Thomas Episcopal Alumni Pipe Band
6. Niagara Regional Police Pipe Band

Judges -
Piping1: Colin MacLellan
Piping2: James Troy
Drumming: Harvey Dawson
Ensemble: Reay MacKay

Special thanks to former CRPB member Gregor Burton for being on top of the numbers, and pointing out the error. Thanks to the PPBSO for making the adjustment. And thanks to the band members for making a great season possible.

Thanks for a Great Season
Just back from Calgary and Canmore Highland Games, and the end of a very good season for the band. The full results for the weekend are available in the usual place and what you'll see is that we split the two contests with our friends in The Rocky Mountain Pipe Band, with them winning the MSR on Saturday on "ensemble preference" and us winning the medley event Sunday. We had 5/8 firsts, and two wins for the drum corps over the weekend. It was a nice way to finish the season.

This was the band's first time competing in Alberta since 2005, and we had lots of people make a point to thank us for coming, which was nice. It was great to be there, and good to see the Alberta scene so vibrant. Whoever arranged the weather did a brilliant job.

The CRPB played in the Canmore beer tent in the evening, and then we stayed to the not-so-bitter end to hear The Searsons, who have been a feature of a few post-Montreal parties at Hurley's Pub in Montreal.

The band has come a tremendous distance this season, and in the beer tent I was asked by one of our World Champion friends what we had done to make such a difference to the sound of the band in the past year.

The answer is fairly simple: we worked very hard, and tried to improve every aspect of the band, starting with each individual instrument. Band members committed to more practices than ever before, and more contests/performances than in recent years. We tried hard to organize schedules long in advance, and we sought assistance from acknowledged experts.

It was the contributions of the members: time, energy, money; and their unrelenting dedication to improvement that made the difference. Congratulations to you all on a great season. Enjoy your week off. ; )

A Week to Remember
This past week the City of Regina Pipe Band travelled to ON and QC for the Glengarry Highland Games at Maxville, ON and the Montreal Highland Games. We have been there many times in the past, and most recently last year. Despite bringing up the rear of both contests last year--soundly whooped by every other band there--it was a success of sorts. We avoided the bullet of extinction, and [barely] learned enough music to put us back at playing in Grade 2, if not really competing.

If you've been reading this, or following the results elsewhere this season, you'll be aware that we seem to have been making some strides, and all of this the result of a lot of hard work by members. Since June, the band has been meeting three times a week as often as possible, and we have worked on every element in our control.

So, it was with some excitement that we practiced in Cornwall, and Friday night we had perhaps the smoothest, best runs we've had in some time. On Saturday at Maxville, all that seemed to disappear on the field, as we had tonal and other issues in both sets, and finished 8th/9th in a 9-band contest. Some of it was player error, and in the MSR, it was clearly P-M error. I was so disturbed/disappointed at the medley, that I didn't keep a close enough eye on the time for the MSR, and we ended up being too late to really get the sound as nailed down as we needed.

We still heard lots of positive noises from people: "The band sounded great marching up to play," "200% improvement over last year" etc., but it was all very disheartening given what we'd experienced Friday at practice.

So, we set off for Montreal Games on a rainy day, and about noon it was bucketing down even worse that last year. Add to this that the PPBSO called a pipe majors' meeting at 1:00pm to announce that there might not be prize of travel money b/c the games was broke, and we took the decision that we might not play in the rain. Last year, we ruined 10 sheepskin bags playing in miserable conditions, and so we sat on the bus and talked about a) going back to the hotel and then downtown, b) just playing our tunes in the beer tent and then going home early without competing and c) maybe having a beer and a sandwich in the tent, see if the rain cleared off, and postponing any decision until we had to decide.

We elected option c. We took our instruments to the beer tent, stacked them on tables and had a beer and a Montreal smoked meat sandwich. In the time, the sun came out, and 30 minutes before our play time, we went out to the track, tuned up, and competed. It turned out to be a good performance: still not our best, but a solid, rich sound and a good MSR.

When we heard that massed bands were going to be postponed for 30 minutes, we decided to play in the beer tent after all, and played our medley and a couple of other selections to huge applause, and for a string of free beer tickets!

At the end of the day, we were 3rd in the Grade 2 event, and Best Pipe Section in Grade 2 with two firsts in piping. Not bad, given that we almost didn't play.

This was perhaps the best prize the band has ever had outside the prairies, except for maybe a third at Maxville one year. We have never clearly won the piping in a big Grade 2 contest. This was clear.

There is still a lot to do, and we are looking at ways to improve on what we are doing in all sections, but the piping wins in Montreal were a nice benchmark of the progress that has been made since early 2007, when the band seemed to almost disappear. The progress is due to the outstanding determination of the band members to be a Grade 2 band, and to do what it takes to get there.

Coming Up for Air
The last couple of weeks have been tremendously busy with preparation for Maxville, and also the annual SOUND ADVICE summer school, which took place last week. We had a great group of instructors and students working and playing hard at the University of Regina, which was a fantastic location and environment for the school. Excellent accommodations, good food, great teaching facilities, all on a modern and beautiful university campus. It was great to see and hear the progress students have made in a year, and also to meet new students. As well, local pipe bands [Fraser, Wa Wa Shrine] took up the offer to have a band workshop at the school, so it was great to involve some more local faces in the school.

Thanks to the CRPB and Conservatory band members and parents, who once again were the stiff underside to the school, holding it up with their volunteer work taking tickets, getting water, driving, airport runs and a hundred other details. Couldn't have done it without you.

Paying for the Bus, and Learning Along the Road

Part of the job of getting the band to competitions is raising the cash to get there, and paying for accommodations and ground transportation while there. Without a full-on sponsor, the band relies a lot on event fundraising, member inputs, and performances. Our Maxville/Montreal trek involves five nights of hotels, a bus from the airport to Cornwall, buses to the Games, and transport from Maxville to Montreal. Not cheap.

This past weekend, we took a parade job in Moosomin and it was a great day. Up at six a.m. for the 2+ hour drive, arriving in time to meet other band members from Estevan, Brandon and [surprise!] Winnipeg, tune for about 20 minutes, and then go on the parade. Not the most fun kind of piping, but greatly appreciated in the town. For many Saskatchewan pipers, this is the main activity.

When we got back to the starting point after the parade, one of the organizers was there with a cooler full of ice cold beer and pop. Now THAT was a treat! We later played for about 30 minutes for a group of people assembled to hear us in the town memorial park, dedicated to the memory of local veterans.

Once re-tuned, the band started with a couple of 3/4 marches, the first being Major Gavin Stoddart's brilliant tune On the Road to Passchendaele. When we were all done, and having lunch provided for us by the local sandwich shop, one of the local guys came to point out that next to the spot we played was the grave of Passchendaele veteran and hero George Harry Mullin VC MM (August 15, 1892 - April 5, 1963). Altogether a fitting way to start, and well noted by the locals, who are very proud of his memory.

It's not easy putting together the money for a trip to Maxville, and sending a mini band to Moosomin is one way to make ends meet. At the end of the day, it turned out to be a day that was worth the effort. We had laughs as a band, got some practice in, had some fun playing old marching tunes in the parade, entertained quite a few people, made some cash for the Maxville trip, and learned something about a Victoria Cross winner of long ago.

Not a bad day out for any band.

The Breakthrough Weekend
Saturday morning, and I'm working on the upcoming summer school, updating web pages, and waiting for the results from the British Pipe Band Championships in Belfast. I made that trip with ScottishPower in 2007, and it was a really fun trip: staying in downtown Belfast [much different than when I was last there in the early 80s!], a miserable wet, cold day, and then a very late night on the town. Hope the guys have better weather, a stronger play, a good result, and just as much fun after! Anyway, back to topic.

Last weekend the band had what I would call a breakthrough of sorts. Followers of the blog and/or the band will note that from our near-death experience in 2007 to now, we have been rebuilding a band that lost many of its long-time members over a two-year period. Following two Scotland trips in 2005 and 2006, we had a natural exodus of people: leaving to play in Grade 1 bands, putting band aside for work, school, family, and some just packing it in because they were fed up. It's the usual way of things. The band had to miss a whole season of competitive practice and performance in 2007, and we started searching for enough players to make a band. Most of the players came from Grade 4 bands. There isn't exactly a deep Grade 2 talent pool in the area.

Anyway, we survived 2007, and in 2008 started to compete again, taking a serious thrashing every time out, which wasn't often, because we didn't know a 2nd MSR until June 2008! Last year's Maxville trip was a lot of fun with a great group of people, and we were last in an 8-band contest. Coming into this season, we had higher hopes, but still lots to do, and it took us until last weekend to perform the way we wanted to. For the first time in a long while, we were pretty happy with both MSR [#2!] and Medley performances. The exciting part is that neither was our "best possible" by a long shot. For the first time since we started competing again, we took first places from judges against the Winnipeg St. Andrew's Pipe Band [piping and drumming], and it seems that we are once again competitive with good bands at our level.

So, here's to the breakthrough, and hopefully, we can build on that with hard practice, and solid performances. Videos are below. And while I was writing this, ScottishPower came through with a 5th prize in the British, and Grade 2 marvels, soon-to-be-grade 1 Inveraray & District Pipe Band won the British with straight firsts. Well done!

Seriously Fun Piping

The past couple of weeks have been a flurry of piping performances of various kinds, starting with the contests on the May long weekend [solo/band] and then moving on to the Conservatory of Performing Arts BRAVO! Gala Event, at which the Conservatory of Performing Arts Pipe Band performed. The event raised serious cash for the programs at the Conservatory, celebrated the instructors, and showed off everyone in their party dress finery. Among the regular two sets of band practices and lessons, seven new pipers at the Conservatory got their new pipes last week, and that was an exciting time for them, if not [yet] for their neighbours! Then last week, the CRPB and CPA bands combined to provide a small band each day for the University of Regina Convocation June 3, 4, and 5th. There seemed to be a real response from the 2000 or so in the audience each day when the curtain was raised as the pipe band started. Friday was a great day for Kenna Whelan, who graduated with her BEd, and got to be piped out by the band to which she has contributed so much.
Today, the bands got together at the Legion just after noon for the annual Decoration Day, at which the Legion places flags on the military graves at the cemetery, and a small service of Remembrance is conducted. The band piped in the colour party, and stood in today's cold rain while the service was underway. After, lunch at the Legion, and then a quick pint at O'Hanlon's. Among the pleasures of all this piping, we got to welcome back Graham Schmidt for the summer, and we're looking forward to having him back in the line-up for upcoming contests.

In the midst of all that band activity, I got a call from Moose Jaw native Scott Benson. I remembered Scott as having attended a fiddle workshop at the MWCF years ago with Antigonish siblings Kendra and Troy MacGillivray, and this was Scott looking for some piping as part of his CD release concerts. So, a week or so later, Barb and I played three shows with Scott on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, in the midst of all the convocation gigs.

It turns out that Scott is a great player, and he brought together some very fine people for the weekend, including Troy MacGillivray, Patrick Gillis and two excellent guys from Moose Jaw: Jared Dormer and Josh Carley on percussion and keyboards. What a pleasure to play tunes with such talented and down-to-earth people. The Thursday show in Regina was small, and gave us a chance to get things going, and then on Friday in Moose Jaw at the Mae Wilson Theatre we re-did the show in front of 300 enthusiastic and appreciative folks, and it was pure piping fun. I got to play some great tunes on the reelpipes with superb musicians, and when I wasn't playing, I got to take in the great music from the side. We did the show again at Bobby's Place in Moose Jaw on Saturday night, again to a full house of enthusiasts, so it was a great finish to the three. Check out Scott's CD HERE.

Benchmarks of Progress ~ Success is in the Details

A week has passed since the Moose Jaw and Regina Highland games, and after recovering fully from the effort, have had time to think about the progress since Brandon, and especially last year. In 2008, we elected to "perform" at Regina and Moose Jaw Games because we only had one MSR fully operational, and people were still memorizing the medley! This year, we had all the music going, and are making a better job of it than in some time. We even managed the band's first event win since 2006! Still, a long way to go.

Band members should take some pride in what has been done so far, and they also need to prepare themselves for what is coming. We are at the point where we have accomplished a lot of good things. We have three solid contest sets, and people are performing pretty well, on good instruments. What has to happen now, is all those "deal-breaker" details need to be sorted: wee note errors, corping and unison issues, sketchy Ds and Fs in the jigs, blowing on Low A. Missing and incorrect execution equals unison issues. It all counts. It can all be heard.

As we prepare for the big contests this summer, we need to make an extra effort to work on the small stuff, to get to as many practices as possible, and to take the devil out of the details. It's our next big challenge.

Keeping It All in Perspective
When you're part of a competition band, and you seek to win competitions, it can be a bit disheartening when you don't. As Andrew Berthoff pointed out in a recent blog, one thing that you need to learn to do is lose contests, because you lose a lot more than you win, on average. In the past two years, the CRPB has learned a lot about losing competitions, because we have lost more than at any other time in the band's history. At a time when the overall Grade 2 standard is rising, ours fell drastically, and it has been a long road back, and the journey's not done yet.

One thing the digital age does for pipe bands, is put every performance into a context—how you compared to last time out, how you compare to the competition, and how you compare to the world standard. The most recent recording of the CRPB shows that we have come a very long way since this time last year, and that we have some distance to go yet. See for yourself.



There's a lot to criticize here, and no one is ripping it apart more enthusiastically than us, and you can bet that we'll be working to get this into what we hope it can be, and get people performing to the level that it will take to be more competitive in the grade.

The thing that makes this recording so great, is that you can see and hear a definitive change from previous recordings. It's getting better, and we're not half done yet. And if you're looking in from afar, keep in mind that very few of these players have ever played in a grade 2 band, and none are coming from great Grade 4 or 3 bands. These players are mostly coming from very basic Grade 4 bands, and they are working very hard to improve their game.



On the way home from Brandon, we turned in to Wapella, Saskatchewan, weaved through the town, and headed 10 minutes south to St. Andrew's Church, which was the heart of the Gaelic community that immigrated to Saskatchewan from South Uist and Benbecula in 1883 and after. They are known as the Lady Cathcart Settlers. In the late 1970s and early '80s, I was in close contact with Alan McDonald of Wapella, who was a descendant of the settlers. He used to bring a group of us out to the parish hall at St. Andrew's to perform each St. Andrew's Night in November, and in the summer, we organized a piping and drumming competition there for several years in conjunction with the annual summer sports day. We had solo piping, drumming, quartets, and even bands some years, and there was a group of Highland dancers from Moosomin who performed each year.

Over time, the games there faded. I moved to BC for a few years, and Alan moved on to other things. Sunday I stood at his grave, and Eilidh played "Lament for Mary MacLeod" in the churchyard, while we thought about Allan and Margaret McDonald, and all those pioneering Scots who left the Hebrides for life in Saskatchewan.

While we were putting the pipes back in the car, and getting ready to leave, another vehicle pulled up, and a family got out with some flowers for the graves. We struck up a conversation, and as it turned out, this was Alan's daughter and her family, out to tend to the family grave as a spring ritual.

And so, all the contest thoughts fall away. We'll be working hard to make a better job of the music that we play. At the same time, we'll be keeping in mind that there's more to this whole thing than the winning and losing.

Lessons Learned in Time
Back when this photo was taken [April 1993] this was an excellent turnout at a band practice. This was actually the band's first competition performance. We took five pipers and played four [as the rules stated we should for a mini band event], and we played all the drummers we had. In those days, we were elated to be able to field a band, and over the years, we gradually built on that, adding players, real uniforms, better instuments, etc.

The band had quite a few years of relative stability, especially in the pipe section, and we could often count on a good turnout at band. When there wasn't one, we tended to not really practice, go for beer, or just twiddle the time away.

When the band fell on hard times a couple of years ago in terms of player numbers and experience, it would have been easy to walk away from routinely dismal practices, where the numbers were low, and the energy even lower.

Last winter, I made the decision to use every practice to play hard with the people who were there, and mostly we have stuck to that. Today, we had a number of regular people away on other things: provincial volleyball, family meeting, daughter's violin recital, etc. and it's always tempting to give in to the "oh whatever," and instead we played hard. An hour of detail work on chanters [with a few jokes and stories] and then an hour or two of piping: setting chanters, working with reeds and pipes, and finally playing through all the contest music with the small number of drummers.

The cool part was: it was a really good practice, and we had some very good sound, and made progress on several fronts. Too bad that there weren't more there, but today's practice is going to make a difference. And in the end, that's why we go in the first place. Well, and for the jokes and stories too.

Part of the excitement for me are recent changes we have made to the music. Can hardly wait to get the whole team playing it at Brandon.

The Sign of Spring
This past weekend the CRPB once again went south to usher in the new season. We performed to an appreciative audience at the Moose Lodge in Minot, and then that night played a few times at Ebeneezer's Pub, where the band received a very positive reaction, and quite a few pints. The pub has a great house band, so there was good music all night.

The next day, we drove the almost three hours west through the snow-covered hills of North Dakota to the historic Fort Buford area west of Williston, ND. The Missouri-Yellowstone Confluence Interpretive Center is a beautiful location overlooking the rivers, and strongly associated with the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The place was packed out with people for the band concert on Sunday afternoon, and despite worries all week about the weather, it was a gorgeous day, and warm enough to have a pretty good sound last for the hour or so we needed. [Pitch was 478, for those who track details!].

That outdoor concert is truly the first real sign of spring for us, and playing outside was great, even at a lower temperature than we like. The oncoming season promises to be a lot of fun as the band progresses musically and socially, and we send thanks to our friends in North Dakota for organizing these events, and for turning up to support them so enthusiastically.

NM Custom Drums
Recently, the City of Regina Pipe Band took delivery of a new set of mid-section drums, some of which we played at the recent Winnipeg Scottish Festival. Over the years, we have had a few sets of drums, and we have pretty much always purchased our drum equipment from our favourite source, in part because Hugh was so good to us when the band started out in 1992, and because his prices and service have always been excellent. Hugh always takes time with his customers, and for example he was a tremendous help to us in Scotland in 2005 when we were trying to get the best from an older set of Premier drums. So, it was a big step to go to Nathan McLaren for his drums, but we heard the great sound that Toronto Police had with them last season, and local expert Kenna Whelan was very enthusiastic about every aspect of the drums, so we thought we'd give it a try.

That move has worked out very well for us, and you can see the results above. From my initial inquiry about drums, right through to the first time we used them, every interaction with Nathan was clear, friendly and professional. He helped match the drums to our existing Premier snare colour, he provided timelines and updates as the drums were in production, and he came through for us in a BIG way right at the end.

We received the drums on the Monday before the contest last week, and when I opened the bass drum, one of the custom heads was split. Even though the heads were slackened before shipping, and very well protected in the box, travelling through 2 days of -30°C prairie weather in a truck did a number on one head, and it seemed like we were going to have to delay playing the new drum. I called Nathan to let him know [on the "Family Day" holiday] and he set to work right away. Within the next day, he found an exact replacement head for the drum, took it to his art guy with our bass head design, rendered the design on the head, and shipped it to Winnipeg, where we would meet it Friday. When we arrived in Winnipeg, we put the head on the drum, and played it for the first time that day.

We had very positive comments on the sheets regarding the tone of the drums, and one of the new tenor drums was used by the winner of the Pro Tenor class. Not a bad first outing.

We're looking forward to spending more time with these drums, and we strongly endorse the maker, the drums, and the service provided. We couldn't be more satisfied. Looking for new mid-section drums? Contact Nathan at NM Custom Drums.

Errors of Judgement
The bagpipe world has been buzzing for a couple of weeks now: first there was the pipes|drums story about the RSPBA barring overseas adjudicators. If you read everything there is to read, you come away with the clear sense that an injustice has been done. This was a very bad decision by the RSPBA, an error in judgement. It is clear that the RSPBA is trying to uphold a policy that has not previously been enforced, without notice to those affected, and without any chance of appeal, or any real discussion.

The second major story is the sad story reported in the Glasgow Herald after first being broken on pipes|drums about the likely scaling down of the Strathclyde Police Pipe Band. In the face of operational challenges——policing Glasgow & region!——they are winding up some of the traditional roles of a unit that has served the region for well over 100 years. Seems short-sighted to me, and the stories all talk about how the serving police officers in the band don't really have an idea what is coming, what their jobs will be like, or what plans might be for the band. The operational decisions seems to be made without the involvement of those most affected. That seems to be another error in judgement.

I am no stranger to errors in judgement, having made many myself. In fact, in the past week, I made a rather large error in judgement, which has adversely affected one long-time friend, and had an unsettling and disconcerting effect on a group of people that includes both friends and acquaintances I respect, and whose work I admire. What seemed like a bit of a wind-up, a short-term laugh, was taken hard, and seriously. It's a bit like sticking your foot out to trip a friend on the way home from the pub, and having them fall and scrape their head on a wall [no, I've never done that]. You can argue about what you hoped for, or what the intent was, or anything else, but it doesn't change the outcome, and it doesn't lessen the responsibility. I feel dreadful about the situation, and know that others are likely still upset. The apology has been made. It struck me that there is a relationship to these other errors of judgement.

My own [large] error happened because I let "the game" or the "sport" get in front of the people. I failed to fully consider how this would affect people I value, and in so doing, I let them down, and me too.

The RSPBA and the senior management of the Strathcylde Police are also putting process and sport in front of people. The RSPBA officials, including all the Scottish adjudicators [who could easily sort this with a boycott of judging], need to examine how the decision affects the PEOPLE who adjudicate. These are not names on a list. These are individuals who have committed many summers, and much of their own money to giving the RSPBA an international panel, and whose very presence gives the "World Championship" a legitimacy that it wouldn't otherwise have. The RSPBA needs to pick up the phone, talk to the people, come up with a solution, and make this right.

The Strathclyde Police may be a different matter. What I call an error in judgement someone else might call "more effective police management." The real error here is that the decisions seem to be made with not the people in view, but as a management/admin exercise. The losses in morale, retention, trust and public relations may not show up on the org chart or the financial report, but they will be a cost to deal with for many years, if this goes through.

At the end of the day, it's not easy to face up to dropping the ball, but it's a lot better than pretending you never had it, and it's much more respectful of the people you play with.

"One of the Best Ceilidhs, Ever"
Have heard from quite a few people directly and indirectly who had a great time at the SOLD OUT Ceilidh this Saturday past. It was a fun night, and the band played pretty well. We particularly liked the two Gord Taylor tunes we played, accompanied by Gord on guitar, Stacy on keyboard, and Brett on drum kit. Very fun. Now we're refocussing to get ready for competing in Winnipeg in a couple of weks, and one thing the videos make clear: we have a lot of work to do.

It's Ceilidh Time, and More

Had a long blow at the Legion today [heat was on, and moderate] in preparation for The Alexander Keith's Mid-Winter Celtic Festival which happens next Saturday. Make sure you get your tickets, because we have some great stuff lined up, including an exciting new addition to the Regina Irish scene in the form of Irish dancer and dance teacher Laura Buckley who danced successfully for years with the Blakey School in Saskatoon, and who is now teaching in Regina. She will be a great addition to what is already a vibrant scene here for Irish dance, and we look forward to her performance at the Ceilidh. While we are working on new concert music for the Ceilidh, and for concerts in the USA in March, we are also focussed on getting ready for the Winnipeg Scottish Festival on February 21. It'll be a tough day, for sure, because we'll all be noticing the absence of PPBAM President Marlene Stephens, whose personal efforts have helped make that event such a success over the years. Marlene was always a friend to the CRPB and also to the Conservatory Pipe Band, and we'll miss her happy face when we arrive at the Games. So, bring your chequebook for the silent auction, and get yourself to the Ceilidh. We're looking forward to a great night. And, if you get to Sunday morning and you think you haven't quite had enough fun, come to band practice at 10 a.m., and then for lunch at O'Hanlon's. See you there.

Advice You Can Take to the Bank

Today I listened to the Toronto Police medley from last summer. I thought it was pretty cool when I first heard it on YouTube, and then it was great to hear it live in the rain and I especially love the crowd reaction. Anyway, there I was earlier, listening again to that, and thinking what great enjoyment I got from the Grade 1 medleys at Maxville, and I happened on the YouTube above, for Melodeon John. Wow. You could spend hours listening to the way this guy uses language, and I love his turn of phrase. His bonnet collection is gallus.

If you have the time to listen to a few of his rants, you'll discover an amazing tangle of contradiction, humour, half-truth, wisdom of the ages, misinformation, sentimental remembrance,and some interesting renderings of auld sangs, ken?

Anyway, there isn't much of a point to this, except to say that if you wonder why I never talk about TV shows, it's because I don't really watch any...too busy seeing this "reality" stuff online.

Enjoyed the band weekend, and thought in particular it was a lot of fun to play the new Gord Taylor tunes. Looking forward to the Ceilidh.