It's recently been brought to my attention by a friend of mine that I've been neglecting this site. More than that, I've just been very busy. Here's a recap of what I've been up to over the past few months.
Pre-Worlds/World Championships
As some of you may know, I've spent the last two years playing with the
Dowco Triumph St. Pipe Band, in Vancouver, BC. This summer was the band's second year competing as a grade I band and made huge improvements over the summer. In the early part of last year (fall 2008 to be exact) we made the decision to make the trip across the Atlantic to play in the World Pipe Band Championships. As can be imagined, we felt a lot of excitement and apprehension (or at least I did). There's a lot of information leading up to the actual morning of the qualifier, so I'll just keep you updated about the actual day of the Worlds. The band was fortunate to have a good draw for the qualifier (around 11:00 am), and especially since the weather earlier in the day was very poor. We slept in as much as we could, had a flash at the flats then hopped on the bus to head to the Green. The next hour and a half to two hours is still a bit of a blur. We had some bus troubles, circled the park, and ended up getting the pipes out about a block away from the Green, only to go in for final tuning. As it turns out, we played a very good MSR and came in 3rd in the qualifier... We were in!
Ryan Murray, Me, Ross Morrill after the morning qualifier, and finals announcement.
Triumph Street playing in the final.
In the end, Triumph Street was the only North American band, besides Simon Fraser University Pipe Band (current world champions) to play in the final. Overall the band placed 13th in the world. Not bad.
Massed bands at the World Pipe Band Championships.
Recordings of the band can be found here, thanks to the BBC. Unfortunately I will not be playing with the band this upcoming year but would like to take this time to publically thank everyone in the band for the great memories and hopefully more to come in the future. I owe special thanks to P/M David Hilder and P/S Shaunna Hilder. Without them this experience wouldn't have been possible. As for future plans, I'm still teaching in the Salt Lake area and will be playing with the Wasatch and District Pipe Band. 2011 will be a big year for the band as there are plans for making a trip with the grade IV and III bands to compete at the World Championships.
Post-Worlds
After the World Championships I traveled with my family to Ireland. They flew in from all over: My mom from Salt Lake, one sister from Germany, and the other sister and her husband from Salt Lake via a trip visiting family in Virginia. Rather than writing a lot about this trip, I'll just post photos.
Waiting for a taxi at University of Strathclyde Dorms, At "Church Cottage" in Kinsale, Co. Cork, Ireland, Sitting at the top of Blarney Castle, and the Cathedral over Cobh, Co. Cork, Ireland.
Back in Salt Lake
Since getting back to Salt Lake I've gotten back into a regular schedule with piping and school. One of the major updates/activities has been starting the
Utah Pibroch Club; a fairly informal group that gets together to learn, talk about, and play piobaireachd. Within the last few months support has grown a great deal, and the club is happy to announce continued support and growing numbers at each session. If anyone's interested in piobaireachd check out the club page. And please don't hesitate to give small financial support by purchasing
official club merchandise. All proceeds go to acquiring educational resources. At some point there is the hope to bring in world-class instructors for weekend workshops. We can use all the support and help that's out there!
