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St. Patrick’s Day in Vancouver can be one of the busiest weeks of the year for a Scottish bagpiper – and it’s not even a Scottish celebration. As a Nova Scotian Scot, I find it amusing in Vancouver that there seems to be little difference between Scottish & Irish culture.  For Irish events, like St. Patrick’s Day, pipers are a busy lot, playing at pubs, concerts and parades. the majority of our tunes are Scottish, with a few Irish ones thrown in. It’s fun and thoroughly enjoyable to bring a bit of pipe music to various events. And while not strictly speaking an Irish instrument, the great highland pipes seem to work wonderfully in the hands of Irish men and women.  Two Irish Grade 1 pipe bands (Field Marshal Montgomery Pipe Band from Lisburn, Northern Ireland and the St. Laurence O’Toole Pipe Band from Dublin) have won 13 world pipe band championships between them, and that’s not even counting the lower grades. \

We have lots of Irish pubs in Vancouver (at least in name), and while not all of them hire pipers, you can certainly find me piping at The Blarney Stone in Vancouver’s Gastown for my 5th year.  Come on down on Friday, Saturday or Sunday. It’s a full-day of fun on Sunday with lots of other entertainment for the adults and kids.

Rocky Mountaineer president Steve Sammut, Armstrong Group CEO Peter Armstrong and RM Piper Mike Chisholm in the new RM tartan livery.

It’s been a great 2018. As both the bagpiper for Rocky Mountaineer Rail Tours and the chair/executive director of the BC Highland Games & Scottish Festival, we have had a very busy year.

The Rocky Mountaineer season is wrapping up next week, with another great year and thousands of international guests passing through the main RM station in Vancouver. This year the company unveiled its new company tartan, representing the colours of the Rocky Mountaineer trains that depart and arrive in Vancouver from Seattle, Whistler, Jasper and Banff, Alberta from April until October. The fabulous tartan was designed by Vancouver designer Gordon Kirkbright and registered with the Scottish Registry of Tartans last spring. It has proven very popular with guests and hopefully we will see more of it in coming years.

Lafarge Lake Park

As the new executive director of the BC Highland Games, we are also in a major transition. After 27 years, we have decided to move from Percy Perry Stadium in Coquitlam, across the street to the redesigned Lafarge Lake Park.  This is a major move for the Games, and it will present plenty of challenges. However, our Games committee along with the City are focused on making this move to what we believe will be a much better venue in 2019. More grass, more shade and more room to move around. Hopefully we will see the stock dogs return to herding sheep around the field along with more bands, more music and new attractions. It’s a big job, but the Games are getting bigger so this new venue should be a great fit.

Now, with the days getting shorter and colder, it’s time to look forward to Remembrance Day events around the region. I hope to see you out there someday.

We all knew it was coming, and now it’s official. After a long career as Vancouver’s go-to bagpipe doctor, Mike McDonald is retiring. In a letter to customers, he says he is going to

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There’s a good reason forward-thinking countries have banned or tightly control the over-the-border

African Blackwood bagpipes

movement of products that contain ivory, such as bagpipes. A proper certificate for an ivory/silver set of pipes is a hassle, but worth it if it slows down the barbaric poaching of elephants in the wild. But now another key component of the Great Highland Bagpipes could be under tight restrictions and this one affects almost everyone who has a set of pipes.

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