Monday, August 14, 2017

The World Pipe Band Championships 2017

Well, it was a nice day. A long day, but a reasonably good one, especially once the sun came out. And that's about all that's the positives dealt with.

Our preparation for the competition actually went well, and our performance was excellent... except for one thing: there was one drone didn't strike up right, which meant it sounded off all the way through. And given just how tough it already was to qualify, that was enough to sink us.

Out of 19 bands in our qualifying group, we came 13th. That was 9th and 12th for piping, 11th for drumming, and 11th for ensemble. Though I should note that I don't think that comes close to reflecting our true position, either based on the competition, our performance, or the judge's sheets - which were extremely positive apart from that one thing. (That I think actually happens is that the judges sort their top eight or so quite carefully, and then pretty much just shuffle the rest - beyond the top eight you're not going through anyway, so who really cares?)

So we didn't qualify for the final, as I had expected. Oh well, I guess there's always next year, for the band if not for me.

There are now two minor competitions left in the season, being Peebles on the 2nd and Innerleithen on the 9th of September. Then the band's AGM on the 14th, and then I'm done.

#39: "The Secret Garden", by Frances Hodgson Burnett (a book from The List)

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