Melrose Pipe Band Contest 2009

SEVENTH PLACE FOR TWEEDVALE PIPE BAND AT MELROSE.

Last weekend saw Tweedvale Pipe Band travel to Melrose to participate in the 14th Melrose Pipe Band Championships. The 2009 event saw a change of venue with the pipe band contest taking place in Gibson Park after many years of being held in the grounds of St Mary’s School. Another luxuriously late departure time saw the band travel down to Melrose well rested and in good spirits having plenty of time to prepare for their performances. Tweedvale Pipe Band took to the field playing tenth out of 14 bands in Grade 3, and put in a decent performance of their March Strathspey and Reel set. Tweedvale was given the opportunity to play all of its competition music at Melrose because of the way the contest had been set up. Grade 3 bands had been asked to play their March Strathspey and Reel set, whilst in Grade 2 bands were asked to play their Medley set. The band “played up” in Grade 2 and put in another reasonably good performance. When the prizes were awarded at the end of the day’s competition, Tweedvale Pipe Band was awarded seventh place overall. First place in the Grade 3 contest was taken by the Boghall & Bathgate Juvenile Pipe Band, with George Watson’s College, Coalburn IOR and the City of Edinburgh Pipe Bands taking the remaining prizes. Tweedvale‘s attendance at the Melrose Pipe Band Championships was made possible by generous coach sponsorship from the Innerleithen Union Club and Lodge 856 social Club to whom the band extends its thanks. The Grade 3 result means that the band has maintained its lead in the race for the RSPBA Lothian & Borders Grade 3 Champion of Champions title, with only one contest to go.

Speaking about the Melrose results, Tweedvale’s Pipe Major Bruce Gillie said, “The band played reasonably well today, though there is room for improvement in the March Strathspey and Reel set and we’ll work on these things during the next few practices. I’d like to thank Innerleithen Union Club and Lodge 856 Social Club for sponsoring our coach to Melrose. The band has the Cowal Championships to look forward to this weekend and another chance to play the March Strathspey and Reel set.”

Tweedvale Pipe Band now moves on to the last of the five “Major” Championships of the year, the Cowal Pipe Band Championships which takes places this weekend in Dunoon. The band is scheduled to play at 11.52am in the Grade 3B contest, fifteenth out of seventeen competing bands after which the band will be on duty playing marches for the heats of the Adult Drum Major’s contest. The band’s attendance at the Cowal Pipe Band Championships is made possible by generous coach sponsorship from Brown Brothers Ltd to whom the band extends its thanks. The band members and supporters face an early start to the day in order to be at Gourock in time for the 9.20am ferry to get the band to Dunoon in good time. Following Cowal, there is a contest free weekend before Tweedvale Pipe Band rounds of the contest season on home ground by participating in the last contest of the year at Peebles on September 14.