42 piob-mad pipers soak up McIntosh Workshop
In what could be a record for a purely piobaireachd teaching weekend, 42 pipers from all over North America soaked up ceol mor tuition and performances at the fourth annual Jimmy McIntosh MBE Piobaireachd Workshop at Carnegie Mellon University’s Cohon University Center in Pittsburgh.
Described by the organizers as “action-packed,” the February 20-22nd weekend was organized by the Pittsburgh Piping Society, with Andrew Carlisle, Mike Cusack and Nick Hudson passing along the piobaireachd knowledge they gained from their longtime teacher, Jimmy McIntosh. Fittingly, Hudson played “MacIntosh’s Lament.”
In addition to group classes broken into three levels of piping experience and ability, more than 200 piping enthusiasts gathered at the Pitch on Butler pub/restaurant on the first night to hear numerous Highland pipers perform, a few sets from local Celtic musicians, and brief recitals from the instructors.
Among the pupils in the masterclass sessions were several Open/Professional-grade players and four accredited piping judges.
“This was in keeping with Jimmy’s philosophy that with piobaireachd, you are never finished learning,” Carlisle said.
Peter Lui of Nashville, the 2025 Jimmy McIntosh MBE Piobaireachd Scholarship recipient, showed off the benefits of his eight months of tuition from Cusack with performances of “The Earl of Seaforth’s Salute” and “The Groat.”
Applications for the 2026-’27 Jimmy McIntosh MBE Scholarship can be submitted by North American pipers by March 7th via email.
The fifth annual McIntosh Workshop is on February 19-21, 2027.
Originally from Dundee, Scotland, and a longtime pupil of Robert Brown and Robert Nicol, Jimmy McIntosh immigrated to the United States in 1982. He worked with Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh to establish its first bachelor’s degree in piping, at the time the only such degree program in the world.
He and his wife, Joyce (nee MacFarlane), also an accomplished piper, moved to the Pittsburgh area, where they would live for many years with McIntosh, a professor of music at Carnegie Mellon. After he retired and was succeeded by Alasdair Gillies, the McIntoshes moved to South Carolina in the 2000s. McIntosh was awarded the MBE for services to piping in 1994. He died in 2021 at the age of 95.
Resurrected in 2015 by Carlisle, Hudson and Palmer Shonk, the Pittsburgh Piping Society was founded in 1898 and is the first known organized, member-based piping association in the United States. The PPS predates the Scottish Piping Society of London (1932), the Scottish Pipers Association (1920), and the Piobaireachd Society (1904).
Be sure to learn more about Jimmy McIntosh at the links below, which include his four-part 1994 pipes|drums Interview.
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