News
December 31, 2008

Updated: New “North American Pipe Band” formed

Reminiscent of the approach that the Spirit of Scotland Pipe Band took in early 2008, the “North American Pipe Band” has been formed in California from players not currently attached to any group, led by Pipe-Major Stephen Megarity and Leading-Drummer Carl Lenny, both former members of the Grade 1 Los Angeles Scots Pipe Band.
 
The new band will be supplied with chanters from McCallum Bagpipes and play Pearl drums. Megarity is a well known reedmaker in the Los Angeles area.
 
The North American Pipe Band has not yet been assigned a grade, but its roster includes many players with Grade 1 experience. Listed as members are 16 pipers and 12 drummers, mostly from the California area. Familiar names include Dave Hicks, Calgary; Fritz Hoffman, Reno, Nevada; Eric Rigler, Los Angeles; and Eli Fugate, San Diego.
 
The band’s website originally listed several pipers and a drummer on the roster who said after pipes|drums first reported the story that they are not yet committed to the band.

14 COMMENTS

  1. This sounds like a sick idea. With all of the talent in North America and so many players not participating in bands, this makes perfect sense. Even though, there are a ton of players from overseas” in this N.A.P.B.

  2. Just a comment regarding simple geography, a North American” all-star pipe band is not very well situated in the south-west corner of the United States. North America being a very large continent and all

  3. i’m pretty sure in WUSPBA you can register at whichever grade you like, in band or solos. as such, wouldn’t be hard for these guys to jump in at gr.1 as it might have been for Spirit o’ Scotland. ironically, this band will be practicing in the same town as another active American gr.1 band…so, this doesn’t make any new opportunities for anyone, in canada or the US

  4. It may be a good thing if there are enough players to fill two Grade I bands in the L.A. area instead of just one. A little friendly competitive rivalry can do wonders to advance the quality of play. Also, if the players joining the new band are basically free agents at the minute, it won’t hurt the existing bands in the area.

  5. I think the airport in Minot, just 45 minutes west of Rugby, is technically ‘international.’ As one of the few competing pipers from North Dakota, I can say that Rugby, while geographically appropriate, is maybe a poor choice. The last time I drove through there I only remember seeing the 3 minimum requirements of a North Dakota town: a church, a bar and a grain elevator. Maybe the church would be an OK practice venue. But given the output of its former members, I move that the City of Regina Pipe Band be the NAPB. Plus Regina is kind of centrally located.

  6. well, the guys who birthed this charade reside in sunny Southern (mostly southern) California, so they get to decide where to have practices and what have you, and the weather is gonna be awesome all year. the LAX or costa mesa airports are pretty international. plus the piping scene is already well established in these canadian cities; i’ve been thinking recently that the US west coast is wanting for more piping activity so regina and winnipeg can handle what they’ve already got. it’s interesting you bring up marketing term, the NAPB title seems to show how large north america is, and its intent on uniting” such a wide space of pipers”

  7. Thanks for the nod, Aaron. It would be a nice change to have players coming in rather than out. Last year, we had ex-CRPB players in SFU, Clan Gregor, Triumph Street, Maple Ridge/New West Police, Alberta Caledonia, Winnipeg St Andrews, Fredericton, Rocky Mountain…did I miss any?

  8. Perhaps yet another band of Paras could be formed in the Mid-West. There certainly seems to be no shortage of players available. It could be called “The Plucky McDucky Superband” (P.M.S. for short). The really big question on everyones’ mind would be which players from around the world would be comprising the Mid Section?…..?

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