Alex Gandy: 2025 Livingstone champion

Hamilton, Ontario—May 10, 2025—With a first in the light music and a second in the Piobaireachd, Alex Gandy of Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, gained the overall trophy at the 2025 Livingstone Memorial Invitational Solo Piping Competition, held as usual at the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders of Canada’s armoury in southern Ontario’s industrial city. It was the second time Gandy’s won the competition, which he had previously achieved in 2011.

Derek Midgley of Tinton Falls, New Jersey, won the Piobaireachd, and Ontario’s Joe Biggs had an excellent day with a second prize in the light music and a fourth in the Piobaireachd. Nick Hudson of Houston enjoyed two third prizes.

The Officers’ Mess was at capacity for the evening light music, and nearly full for the daytime piobaireachd performances.

The event, which is put on by the Pipers & Pipe Bands’ Society of Ontario’s Niagara-Hamilton Branch, was started in 1978. It was later named to pay homage to William Livingstone Sr., and now also memorializes the great Canadian piper Bill Livingstone, who died last February.

Interestingly, adjudicator Jack Lee returned to the event for the first time since he was a competitor in 1983, shortly after Bill Livingstone Sr. had passed away.

Piobaireachd
1st Derek Midgley, “Lament for Ronald MacDonald of Morar”
2nd Alex Gandy
3rd Nick Hudson, Houston
4th Joe Biggs, Ontario
5th Sean McKeown, Bowmanville, Ontario
Judges: Peter Aumonier, John Cairns, Jack Lee

MSRHP&J
1st Alex Gandy
2nd Joe Biggs
3rd Nick Hudson
4th Sean McKeown
5th Andrew Carlisle, Pittsburgh
Judges: Peter Aumonier, John Cairns, Jack Lee

Tyler Bridge, Guelph, Ontario; Jacob Dicker, Maxville, Ontario; Ian K MacDonald, Whitby, Ontario; and Ben McClamrock, Washington, DC, also competed.