With your help, Australia’s Bede Patterson hopes to fund pipes-jazz infused NEXUS Project album

In the 25 years since the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and the National Piping Centre introduced a Bachelor of Arts Music Degree Course in Highland pipes, many musically accomplished and highly educated pipers have gone on to make a career with their art, including Steven Blake, John Dew, Ross Miller, Sarah Muir, and Connor Sinclair.

Bede Patterson moved to Glasgow from his native Australia in 2020 to graduate from the four-year program. Last year, he launched The NEXUS Project, a collaboration of jazz, Celtic traditional, and classical musicians from Glasgow. Now, the band is hoping to raise enough funds to release an album of their creative work.

According to Patterson, the album will incorporate “free-form improvisations, original compositions and arrangements, historical and contemporary interpretations of piobaireachd, and some really exciting takes on other respected Scottish musicians’ music, including the works of Ross Ainslie, Fraser Fifield, and Martyn Bennett.”

The Highland pipes are at the centre of the music, he stresses. The NEXUS Project was featured at the 2024 Piping Live! Glasgow International Festival of Piping in a sold-out show at the uber-cool Nice N Sleazy.

So far, the band has raised about half the $12,500 they need to complete the commercially available album, and they’re hoping the generosity of the piping and drumming world will contribute to their Indiegogo campaign.

Here’s a taste from The NEXUS Project: