News
Ali MacKenzie from ILT City of Invercargill Highland Pipe Band’s Pipe Major of the Grade 2, and the full time tutor gives a review of a very successful weekend at major South Island contest in Christchurch.
We took all our 5 pipe bands up to Christchurch at the weekend for one of the major contests of the season. A Grade 2, Grade 4A, Grade 4B and 2 Juvenile bands.
Our Grade 2 took out the Overall which was a great start to the season, with a lot of new youngsters stepping up for the first time and doing great. Grade 4A also won their category with some tidy performances, again a very young team. Our Grade 4B finished 5th in the same category, a lot of players in their first major contest, so that was a big positive.
One of the highlights for me was our Juvenile teams. Our Juvenile A took out the Juvenile section. Which was quite significant, there are some top Juvenile bands in New Zealand, which stand up on a global elite level.
One of these is St Andrews College, a huge operation from Christchurch who just came back from the World Championships in Glasgow, Scotland with a 2nd place. So for our wee guys to take out the overall result was fantastic and we are all super proud of them. Our Juvenile B was not too far behind them in 3rd place … again very cool.
It’s a fantastic organisation. We are one of, if not the biggest pipe band organisation in New Zealand currently, and when all parents, band managers and players get stuck in, it makes weekend’s like this very memorable. With 5 bands and more than 100 members, it can be pretty hard work.
So much appreciation to those behind the scenes, and that goes further to the key fundraisers and sponsors too – in order for us to get to competitions and show what we are made of.
It’s a great time at the moment for pipe banding in the Deep South. We have two nationals in a row, Dunedin in 2019 then Invercargill in 2020, which will be awesome. So now is a great time to sign up and get involved in something that is a lot of fun.
We are recruiting in mid-January, students starting from 7 years of age and older, if any parents are keen or have any questions please get in touch with Scottish tutor Ali Mackenzie via email: [email protected] and he can get you some information or get you started.
But yeah a lot of fun had, we based ourselves in Methven. There was a Scottish lad playing guitar and singing songs for St Andrews night, and the pipes and drums came out late into the night, good “craic”, making the long nine-hour bus trip home definitely worth it.. Great weekend 🙂
- Grade 1 – Canterbury Caledonian Society
- Grade 2 – ILT City Of Invercargill Highland No.1
- Grade 3 – Scottish Society NZ, Christchurch
- Grade 4 – ILT City Of Invercargill Highland No.2
Juvenile
- Invercargill A
- St Andrews College A
- Invercargill B
- Canterbury Cale Youth
- St Andrews College B