significantly better piper, drummer or drum major and that students should not hesitate to ask their teachers any question that they had on their minds. And students did have a
lot of opportunities to learn, not only in the classes during the day. In extra courses in the evening they had even more possibilities to enhance their knowledge of pipe-maintenance, appre- ciation of the sound of pipe- bands at the World Championships, the under- standing of piobaireachd or the history of bagpipe music. In addition, each day there was band practice. On the Wednesday, the massed band of teachers and students marched through the town, an impressive sight with an even more impressive sound. The parade on a warm and sunny winter afternoon was warmly welcomed by the townspeople and some of them followed the band on its way through the town, enchanted and captivated by the exotic sound of the pipes – just as the children of Hameln followed a mysterious piper hundreds of years ago, according to the old German legend. But unlike the piper of Hameln, theWinter School band did not intend to lead the people of Homburg to their doom; rather they wanted to promote a recital in the youth hostel on the Friday by the outstanding piper DavidWilton (who travelled to Germany just for this event and to hand over a set of pipes very generously supplied by Winter
David Wilton presents prize draw winner Michael
Purpos with a set of pipes generously donated by RG Hardie & Co
School sponsor RG Hardie & Co). The parade also helped publicise the closing concert of all the students and teachers on Saturday. There were special warm-up
exercises each morning, there was a fun knockout-competition, a raffle for the sponsor’s bagpipe (won by a tearful and delighted Michael Purpos), certificates were given to those students who succeeded in their exams and the JoeWilson Memorial trophy for the most promising student was given to Vaclav Rout from the Czech Republic for his improvement and for his achievement of writing a bagpipe tutor in Czech. But to describe everything that
happened this week is a task on which the author cannot but fail; there was just far too much to list. Surely the CoP teachers had achieved their goal of enabling all of their students to rise to a higher level of producing and also appreciating the music of the pipes and drums.