International Bagpipe Day 2013 – a huge success
Well, it happened! We had an excellent event in Oxford, with – amazingly - well over 2500 visitors passing through the museum doors during the day, which was about 500 more than usual for the time of year. We are also getting reports back from around the world, ranging from a pipe band performance in an underground cavern in South Africa, to a party on an Athenian hill in Greece. The day was even celebrated in Nigeria, a country not often associated with piping. See our facebook page for updates and photos. Don’t forget to make your contributions if you were involved.
Here is what we set out to do:
Continuing on from the success of the first ever International Bagpipe Day in 2012, Sunday March 10th 2013 was chosen to be a day to celebrate the world’s bagpipes and piping traditions. With over 130 different kinds of bagpipe played worldwide, we invited pipers everywhere to organise local events – talks, lectures, school visits, museum events, pipers’ picnics, concerts, gigs, ceilidhs and folk bals.
This year, on Saturday March 9th we had a flagship event at the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, which ran all day – we had guest speakers, performances, pipe makers, pipes to try and much more!
We also planned the Great Bagpipe Convergence. We invited everyone to go out on March 10th at noon local time, play their pipes, and then post a photo or video on our facebook page
International Piping Conference
2012 saw events across Britain and as far afield as Seattle and Athens, but our flagship event was an International Piping Conference at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London, organised by Cassandre Balbar.
Couldn’t make it? There will be another conference on 15th March 2014 details will be available here later in the year
BBC Breakfast: watch the BBC TV coverage here
BBC Radio 5 Live’s ‘Double Take’ Cassandre Balosso-Bardin. Listen here, article starts at 1:26:00
The Scotsman: a lively article from the Scottish perspective.
YouTube clip of the Boha being demonstrated during one of the talks here
