Happy Lunar New Year from City of Angels Pipe Band! The Wood Dragon’s influence in 2024 promises evolution, improvement, and abundance. This lines up perfectly with our big trip to compete in the World Pipe Band Championships in Glasgow this August!
What’s On
Preparations for the 2024 season leading up to Glasgow are underway with rehearsals, workshops, performances, and a mock competition. Through it all, the band is forging connections with patrons, family, friends, fans of the music, and each other.
And on that note, please mark your calendar to join us at MacLeod Ale Brewing Co. on Saturday, March 30th from noon to 2pm for our Season Kick-Off Cèilidh (pronounced kay-lee). See our evite below with more info about this party that’s open to friends, family, and supporters of the band, and RSVP via Facebook HERE now!
What We’ve Been Up To
We began the year with a performance at the St. Andrews Society of Los Angeles’s Burns Supper at the beautiful Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, complete with a toast to the haggis, music, and highland dancing. Burns Suppers are are huge tradition in Scotland, and are held as dinner parties every January 25th, Robert Burns’ birthday. These suppers are meant to celebrate the life and work of Robert Burns, Scotland’s national bard.
The very next weekend, we hosted an early mock contest (which means that the results are not officially ranked) where two other Southern California pipe bands joined us to put their competition sets on the field for our friends, families, and judges. This mock contest event is called Pipes in the Park has been held at Griffith Park three times in the past two years, and it’s an excellent way for local bands to work out performance nerves and get feedback on their competition tunes from judges before the contest season kicks off in earnest.
It was also a great place for supporters to buy our limited edition Scotland 2024 t-shirts (shown below). Here’s a link again just in case you haven’t gotten yours yet!
Joining us as a judge for Pipes in the Park this year was Ali North, bass drummer of Simon Fraser University Pipe Band from Vancouver, Canada, who currently hold the title of World Champion Drum Corps in Grade 1. Drumming and ensemble judges rarely, if ever, come from the mid-sections of pipe bands (bass and tenor drums), so receiving sheets from Ali that pinpointed mid-section specific feedback was a unique and valuable experience for all bands involved.
Ali describes the bass drum as the beating heart of any pipe band - a steady, powerful rhythm that is so much a part of the music that you may not even notice until it’s missing. Our bass drummer, Tangie Hill, is certainly our heartbeat. Not only does her drum keep time to Trevor’s foot and Lei’s snare in the competition circle, she is kindness and generosity personified off the field too. Introduce yourself next time you see her — she’s the one carrying the band’s beating heart!
In the Spotlight
Speaking of Tangie, she was one of the City of Angels Pipe Band soloists who attended Winter Storm in January, and we promised a recap.
To set the scene, January in Kansas City is cold - like, blizzard, wind chill, and below zero cold - which even affected the hotel lobby, where temperatures dipped to the low 50s inside. Fortunately, all of the piping and drumming solos, events, and workshops happened indoors, which made for some interesting tuning challenges between practice rooms and performance areas.
Our youngest piper, Logan Gorsuch, had two Thursday solo competitions - his first ever at Grade 3 - and Tate Mauzy, snare drummer, had one Grade 3 snare competition. The judges for Winter Storm are internationally renowned, and many of them have won major competitions, including the World Pipe Band Championships, so it’s definitely a nerve-wracking honor to play for them. Both Tate and Logan placed in the top six in their solos - Tate got sixth place for his snare solo, and Logan earned fourth place for his MSR in the amateur Grade 3 category. Congratulations to both of them for placing in their first-ever Winter Storm solos!
Tangie’s very first Winter Storm Gold Medal Bass solo competition was Friday, and while she didn’t place in the top six, she had the opportunity to compete against Ali North, her mentor (and our mid-section judge at Pipes in the Park). The experience was phenomenal, and she’s taking what she learned at Winter Storm into the 2024 season, to all our benefit.
Piper Andrew Reynolds was the winner of the Midwest Pipe Band Association’s scholarship to Winter Storm, which was an outstanding achievement by itself. He was able to join his teammates in Kansas City in time for the all-day workshops on Saturday, and the spectacular Winter Steam concert on Saturday night, where the workshop leaders and judges performed for all attendees, friends, and families. You can watch the recorded livestream of the 2024 Winter Storm concert, posted by Piper’s Dojo on Facebook, linked here.
What’s Next?
You know there will be LOTS of fantastic music at the Season Kick-Off Cèilidh on Saturday, March 30th, but we’re also planning an opportunity drawing with amazing prizes, new merch with our exclusive Scotland 2024 design, and in true Celtic tradition, a treasure hunt for a little bit of gold. Join us at MacLeod Ale Brewing Co. from noon to 2pm for an afternoon full of festivities. Invite all your friends and family to come out for fun in the sun, plus some great music and craft beer!
MacLeod Ale Brewing Co. is located at 14741 Calvert St. in Van Nuys.
We have so many other big plans for 2024 and can’t wait to take along on the journey with us. Here are some of our key events for the year, which will be updated in real time on our website homepage and shared out across our social media channels.
Mar 15-17: St. Patrick’s Day (schedule and locations TBA)
Mar 30: Season Kick-Off Cèilidh at MacLeod Ale Brewing Co. - noon-2pm
Apr 6: St. Andrews Society of Los Angeles Tartan Film Festival
Apr 13-14: Las Vegas Highland Games | Las Vegas, Nevada
May 25-26: Costa Mesa Highland Games | Costa Mesa, California
Jun 22-23: San Diego Highland Games | Vista, California
Aug 17: World Pipe Band Championships | Glasgow, Scotland
Aug 31 - Sep 1: Caledonian Club of San Francisco Scottish Games | Pleasanton, California
Oct 12-13: Seaside Highland Games | Ventura, California
The band has set a high bar for itself as an organization, as individual musicians, and are especially committed to world class performance excellence and inclusion. We are inspired to embark on an exciting 2024 season, and can’t wait to take you along with us!