Save the Strathclyde Police Pipe Band!

[Phogfan86]

Join this group on facebook. Someone has decided that the 12-time world champions don't need to be around anymore.

They were one of the first bands I heard once I started listening to pipe music and said, "Damn. That's why you play."

This is yet another bit of Scottish pipe band history going down the drain, just like the Regiments.

As I said above, there's a facebook group you can join. You can also write...

Chief Constable Stephen House
Strathclyde Police Headquarters
172 Pitt Street
Glasgow
G2 4JS

Let him know (courteously, of course) how you feel. This just stinks.

[OFCJAX]

I have one of their patches up on my wall not 2 feet from my computer.

[David Dalglish]

Thats sad, they are a great band.

[The Barry]

Why are they being disbanded?

[haukehaien]

Here are the details, such as they are:

On 17 February, Pipes|Drums magazine reported:
"As of February 17, 2009, the one of the world's most famous bands as we know it may be no more, after the Strathclyde Police force made a decision to halt the traditional activities of the Grade 1 Strathclyde Police Pipe Band.

According to sources who spoke to pipes|drums on condition of anonymity, the decision was made by the Chief Constable with little advance warning to band members, which previously operated as the Pipe Band Division of the force. The source said that the future of the working police officers within the band is uncertain, and they will each learn on February 18th what their assignments, if any, might be."

Full story

On 19 February they updated:
"In a statement to pipes|drums, the Strathclyde Police force has indicated that its world-class Grade 1 band "will continue to compete in major competitions."

The information was signed by John Neilson, ACC Territorial Policing, and sent by Chief Inspector Iain Murray."

Full Story

It appears that (at least for the moment) they're not in danger of disbanding. Neither the band's website nor Pipes|Drums has anything else about the story. Other sites I found had the same sorts of things as Pipes|Drums.

[haukehaien]

Update:
Piping Times Editor (and SPPB member) Robert Wallace says, "Just when we thought things were getting better.......Strathclyde Police pipe band is near breaking point. Something needs to be done soon or, take it from me, it is all over. Here's the latest: Serving members of the band would normally be on plain clothes duty for Saturday's Old Firm football match (Rangers/Celtic). This would have enabled them to play at Gourock on Sunday where they are entered for, of course, Grade 1. They have learned this week that they have been switched to uniformed night shift on Saturday night and won't therefore be able to play in the contest."

More at his blog: http://pteditor.blogspot.com/2009/05/guantanamo.html

[beloitpiper]

This is awful. Can't we compromise? Let's disband a handful of Grade V bands and let Strathclyde PD continue playing!

[Tartan Shortbread Jock]

The police band are good, always there for charity events and local fetes.
It would be sad if it ends, another chapter closing on Scottish tradition.

[Colonel MacNeal]

Bean counters are probably to blame. Always looking to shave a nickel/farthing here and there.

[Kid Cossack]

History, tradition, bah! They mean nothing. We can invent new stuff, out of whole cloth, which will be just as good, if not better. Let us continue to abandon our heritage, let us continue to ignore our roots, let us continue to throw aside the wisdom of the ages.

Surely those who have gone before us, they knew nothing. Right?

Right?

And if the Strathclyde Police Pipe Band could put out a good sound, and put on a good show, well, let's just record it, and we can replay it via a hundred pound mp3 player. That will be just as good. Probably better.

Right?

Having recently reread "Quartered Safe Out Here" by George Macdonald Fraser, I may be a little tetchy about such things. I mean, the Thin Red Line was so very long ago . . . it cannae matter to anyone today, surely?

(Yes, yes it can. And don't call me Shirley.)