Old salts on parade

This years Arimistice Parade marked the 50th year in the Band for Pipe Major Rob Bell and Piper Frank Mount.

08 November 1959 was the first parade where Frank and Rob played in the Band. Rob has made every parade since, other than 10th November 1973 when his nuptials got in the way. (He got married to Elspeth).

Frank and Rob marked the occaision in true style.

Piper in winching-interruptus scandal

Just a normal day in Coldstream.

Rob the piper is out looking for work; spots a potential business opporchancity, swoops and the deal is done.

Game, set and marriage made in heaven!

Drams all round..

The engagement of Christine Gray and Ben Halfpenny on 30/10/09. Rob recently played for Christine and Ben at their engagement on the Craw Green - the event made the Berwickshire News.

Yetholm Show

Unlimited excitement!

New Baby for Pete and Tammi

Leighton Scott, arrived 28th September, 8lb 7.5oz. Flourishing!

Piper in knife attack shock....

While proper members of the band were enduring the blazing 20c heat of Coldstream high street on Flodden Day, in a mountain-top village in Italy, whilst suffering the freezing 20c evening, an angry Italian was taking out his frustrations on one of the part-time members of the band.

Most of you will be pleased to know that Rimorchio the Clown missed the vital organs. He just cut me in the head, ha ha!

Reports that Rimorchio's brother Frageloni the Clown is about to sign a three-year deal as Hibs new goalkeeper are, of course, true.

Apologies for the video being at an angle. To view: tilt your head to the left, only after removing your Glengarry.

Don Costello in hoots mon shocker

Don Costello, former Coldstream Guardsman and good friend of the band. Pictured in Inverness, noising up the locals.

Black Kilts Berlin

On Saturday night we hosted some players from Berlin's Black Kilts pipe band. We had a great night at the Besom, with food provided by Elspeth and great music from various band members and friends. Rebecca has placed a vidoe of the evening on you tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5lqG9NP-qBc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5lqG9NP-qBc.

More about the Black Kilts at http://www.blackkilts.de/gallery.html

Dorothy from the Besom presented Gordon with a cheque for £500 for the Band, from collections taken during Civic Week.

Civic Week on YouTube

Clicke here for some Civic Week 2009 memories http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kh32akpWDrc

Video of Masssed Bands

Link here to the mighty YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxAlLWMGdW0 for 4 minutes of massed bands mayhem.....

Bad influences, good influences....

James trying to bring order to chaos and get one band in particular to observe some kind of discipline. No names, no pack drill. Dib, dib, dob, dob...

Is Oomy the naughtiest boy in school or are some members of the band easily led? We think the latter. Peter sets an excellent example by drinking H2O, balanced by the fag.

Heard the one about.......

Something was said between these two photos. Answers will win a prize!

Massed bands pics from Mabel

More pictures of Floors, this time sent in by Mabel.

Massed Bands: contribution from Agnes

Agnes has sent in some pictures of the Massed Bands. Rob is looking mightily relieved at the end of the show:

Civic Week 2009

A new set of pictures from Mabel of the band at Civic Week; beating retreat or on the Sunday?

Floors Castle Massed Bands

To Floors Castle for the annual massed bands. Ho hum. Lots of people watching, which must have gladdened the heart of the Chookie Roxburgh who pays us to entertain the tourists while they tour the house, watch the other attractions, spend money, etc.

We were the lead band this year. A great turn-out saw us there in good numbers. (Pictures by Charlotte Lauder).

Over 180 pipers and drummers were on parade, with bands from a' the airts: Dalkeith, North Berwick, Melrose, Hawick, Berwick, Eyemouth, Duns and Kelso. The military band of the Royal Regiment of Scotland were also there to provide a bit of clarinet tootling.

Coldstream featured very strongly this year; we were the lead band for the day: Rob led the pipe majors and selected the tunes, Ian was lead drummer and led the drummers call, Peter played the Royal Salute on the bugle and James was lead drum major and kept the entire show on the road. No mean feat, which he delivered to a very high standard.

As ever, some of the playing was erratic, starts and stops were better this year than previously, but the volume still went up and down like the proverbial fiddlers elbow. The finale was a hilarious, free-jazz fusion of pick a tune, any tune, and play it in whatever order you want. Many thanks to the military band, who led with their own, unique, timing.

Otherwise, this was a good day out and brought to an end our summer season, which began back in June at Cockburnspath. Over the summer, the band has been out in great numbers and it is heartening to see how many young players, pipers and drummers, are now coming through the training programme and featuring regularly as members of the band. It is also good to see people returning to the band, Peter has returned after his service with the army and Graeme Tait, who is now an army recruiter, was also playing with us on Sunday.

More news as it comes, including various oppor-chancities of tours in Germany!

David Guthrie's civic week gallery

DSC_0679 A5
Originally uploaded by GU3 PHOTOS

What a happy bunch!

Lots of great pictures of the band can be found at David Guthrie's gallery by clicking on the picture.

Coffee morning

The coffee morning was very successful and raised £373.

Open mic' night

Rob's open mic night continues to be a big success for the band and a good fund-raiser too, this year the raffle raised £500. Below is a video of two of the stars of the night!

Civic Week 2009

The Band enjoyed a very successful Civic Week this year. Fair weather and good numbers maintained the band's high standing in the town and ensured every event had a sense of occaision.

The quality of our performances were excellent and brought many compliments from locals and visitors alike. Well done everybody.

The next Pipe band outing is at Floors Castle on 30th August. We are the leading band on the day so we will need a good turn out.

Band practice will resume on Monday night at the school at 7-pm. Can all the drummers please be at band practice at 7pm so we can go through the drummers call for Floors Castle.

Coldstream Civic Week

Coldstream Civic Week
Originally uploaded by marcela_bagarollo

Civic Week and the excitement is getting to everyone: particularly Duncan!

Picture courtesy of Marcela Bagarollo, presumably on holiday.

Civic Week

Pictures from Rebecca of this year's civic week. More images to come in the future.