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I am a professional instructor of the Scottish Highland Bagpipes and have been teaching students privately for five years. I am currently instructing almost twenty students at varying degrees of experience. Private instruction is my business and I devote all my time amd attention toward perfecting my method of instruction and providing my students quality training of the highest standard.
I received my initial training as a parade piper from Dr. John Richardson and Pipe Major Charles Smith of the Heritage Pipes and Drums, students of Pipe Major Ian Sturrock of the Royal Air Force, the first piping instructor in the state of Alabama. I advanced quickly and began playing the pipes after only two months of formal instruction, extending my repertoire to forty tunes by the fourth month of instruction.
In the summer of 1995 I attended the North American Academy of Piping located in Vale Crusis, North Carolina. There, I received instruction from the famous Canadian piper Colin MacLellan, the son of John A. MacLellan, Pipe Major of the Seaforth Highlanders, learning from him in the traditional manner passed down many generations. There, I also learned my first competition march from Bill Caudill Pipe Major of the Grandfather Mountain Highlanders of North Carolina.
My training as a competition piper I received from Pipe Major Jamie Brooks-Hamilton, former Pipe Major of the House of Scotland Pipe Band of San Diego, California and current Pipe Major of the Birmingham Society of Piping. Pipe Major Brooks-Hamilton was the student of Campbell Naismith, Pipe Seargent of the L.A. Scots Pipe Band, the only Grade I pipe band in the United States, and editor of The Vortex Street Collection of tunes for the Great Highland Bagpipe, himself the student of the famous Jim MacColl of the MacColl piping family, who was student of the famous Iain MacPherson, father and teacher of the acclaimed greatest piper of the century, Donald MacPherson.
In addition to instruction, from 1996 to 1999 I was the owner and operator of The Town Piper located in Birmingham, Alabama, a retail business geared toward instruction of the Great Highland Bagpipes. I cultivated my market from a virtually nonexistent circle to a sizable Piping Community supporting our local pipers and pipe bands.
I am a Grade III competing solo and band piper who has won awards and medals at various sanctioned competitions for Great Highland Bagpipes. I have performed and competed at Scottish Festivals in Montgomery, Alabama and Atlanta, Georgia and placed in competitions evaluated by Eastern United States Pipe Band Association adjudicators such as Sandy MacPhee, Peter Kent, William Logan, and Michael Cusack. I have also served as the Pipe Seargent of the Birmingham Society of Piping and as Pipe Corporal of the Heritage Pipes and Drums.
I am a professional performer on the Great Highland Bagpipe and have been giving recitals for nearly five years. Statewide, I have played for over 300 weddings, funeral services, and other special occasions. I have also recorded with professional recording artist Jefff Sauceda and perform and will soon record with Celtic Harpist Cynthia Lynn Douglass. I have an extensive repertoire of bagpipe music and can cater my performance to suit any occasion.
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