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Another extremely successful Winter School has just passed by with everyone involved commenting that the atmosphere and learning capabilities were better and more familiar than previous years. The daily timetable of 1-hour lessons with 8 (very small) different level classes followed by practice time to consolidate what was taught proved to be very worthwhile. Everyone noticed the standards in personal skills improving very quickly after just one day and all the instructors reported big improvements from all students by the end of the week.
19 Students took SCQF examinations with most passing with high grades – congratulations to all of them! The examination process is proving to be a good way of progression for many pipers and drummers with set standards and criteria to be achieved at every level. Another way of progression is through solo competition and we were very impressed that everyone on the course took part in this learning experience. The competition took place on Wednesday evening starting at 19:00 finishing at 23:00. All students received good constructive feedback from the judges and special prizes like T-shirts, music books and CDs were presented to all competitors. During the lunch periods, a recital by the instructors was delivered and evenings were filled by different lectures and practicing.
The whole week was very intensive starting at 07:00 with the duty piper waking up all the students and instructors. Following the daily assembly, classes carried on until 17:30 with the evening programme starting at 19:00. There were 2 sponsors (Wallace Bagpipes and David Naill & Co) and both companies sponsored an amount of money towards a new set of Bagpipes – Big thank you to them for their generous offer and Tjitte from the Nederland’s and Silke from Berlin have gone home very happy with their vouchers.
Friday evening was our usual visit to a local pub for our end of course party and Saturday was the Grand Graduation Ceremony concert, which was held in a much-improved venue this year. The massive stage made it so much nicer to perform and express our wonderful music to the ever-increasing number of fans of our great music.
A big thank you goes as well to:
Sylvia and her staff at the Youth Hostel for their very good service, including the never-ending supply of coffee and biscuits throughout the day.
Europcar for the School Mini Bus. This has also been confirmed as an ongoing sponsorship for the next years to come.
The instructors from the NPC Glasgow, Craig Munro and Mark Wilson for their good teaching skills and enthusiasm.
My wife Heike for the behind the scenes work that has gone into this successful school throughout the complete year.
Michael Sroka for designing the tickets, posters and the musical programme.
Brigit Eickenberg and Franz – Heinrich Busch for the effective Press and Marketing work.
The wonderful students, making this school a real family of musicians, working together to achieve a common goal of improving their personal playing skills.
Dates for the next Winter School 2014 and registration will be confirmed very soon.
Hoping to see you all again in 2014.
Best regards,
David