Pipe Band College – Composition Competition

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Composition Competition: – 6/8 March of 4 parts

We are all disappointed that the 2020 Competition Season has ended before it began due to the Coronavirus pandemic (Covid-19), and our need to follow the government health advice.

The Royal Scottish Pipe Band Association celebrates its 90th Anniversary in 2020. To mark this occasion The Pipe Band College have set out the framework for a Composition Competition focusing on a 6/8 March of 4 parts.

The focus is to provide a challenge to our Juvenile Pipers and Drummers to develop an individual Composition as a Melody or Score as they are unable to engage in their normal practice regime whilst maintaining the need to remain at home and self-isolate. Entry is open to those who through their Band have registered with The Royal Scottish Pipe Band Association for the 2019/20 season.

The competition also encompasses a Band Combined entry as many bands will be continuing to work together using Social Media and any one of several collaboration applications. The entry should comprise of the Melody and Scores for the Pipes, Side Drums, one Bass drum and up to two Tenor drums. An entry can be submitted by any Band that has registered with The Royal Scottish Pipe Band Association for the 2019/20 season.

Valid entries must be submitted by Email to pbc.competition@rspba.org between the 20th April 2020 and the 13th June 2020. Entries will not be accepted after this date.

Please choose your entry Category, Title your entry, and include the Band Name and in addition for individual entries the Composer’s name: –

  • Piper Juvenile Age Group individual entry
  • Side Drummer Juvenile Age Group individual entry
  • Band Combined entry

To enter a Juvenile category, you must have been under 18 years of age on the 1st day of November 2019.

Please submit your Composition or Band Arrangements in Portable Document Format (.pdf). This can be a scanned copy of a manual manuscript or one saved in .pdf format from an application you have used to develop your manuscript. Entries in Audio or Video Formats unfortunately will not be Accepted.

The Pipe Band College will provide designated individuals to preside and collaborate on the assessment of the competition entries.

The first Review will be to identify a specific number of Entries to go through to the final deliberations in each of the categories.

These Identified Entries will be included in a formatted publication that will be available to be downloaded.

The Presiding panels will then decide the top three entries in each category. The top three entries will receive a commemorative printed copy of the Identified entries.

The aim is to complete the assessment process as quickly as possible following the closing date of the competition. The time needed will be dependent on the number of entries received, so the assessment timeline will be communicated separately.

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