SCHOOL pupils in one of Scotland's most deprived areas are shunning games consoles and embracing bagpipes and drums after being offered tuition from members of the world's most successful competition pipe bands.
Officers in Greater Glasgow Police Scotland Pipe Band, formerly Strathclyde Police Pipe Band, are sharing their skills with 60 youngsters in Govan, coaching a team to compete for the first time in the Scottish Schools Pipe Band Championships.
Funded by the Govan Weavers' Society, four primary schools - Riverside, St Constantine's, Pirrie Park and St Saviour's - receive an hour of tuition every week while aspiring musicians at Govan High School receive instruction one day a week.
Iain MacPherson, Glasgow Police Pipe Band sergeant, said: "It's been a real privilege to head back to Govan to open the eyes of youngsters to the world of piping.
"It's definitely helped inspire them into picking up the bagpipes and we have been inundated with requests for tuition. Their dedication is really shining through and instead of going home to play on their Xboxes, students are now staying at school after hours to perfect their technique.
"Although we are still in the very early stages, we've set our sights on a debut public performance at the Scottish Schools Pipe Band Championships next year. We are very much looking forward to the challenge."
The Greater Glasgow Police Scotland Pipe Band, originally formed as the Burgh of Govan Police Pipe Band in 1883, has won 20 World Pipe Band Championship titles. Tom McInally, deacon of The Govan Weavers' Society, said the group was keen to build on important elements of the community's history as part of a programme of regeneration. He added: "Govan suffers from a number of social and economic issues and it is our central objective to ameliorate this. We looked at a number of possibilities but thought the piping project was not only fitting with the history of pipe bands in the area but also due to the great number of benefits it brings."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article