Band turns it on for its oldest boy
Scots College’s pipe band has come to Nelson for the national championships but also had another special appointment.
The Wellington students visited their college’s oldest Old Boy, 96-year-old Ian Walker, and did him the honour of playing a concert.
Walker was delighted as the skirl of pipes sounded in the courtyard at the Ernest Rutherford Retirement Village where he lives.
Thirteen bagpipers and drummers played for the hospital wing residents, including one of their competition pieces, Highland Cathedral.
Band leader Ian Leslie said: ‘‘A lot of what we do is about service so it is natural for us to come and acknowledge our Old Boy.’’
Walker was appreciative but con- fessed he hadn’t enjoyed school. A boarder for two years from 1933, he recalls stern staff.
‘‘One of the terrifying moments was when I got caught smoking in the dormitory and one of the tutors said ‘come with me’ and gave me six whacks with the cane on the backside.
‘‘Now the students are well cared for, they would not even know what a cane is, they get real attention and are encouraged.’’
Walker went on to work in banking in Australia and New Zealand, then in his father-in-law’s printing business in Tasmania before running a Four Square store in Tauranga, and moved to Nelson three years ago.
The Scots College band is one of 45 competing in the Royal New Zealand Pipe Band Championships at Trafalgar Park today and tomorrow. The event has brought more than 1300 players and officials to Nelson and would inject $2 million into the local economy, said Bryce Gilchrist, president of the Celtic Pipe Band of Stoke. A committee has been organising the event for two years.
A highlight will be Saturday’s street march, starting at 9am at Millers Acre, turning into Trafalgar St and then into Bridge St. It will last 21⁄ hours, with each of the 45 bands setting off at three-minute intervals.
‘‘The march will culminate with the Grade Four bands marking back to Trafalgar Park as a massed band, playing the same tune – this is a sight to behold,’’ said Gilchrist.
The contest finale will be a massed band performance and prizegiving at 5pm on Saturday.