The SFU Pipe Band’s capture of its first World Pipe Band Championship

A 30th Anniversary Look Back

August 12, 1995 was a historic day for the Simon Fraser University Pipe Band in many ways. Not only was it the culmination of a decade and a half long quest to win the Grade 1 World Pipe Band Championship, after coming agonizingly close three times in the mid to late 1980s, it was also the culmination of an amazing sequence of circumstances and bold risk taking over the 1995 year.
The meteoric rise of the SFU Pipe Band in the 1980s was remarkable, winning the North American Pipe Band Championship in 1982, capturing 2nd place in the 1985 World Pipe Band Championship and almost derailing the Strathclyde Police Pipe Band’s record tying 5th consecutive World Championship, and coming so close to winning it in 1987 and 1988.
However, fortune did not shine on the band at the WPBC in the next several years and it was not until the arrival of J. Reid Maxwell as Lead Drummer in the fall of 1992 that prospects started improving.
It all bode well at the 1993 WPBC when the band placed 4th but were crushed that autumn with the tragic deaths of band pipers Robert Barbulak and Malcolm Bokenfohr due to a drunk driver. The formation of the Robert Malcolm Memorial junior band in their memory in January 1994 and the recording and release of the band’s album “Do Mo Chara Maith” (“For My Good Friend”) in the spring and summer 1994 were thought to be the springboard to a higher rung on the WPBC prize list. Indeed, it was exhilarating when the band won the Bridge of Allan competition a week before the 1994 Worlds, only to have spirits dashed again when the band fell out of the prize list at the 1994 Worlds.
The single factor that significantly changed the situation for the band was the Royal Scottish Pipe Band
Association’s decision in early 1995 to add suspense to the Grade 1 Championships by setting the order of play for a Grade 1 Championship to the reverse of the result from the just previous Championship.
This would mean that the SFU Pipe Band, with a 7th at the 1994 Worlds, would play anywhere from 7th to 10th from the end at the 1995 Worlds, a difficult position to claw back from. However, Pipe Major Terry Lee saw an opportunity and told the band he wanted the band to travel to compete at the Championship before the Worlds, the Scottish Championship in Stirling in late June. It was a bold but risky decision, as the trip meant leaving on the Thursday, arriving Friday, competing Saturday, and returning home on Sunday. It involved not just playing preparation but preparation for players to quickly handle jet lag and to use a cargo container to ensure all the drums arrived together.
Terry’s gamble paid off as the band arrived to sunny and very warm weather and placed 3rd at the Scottish Championship, ensuring a 3rd from the end spot in the Worlds order of play (with Shotts & Dykehead and Field Marshal Montgomery following respectively), and it shifted the pipe band world’s attention to SFU in the weeks leading up to and on the day of the Worlds.
Worlds day was overcast with a bit of drizzle during the band’s Medley performance, into the retuning ring, and then for the MSR performance, however the band was calm and determined as the sound was solid and playing was tight.
Placing 7th at the 1994 Worlds meant that the band would not be among the Grade 1 duty bands at the front of the massed bands during the March Past and prize giving, and actually SFU was one of the final bands to enter the arena and was positioned at the back corner of the massed bands. When it came time for the Grade 1 result, there was silence, the band was grouped together, and Reid was pacing back and forth with anticipation. RSPBA Executive Officer J. Mitchell Hutcheson announced “Now, the Grade 1 band awards, the World Champions for nineteen hundred and ninety-five, first, with 237 and a half points, the RSPBA trophy and banner, Simon Fraser…”
and pandemonium broke out in the band. Hands and glens in the air, hugging, jumping up and down and on each other.
It took a while for Terry to make his way through the bands and then across the duty bands to accept the prize as everyone was shaking his hand. Also, none of the band members could see Terry accepting the prizes, which also included the 1st place Medley and MSR trophies, and they eventually scrambled to find their glens and push through to the front of the massed bands for the march off as World Champions.
Finally, in a full circle moment, Ian McLellan, Pipe Major of the Strathclyde Police Pipe Band when they won 12 World Championships, came forward to shake Terry’s hand as the band was playing off as World Champions, as he also did in 1985 when he found the SFU bus and came onboard to congratulate Terry on the band’s 2nd place.
The world level successes by BC bands in the 1970s and 80s laid a foundation for the SFU Pipe Band’s 1995 Worlds win, and many more World Championship wins by SFU Pipe Band organization bands and other BC bands subsequently followed, cementing BC’s place in the world for continued excellence in pipe band performances across the grades.
More reminiscences of the 1995 Worlds win can be found in the two part documentary on the band’s YouTube channel youtube.com/SFUPipeBand

written by Rob MacNeil

SFUPB Players in the 1995 World Championship

P/M Terry Lee, P/S Jack Lee, Bonnie(McKain)Bevan, Andrew Bonar, Richard Brown, Allan Campbell, Colin Clansey, David Hicks, David Hilder, Shaunna Hilder, Anthony Kerr, Robert MacLeod, Bruce McIntosh, Danielle(Brin) Millar, Derek Milloy, Patrick Napper, Bruce Woodley

L/D J.Reid Maxwell, Blair(Buz)Brown, Keith Clark, Callum Hannah, Karen(Hinchey)Barr, Colin Nicol, Rolland Reid, Scott MacNeil, Christine Rickson, John Nichol