The Pittsburgh Piping Society is excited to confirm the following instructors for the 2025 Jimmy McIntosh Piobaireachd Workshop Weekend.
Mike Rogers
Mike Rogers is a piper from Silver Spring, Maryland. He received tuition from Robert Mitchell, Jimmy McIntosh, Murray Henderson, P/M Angus MacDonald, and P/M Roddy MacLeod. Other bands he played with included the MacAlpine/Clan Campbell Pipe Band, and from 1995-2005 the City of Washington Pipe Band, where he served as Pipe Sergeant for several years in Grade 1.
As a solo competitor, his successes include the Highland Society of London Gold Medal at the Argyllshire Gathering, the Piobaireachd Society (Canada) Gold Medal for Piobaireachd, the Silver Medal at the Argyllshire Gathering, and the Dan Reid Invitational Cameron Gillies Championship.
He is an EUSPBA adjudicator and President of the United States Piping Foundation. Mike is a registered professional engineer and recently retired from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers where he led a variety of design, construction, and environmental missions.
-bio and image from: https://macmillanpb.org/mike-rogers/
Alex MacIntyre
Alex began his band career as a side drummer with the Edmonton Boy’s Pipe Band. He and his late brother, piper, Patrick went on to play with the Strathcona Legion Pipe Band which eventually morphed into the Viscount Park Pipe Band. Alex eventually took up the pipes and continued on with the original Alberta Caledonian PB, then the Edmonton Caledonian PB and eventually, was elected Pipe Major of the Alberta Caledonia PB. In 2001, Alex led the Alberta Caledonia PB and qualified for the final round of the World Pipe Band Championships in Glasgow. Two further attempts were made for the crown in 2002 and 2003 when the band placed 7th in the Worlds. Alex retired from bands in 2004 and has been called upon for several times as a judge.
-bio from https://albertapipebands.ca/the-influencers
Andrew Carlisle
Andrew Carlisle is originally from Ballygowan, Northern Ireland and joined the Carnegie Mellon School of Music faculty in 2010. That same year, he began studying piobaireachd under the guidance of Jimmy McIntosh.
Andrew has performed in over twenty countries, across four continents; most notably at The White House in 2008, and in front of 50,000 people at the Oz Stadium in Sydney, Australia in 2010.
He is one of the world’s leading solo pipers and has won numerous prestigious awards including:
- The Gillies Cup for Piobaireachd, London, UK (one of the most coveted prizes in solo piping)
- The A Grade Strathspey and Reel at the Argyllshire Gathering, Oban, Scotland
- The A Grade Piobaireachd and Overall at the Cowal Highland Gathering, Dunoon, Scotland
- Five United States Piping Foundation Championship wins
- The Macallan Trophy on three occasions, Lorient, Brittany, France
- William Livingstone Memorial, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
- The Gordon Duncan Memorial on two occasions
- The British Army Championships, Edinburgh, Scotland
- Three All-Ireland titles at Senior level
For twenty years, Andrew has been an active member of the world renowned Field Marshal Montgomery Pipe Band, sharing in the success of over forty-five major championship wins, including ten World Pipe Band Championship wins. He has been featured as a soloist on the band’s Re:Charged and Impact albums.
Since 2012, Andrew has been the Artistic Director, Pipe Major and Senior Arranger for the annual Virginia International Tattoo; a production involving 900 performers held eight times each April in the 8,000 seat Scope Arena in Norfolk, Virginia.
Andrew has been a qualified adjudicator for solo piping and pipe bands with the Eastern United States Pipe Band Association since 2010.
Andrew was the featured artist in a one hour television program recorded by the BBC in 2016 entitled ‘The Castle Session’ performing the Great Highland Bagpipe, Scottish Border Pipes, Scottish Smallpipes, low whistle and penny whistle
Since arriving in 2010, Andrew has transformed the Carnegie Mellon University Pipes and Drums into one of the leading pipe bands in the United States. In 2019 the band were crowned American Pipe Band Champions at Norfolk, Virginia winning both the traditional March, Strathspey and Reel and contemporary Medley Selection categories.
Peter Kent
Peter Kent started piping around age 13, first taught by Dr. Henry Hood in Greensboro, North Carolina. He later studied with John MacFadyen and Sandy Jones’ at summer schools in the North Carolina mountains, and was a regular student of Bill Logan, a formidable light music player. In 1979, when Albert McMullin formed the Balmoral School of Piping and Drumming, he met Jimmy McIntosh, who became his teacher, piping mentor and friend for over 40 years.
Kent achieved some success in open competition through the early 2000’s, winning piobaireachd events at most of the major games in the Eastern US. He played with the grade one City of Washington Pipe Band and later was a member of the Balmoral Highlanders, led by PM Joyce McIntosh, with Jimmy McIntosh as musical director. He has been a EUSPBA judge for over 30 years.
Jimmy’s mastery of piobaireachd and his skill in imparting the nuances of the music is a legacy that inspires his students to emulate and to pass on to future generations of pipers.