House of Edgar Shotts and Dykehead proved themselves the best Scottish pipe band around with their MSR set at the Cowal Highland Gathering.
They finished third in the Grade 1 competition, the highest placed Scottish band. They took the drumming honours by being placed first, while the piping judges put them at fifth and fourth and they were placed second for their ensemble performance.
For their march, strathspey and reel set they played Balmoral Highlanders, Susan MacLeod and MacAllister's Dirk.
Since Pipe Major Mathieson has been in charge of the band, he has always kept the band in the top 6 of the Champion of Champions table and in 1994, he won his first World Championship, winning both the Medley and March, Strathspey and Reel sections, another first for the band as we were the only band to have achieved this. More World Championship titles followed in 1997, 2000, 2003 & 2005.
The Cowal Highland Gathering took place in Dunoon at the weekend, and among other events there is the final major pipe band championship of the year.
As is traditional, after the results were announced many of the massed bands then paraded down Argyll Street as an impressive finale to the three-day gathering which attracts thousands of visitors to the area.
