Pipe-Major Brian MacRae

Found this old clipping in my papers.

October 1, 2000
Pipe-Major Brian MacRae, Bagpiper for Queen, Is Dead at 58
By DOUGLAS MARTIN

Brian MacRae, who for 15 years was the Queen of England's personal bagpiper, died on Sept. 3. He was 58.

The cause was a heart attack while he was on vacation in France, The Times of London said.

Pipe-Major MacRae's principal duty, starting at precisely 9 a.m., was to play for 15 minutes under the window of Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle or Balmoral Castle and the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Scotland. Tradition required that he march up and down four times as he brought forth his instrument's eerie, inimitable sound.

He also piped at the queen's dinner table, and was responsible for the 12 pipers who played around the table at state banquets.

His daily duties did not end with the morning serenade. His next duty was to escort the queen from her private quarters to her first appointment of the day. He also served as page of the presence, responsible for meeting and escorting the queen's visitors, including the prime minister and ambassadors, to the Grand Entrance of Buckingham Palace.

''His expert playing, composing skills and cheerfulness earned him his coveted post,'' The Daily Mail newspaper reported. ''Once, as a birthday treat, he woke the queen on the Royal Train with one of his familiar medleys.''

Brian MacRae was born in Aberdeen on March 27, 1942. His grandfather and father played the pipes, and he began to play at 6. The Times of London reported that his father insisted that he learn a trade so he apprenticed as a yacht builder and cabinetmaker.

He joined the army at 18, serving with the Royal Engineers. He transferred to the Gordon Highlanders two years later. He rose from piper to pipe-major in nine years on the strength of his virtuosity and skill at composing. But his duties extended beyond music: he commanded his drummers and pipers as a rifle platoon in Northern Ireland in 1976.

He was selected to be the queen's piper in 1980. He was the ninth person to fill the position since Queen Victoria first heard bagpipes when she and Prince Albert visited the Scottish Highlands for the first time in 1842 and the queen declared, in a letter to her mother: ''I must have a piper.''

Pipe-Major MacRae became particularly known as a composer for the bagpipe. His ''Cannongate'' strathspey, a Scottish dance a bit slower than the reel, won the Scottish Division competition in 1976. When Prince Charles visited the Gordons as their colonel in chief in 1978, he was greeted by ''Prince Charles March,'' composed by Pipe-Major MacRae.

A reel he wrote the same year, called ''The Tache'' and dedicated to his commander, was said to be ''probably the best new reel since the war'' by the piper and critic Archie Kenneth, according to The Times.

He retired as the queen's piper at 52, because of Army retirement policies, and played at weddings and funerals afterward. He is survived by his wife, Joan, and daughters, Fiona and Helen.

At a private observance at St. George's Chapel at Windsor Castle that preceded his private funeral, The Mail reported, a band of pipers struck up ''Lord Lovat's Lament'' as his coffin was carried to the hearse.