If you have ever heard a bagpipe band perform the tune “Amazing Grace,” you can’t help but be inspired.
The bagpipe sound echoes in East Tennessee thanks to the Knoxville Pipes and Drums, an organization of approximately 35 members practicing weekly in Maryville and performing several times a year in East Tennessee and throughout the Southeast. Four members of the band have ORNL connections, including Mark Coleti, Bryan Crable, Andrew Kerr and Andrew Payzant.
“I was signed up to play in the Knoxville band before I even got an apartment here,” said Mark Coletti of the Computational Sciences and Engineering Division. “I played in a bagpipe band when I was at Penn State. When the folks up there found out I was heading to Oak Ridge, they contacted the folks in Knoxville. I actually knew what I was going to be doing with the band before I knew what my job would entail at ORNL.”
Geography did not stop Bryan Crable from continuing his love of playing the bagpipe as he moved around the country.
“I played in Pittsburgh before I moved to Oklahoma for the next three years and really enjoyed playing the bagpipes there, said Bryan, formerly of the Biosciences Division. “When I found out Knoxville had a band, I got involved quickly.”
Andrew Kerr, whose parents were from Scotland and who played bagpipes in the United Kingdom while serving in the U.S. military for seven years before moving back to the United States, has been a bagpipe fixture for years.
“I got into Knoxville Pipes and Drums after meeting the members at the Smoky Mountain Festival & Highland Games held at Maryville College. “I have been playing the bag pipes all of my life and I’m glad to have the opportunity to assist and help inspire our musical art in the East Tennessee bagpipe scene for years to come.”
Andrew Payzant of the Chemical and Engineering Materials Division is the senior citizen of ORNL bagpiping as he has performed during a number of ORNL events, including Veterans Day, during his 22 years at the lab. Andrew started piping as a youth in Canada and was at least partially responsible for recruiting most of the other three into the Knoxville band.
“Before I arrived here, I learned via a usenet group that there was a big interest in bagpipes in East Tennessee, which is why the Knoxville band started,” Andrew Payzant said. “I’ve been at it ever since.”
The Knoxville Pipes and Drums started 25 years ago through the Scottish Society of Knoxville. Many of the players during the early years were beginners, but the group has grown and musically matured over the past quarter century.
“During 2016, our group finished in the top five among Grade 4 bands in the Southeast,” Andrew said.
The Knoxville Pipes and Drums have also performed at some special local events.
“We have performed at halftime of some UT men’s basketball games,” Andrew Kerr said. “We were honored to perform at the memorial service for Coach Pat Summitt.”
The Knoxville Pipes and Drums is a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation. Its mission is to foster and promote Scottish bagpiping and drumming and the related Celtic arts within the East Tennessee community.
More information about the organization is available at: http://www.knoxvillepipesanddrums.org/.
You may also view a performance of the band during the Stone Mountain Highland Games at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TDwnKOgJhI –Fred Strohl
