Julian Goodacre summarises the main points of last October's very encouraging Annual General Meeting in Edinburgh.

THE ANNUAL General Meeting of the LBPS took place in St Anne's Community Centre at 2pm on Saturday, 14 October, 1989. It was well attended, by Society standards at any rate, with 13 members present and apologies from Andy Hunter, Hugh Cheape, Jim Gilchrist and Malcolm McLaren.

As stated in the September newsletter, the main topic for discussion was “the Future direction, if any, of the society". Gordon Mooney, who chaired the meeting, started by reading out a letter in which Jim     Gilchrist, editor of Common Stock        expressed his concern at the state of the Society and at the fact that the bulk of its activity was being carried out by a handful of people who, like himself, were also very busy professionally and domestically. He felt that perhaps the election of an     efficient committee would help the Society to function in a more organised and effective manner. He would also like to see more and better playing from members at meetings and/or its informal sessions (see editorial on Page 3. The discussion following this letter proved to be highly positive. Financially, the Society was in a good   condition - even after reprinting Gordon Mooney's tutor for cauld-wind pipes, there was more than £700 in the bank. Membership was now at about 100, about a third of which was within Scotland, a third in England and a third abroad. There was discussion about what more could be done  for members living outwith Scotland. Jock Agnew, who has been running the London branch of the LBPS, reported on its activities. He also suggested that one of the Society's Saturday outings could be held in Birmingham - a central point for the English membership.

Robbie Greensitt said that he was prepared to organise an all-day meeting at the Chantry Bagpipe Museum in Morpeth, Northumberland. Chris Walshaw suggested that pub sessions should be held after Saturday afternoon meetings. It was asked whether Saturday evening would be better for meetings than the afternoon.

Julian Goodacre suggested that the meeting discuss what the Society does do well to see whether it could concentrate its efforts in these areas. The tutor was excellent and had just been reprinted. The tune books were important also, but were currently out of print and should be reprinted, Scottish meetings benefitted only local members, whereas Common Stock reached all members; he suggested, therefore, that CS be built up and published more regularly. Julian volunteer- ed to help Jim Gilchrist collect more articles and material for the journal. He also felt that the competition was very important and the Society should concentrate on doing it well. Attendances at the session in the back room of Stuart's Bar (Drummond Street, Edinburgh) on the last Thursday of every month had been poor. If people were not bothered to remember about it, was it important enough to go on with? There was general dis cussion about the merits of all-day meetings to encourage members to come from longer distances.

The competition was also discussed, with Jock Agnew suggesting that the prize for the novice section might be a bursary to go on a piping course.

At the start of the meeting, there had been some suggestion that perhaps the Society had reached a point where it would be best to wind it up. Throughout the meeting, however, it was apparent that everyone felt that the Society was important and that it should continue and, hopefully, expand. It was unanimously agreed that a committee should be formed. This was voted in and the AGM ended on an optimistic note with a general feeling that now the Society had a working committee it could function more satisfactorily and, it was hoped, expand and increase its activities.

Committee meetings

Julian Goodacre gives a brief on the last two meetings of the Society's committee, formed at the AGM in October last year.

THE FIRST Society committee meeting was held immediately after the 1989 AGM. At this meeting it was decided to improve the Society's image by having official writing paper designed and printed and to start working on a new publicity leaflet. Meetings and events for 1990 were discussed. It was agreed to approach the organisers of the Edinburgh Folk festival to see if they were interested in including a concert of Lowland music and piping at the 1990 festival; this could perhaps be sponsored by the Society in return for publicity. Robbie Greensitt agreed to organise the meeting to be held at the Chantry Museum in Morpeth on Saturday, 10 February, Jock Agnew suggested having an all-day meeting in Birmingham and Gordon Mooney said he would be willing to organise one at his house in the Borders. Various other matters were discussed, including the possibi- -lity of selling T-shirts, mugs and stickers promoting the Society.

AT THE committee meeting on 9 Dec, the new writing paper was unveiled and a draft of the new publicity leaflet was discussed; hopefully the leaflet will be ready for the Edinburgh Folk Festival. it was also agreed that the subscription should stay a its present £5.

Details were discussed of the next Society meeting in Morpeth on 10 February. It was agreed that the competition would be at St Anne's Community Centre on Saturday, 7 April, to coincide with the first weekend of the Edinburgh Folk Festival; however, it was decided not to sponsor a concert at the festival as it did not appear to fit into this year's format. Possibly the Society should organ- ise its own concert later in the year? It was agreed to further investigate having a Society sticker produced - a round, self- adhesive label with the LBPS name and logo, suitable for pipe boxes etc. There was also a discussion about the competition medals and how these could be produced. It was also agreed that committee members could have any postal and telephone expenses incurred on behalf of the Society reiabursed by the Society. Jamie MacDonald Reid was to be given £10 for his talk to the Society.

The committee members are:

Jock Agnew, 11 Ulting Lane, Maldon Essex,CM9 6QB. (0621 855447)

Jeannie Campbell, 95 Avenue Park St.  

Glasgow, G20 SLL. (O41 946 2137)

Jim Gilchrist, 10 Pittville Street, Portobello,

Edinburgh, EH15 2BY. (031 669 8235)

Julian Goodacre, 29 Bellevue Ad,Edinburgh, EH] 4DL. (031 556 4151 )

Robbie Greensite, 28 Fairfield

Green, West Monkseaton, Whitley Bay, cont Tyne & Wear, NE25 98D, (091 251 3045)

Andy Hunter, 7 Middlebank Holdings, by Dunfermline, Fife, KY11 5QN. (3 414290)

Iain Macinnes, 6 Spottiswood Street, Edinburgh, EH9 1ER. (031 229 5800)

Mike Mechen, East. Kinpurnie, Newtyle, Perthshire, PH12 8TW. (Newtyle 210)

Gordon Mooney, The Croft, Eildon Village,,Melrose, TD6 9HB. (0835 23884)