The Piping Live! Festival (a.k.a. Piping Hot Festival) is an annual
bagpiping
Bagpipes are a woodwind instrument using enclosed reed (music), reeds fed from a constant reservoir of air in the form of a bag. The Great Highland bagpipes are well known, but people have played bagpipes for centuries throughout large parts of ...
event held in
Glasgow
Glasgow is the Cities of Scotland, most populous city in Scotland, located on the banks of the River Clyde in Strathclyde, west central Scotland. It is the List of cities in the United Kingdom, third-most-populous city in the United Kingdom ...
by the
National Piping Centre. The festival was created in 2003 and occurs on the run-up to the
World Pipe Band Championships.
It is estimated that the festival alone adds £12 million to Scotland's tourism revenue and it is the largest bagpipe festival in the world.
The festival is always opened with performances in the
Royal Concert Hall by musicians including
The National Youth Pipe Band of Scotland.
The festival itself consists of over 150 individual events including free classes, concerts and
ceilidhs throughout the week.
The festival also has its own "Canada Day" to celebrate the multitude of Canadian Grade I bands who participate in the Championships. The Piping Centre also produces and releases albums around the festival, such as
Seudan by the band of the same name in 2011.
The festival won Event of The Year at the
Scottish Traditional Music Awards in 2008 and in 2010
Eve Muirhead was named the festival's ambassador in an effort to reach out to a younger audience. The event is directed by
Roddy MacLeod.
References
{{coord missing, Glasgow
Music festivals in Scotland
Tourist attractions in Glasgow
Piping events