Chris Bell

  Chris has been extremely fortunate to have experienced instruction from many exceptional players and instructors. These included, but not limited to, Dave Danskin, Elizabeth Danskin, Al Savage, Hugh Cameron, Harvey Dawson, and Graham Kirkwood. Every instructor brought something different to the table but Chris credits Graham Kirkwood and his brother Scott with really helping him understand how the piping and drumming all fit together. 

  Although now essentially retired from solo competition, Chris had considerable success during his solo career. He credits a good deal of his success to having an incredibly stable and reliable piper at every contest – his brother Scott. Chris won the Pipers and Pipe Band Society of Ontario (PPBSO) Champion Supreme award for Grades 4, 3, and 2 in consecutive years in the mid 1980’s. He followed this with some consistent prizes in Grade 1 before moving to professional ranks around 2000 when he would eventually win Champion Supreme again in 2015. 

  Chris was fortunate to make the trip to the world solo drumming championships in 1990 where he was pleased to finish 8th that day, in the 18 and under category, and being beaten by the likes of Barry Wilson was nothing to be sad about. From a band perspective, Chris has overseen the Rob Roy drum corps for the better part of the past 32 years. He has had the pleasure of leading his corps to many prizes in both band and drum corps categories. In 2003, Chris took on a new challenge, by joining the Niagara Regional Police. There, he had the opportunity to play with a world class Grade 2 band and study under Harvey Dawson for the year. Graham Kirkwood took the corps in 2004 and the drum corps excelled, being compared to some of the very good Grade 1 corps at the time. 

  After spending many years playing in grade 2, Chris made the final jump to the Grade 1 Peel Regional Police in 2011. Chris played with Peel for five years and his playing caliber exploded simply from being around so many exceptional players all the time. Chris has run the teaching program for Rob Roy for a long time, starting approximately in 1988 when he became the lead tip. Chris is very proud to have been involved in the development of many players who have gone on to great success, including, but not limited to, Zach Smith, Iain Bell, Sean Donaldson, Scott Nicholson. Although he has taught many drummers, he has learned something from each of them. He feels it is very important to not only keep learning and advancing, but to know your limitations and encourage people to seek out more qualified instruction.

  Chris wrote his A certificate drumming certification in 2015 and is always very happy to step behind the clipboard as an adjudicator. He notes that as a competitor, it is very easy to complain about a result or a comment (something he has done on many occasions himself), but when you step behind the clipboard the job is not quite as easy. There is a lot of information to process in a very short period of time, and judges are simply offering their most honest opinions on what they hear.