The band competed at the recent Palmerston North Square Day in December against the rest of New Zealand’s premier pipe bands (except Invercargill, who didn’t make the trip up this time).
Having come off two poor performances at the recent National Championships and been placed accordingly, A&D were hungry to get back on track and taste some competitive success.
Having bolstered the numbers throughout the off season and continued to solidify as a unit under the (still relatively) new leadership, the band came out fired up and presented two performances that were very credible, which also attracted international attention.
The results were as follows:
Overall
1st Canterbury Caledonian (9 place points)
2nd Manawatu Scottish (21 place points)
3rd Auckland & District (22 place points)
4th New Zealand Police (28 place points)
5th Northland Caledonian (Gr2 – 40 place points)
Medley
1st Canterbury Caledonian (1,1,1,1)
2nd Auckland & District (2,3,3,2)
3rd Manawatu Scottish (3,2,2,4)
4th New Zealand Police (4,4,4,3)
5th Northland Caledonian (Gr2) (5,5,5,5)
Judges: Martin Frewen, F. Jones (piping); A. Roach (ensemble); R. Levy (drumming)
MSR
1st Canterbury Caledonian (1,2,1,1)
2nd Manawatu Scottish (2,1,3,4)
3rd Auckland & District (3,3,4,2)
4th New Zealand Police (4,4,2,3)
5th Northland Caledonian (Gr2) (5,5,5,5)
Judges: A. MacKenzie, Philip Mair (piping); L. Turnbull (ensemble); J. Hilliard (drumming)