My personal all time favorite pipe band is/was the 1998 Victoria Police Pipe Band from Australia. They won the World Championships in Grade I the same year we (the Hamilton Pipe Band) won it in Grade III. They had the purest sound and some of the best music I have ever heard produced by a pipe band. To hear them live in Scotland that year was truly amazing.
The organization that sanctions and helps to organize and officiate the many highland games competitions in the Eastern United States. Their website is a great resource for all things related to pipe bands and bagpipe competition in this part of the world.
Another Asheville-area bagpiper, and a good friend.
E.J. learned to play pipes at the same parochial school that I did in Houston, Texas. Hs is an accomplished performer and composer, and a skilled craftsman who makes a beautiful set of smallpipes.
Based in Oklahoma, the Westminster Pipe Band is a competitive Grade III band that E.J. Jones and I will be playing with in the 2010 competition season. Several of its members are old Hamilton Pipe Band guys and top-notch pipers, including its pipe major, Bruce Robertson -- another attorney/piper and a heck of a good fella.