Let me expand a bit on the College of Wooster and how ingrained the pipe and drum band is to the campus culture. “Random Acts of Piping” are common and are just what they sound like…pipers with or without drummers making an appearance at an unrelated campus event, playing through an academic building while classes are going on, serenading students during dinner at the dining hall, etc. The pipe band plays at most important campus events as well.
They are also integral in one of the coolest athletic traditions I have witnessed. During home games just before kickoff, the Fighting Scots football team lines up shoulder to shoulder, arm in arm at the top of a slight hill adjacent to the open end of the stadium. In the very center of the line is a group of drummers and pipers. The drummers begin with drumrolls and the pipers follow with Scotland the Brave. The drummers and pipers lead the team down the hill, the team hooting and hollering, pumping themselves up for the game. Eventually, emotion takes over and the team breaks out into a jog which turns into a run, rushing the field Braveheart style. For rivalry games, the captains may break out the blue face paint, an axe and a sword to heighten the imagery. I still get chills whenever I see it. The sound of bagpipes holds a special place in my heart.