Meet Our Instructors!
Matt Kiegelmann
It is very important that new students are taught things the right way while on their journey to becoming a piper or drummer. The teaching process for a piper will take a student roughly 1 year until they are ready to be playing in the circle on the bagpipes. The drumming learning curve is slightly shorter however this always relies heavily on how often students are practicing and if they have had any musical experience in the past.
We are very fortunate to have 2 very dedicated instructors who's mission is to get you from dreaming about being in a pipe band to actually playing in one. Currently we have a father/son duo who take care of this very time consuming task. Both Peter and Kavan come to practice early and usually stay late, making sure each of our students get the attention they need.
Peter Johnstone-Shulz has been a member of our band and executive for the last 7yrs. Peter wears many hats in our band as he is our Pipe Sergeant, Equipment Manager and Piping Instructor. Pete spends at least 15-30mins individually with each student and makes sure no bad habits are ever picked up. He is easily one of the most dedicated members of our band and he is my right hand man when it comes to running our band.
Kavan Johnstone-Shulz is our side drumming instructor. Kavan was a member of the band for 4yrs until he took over the Drum Sergeant role for the Ryan Russell Memorial Pipe Band (Toronto Police). Kavan is an accomplished solo player and will be competing in the Grade 3 category this coming season. He takes lessons from the best (Dan Bist/Doug Stronach) and shares his knowledge with our up and coming drumming students.
Teaching takes a lot of patience and dedication. I would like to thank both Peter and Kavan for their ongoing hard work and let them know that their duties in our band do not go unnoticed. The level of playing in our band is on the rise as our students are better prepared for the big band experience due to our instructors hard work and diligence.
P/M Matt