Ron Bowen
Ron Bowen (aka Ringo) is the Pipe Band Instructor at St. John's Northwestern Military Academy. He joined the SJNMA faculty in January 2006, and quickly established a new and higher level of excellence for the Academy’s prestigious Bagpipe and Drumming Program. He has grown this daily classroom program to include 90 cadets. In March, 2010 they will perform with The Chieftains, Ireland's most famous mucial group.
In addition to a very diverse background (35 years in senior corporate management) he is highly regarded worldwide as an authority on the Great Highland Bagpipe, and is equally in demand as an instructor of music and pipe bands.
Ron played with several outstanding Grade one and two bands through his competitive piping career, including the famed Clan MacFarlane Pipe Band from St. Catharines, Ontario and, more recently, The Niagara Regional Police Pipe Band which took an impressive 2nd Place
in Grade two at the Worlds in 2001. Ron has since dedicated his time and talent to teaching. In 2004 he built the Braemar Pipe Band into an organization of over one hundred members and three competing bands. He also published a book for pipers entitled The Care and Maintenance of the Great Highland Bagpipe. Today he provides instruction to bands and individuals across North America.
Ringo is an Instructor and Director of MSOPD. The Musical Director for Celtic Nations Pipes and Drums and regularly provides instruction to The Greater Milwaukee Fire and Police Pipe Band. He was instrumental in Celtic Nations winning Grade V MSPBA Champion Supreme, in 2008.
He is a regular composer of pipe band tunes, customized to fit the ability of the group he is working with.
His website, The Bagpipe Place, is one of the premier sites in the world, devoted to his love of bagpipes.
Ron conducting the
SJNMA Pipe Band
