When looking back on his life and involvement with music, Jack seems to do that with a somewhat “telescopic” view.
He was born in Winnipeg, and his father was transferred to Montreal when he was just 18 months old. They frequently returned to Winnipeg and he distinctly remembers being in his grandfather's living room and marveling at the sound of the pipes. Especially the chanter when he came really close by (apparently, as an infant, they had to remove Jack from the room as he would have a tendency to just scream).
The Coghill family moved to Ottawa in 1962 and it was about 1963 when his father brought him for drum lessons at the old CFB Rockliffe band house with John Kerr. The classic mama dada, and paradiddle. He would have been just eight years old at the time and was genuinely frightened by this tall and monstrous character. Maybe three or four lessons is all it lasted? Twenty years later, John and Jack were great friends, playing together in the Dunvegan Pipe Band, not to mention the summer
militia courses, and the times JK caught Jack in a mess while he was working on his BMus and wanted to discuss something about Dvorak, Balinese Gamelan, or why strathspeys weren't written in 12/8, etc.
Thank you to Graeme Ogilvie for this instalment.