Four members of the Banda de Gaitas del Batallon de San Patricio, a Mexican pipe band that pays homage to the Irish battalion that fought on the side of Mexico in the 1846-48 U.S.-Mexico War,
made the group’s first ever appearance at this year’s world-famous Edinburgh Military Tattoo, a popular display of British and international military bands that takes place each August on the esplanade of Edinburgh Castle in the Scottish capital.
The term “tattoo” derives from the Dutch phrase doe den tap toe (turn off the tap), a signal to tavern owners each night, played by a regiment’s Corps of Drums, to turn off the taps of their ale kegs so that the soldiers would retire to their billeted lodgings at a reasonable hour.