The National Youth Pipe Band of Scotland's concert on Saturday will see it premiere new material alongside some of its established repertoire

PIPE Band aficionados can expect a dazzling performance in more ways than one from the National Youth Pipe Band of Scotland when it takes the stage at Glasgow's Old Fruitmarket this Saturday.

Having established a reputation for accomplished and ambitious performances since its formation in 2003, the band, whose musical prowess belies an age range of between 10 and 25, has further developed its act by commissioning stage lighting designer Adrian Turpin, whose previous concert credits have included Runrig, to create a light and video show around the band's music.

Saturday's concert, aptly titled Illuminations, will see the NYPBoS premiere new material alongside some of the established repertoire it featured in its Dragon's Lair concert at Edinburgh's Usher Hall in November 2009 (and recorded on DVD). Alisdair McLaren, the band's director, concedes there is always a risk of the light show spilling over into gimmickry rather than simply complementing the band's musical abilities.

"Saturday will tell whether we've done the right things or pushed the limits too far," he says, speaking at the National Piping Centre in Glasgow, which employs him to run the youth band, "but from the look of things so far, I don't think we're going overboard."

The NYPBoS takes a "total performance" approach to concerts, augmenting pipers and drummers with rock drum kit, keyboards, electric guitar, bass and fiddle, and on Saturday will also feature guest Gaelic singer Catriona Watt. The band can field as many as 35 pipers, but limited space at the Old Fruitmarket suggests that there will be only 20 pipers and five snare drummers on stage at any one time.

Not that the spectacle is likely to be diminished. This is Turpin's first time designing for a pipe band performance, although, he says, essentially the approach is the same, whatever the genre: "It's about really listening to the music and interpreting what you hear. I was pleasantly surprised at the wide variation in style of the material that was going to form the content of the Illumination show, from traditional to what is essentially rock music."

Lighting apart, McLaren promises newly composed material including a suite, 1915, commemorating the war dead, and a "rock suite", intriguingly titled The Hamster. In contrast to their more exuberantly contemporary material, he also promises the kind of "straight" march, strathspey and reel medley which is an essential of the competition piping repertoire. For while the band is strictly a performance ensemble, most of its members also play in leading competing bands or compete as soloists, and will be dispersing shortly for this year's competition season, although we can expect further NYPBoS concerts later in the year, including a collaboration with that other esteemed musical acronym, the RSNO.

Among them is the NYPBoS's pipe major, Emma Buchan, who will make her farewell appearance with the band on Saturday, while continuing to play in the ranks of one of Scotland's leading competition bands, Boghall & Bathgate Caledonia.

McLaren himself, a 31-year-old Australian and former pipe major of the West Australia Police band, will also enter the competition arena with Northern Ireland's six times world champion Field Marshal Montgomery Pipe Band - an example of the mobility of today's top competing pipers.

If the standard among the youth band's highly motivated young players is anything to go by, many seem likely to carve out a place in top level band or solo piping.

"Their playing is exceptional for the ages some of them are," observes McLaren. "I probably wasn't playing anywhere near the abilities of some of these guys when I was their age, and I've managed to get into a top Grade One band, so these guys are going to be even better."

•The National Youth Pipe Band of Scotland plays the Old Fruitmarket, Glasgow, on 23 April