Despite the rain, the Moss Vale Showground played host to the inaugural Highlands Pipes and Drums competition at the weekend.

A truly damp Highlands day was enjoyed by all last Sunday as 11 pipe bands and more than 100 pipers took to the field to take part in the event.

The solo pipers and bands filled the Moss Vale Showground arena with bands competing from across NSW.

Chieftain for the day, Wingecarribee Shire Council Mayor Phil Yeo, officially opened the competition.

Mayor Yeo congratulated the bands on realising their goal of putting this Highlands competition firmly onto the NSW Pipe Band calendar.

The pipers and drummers performed without a second thought despite the frequent downpours, providing a great spectacle and wonderful music before culminating with a massed bands display.

The Southern Highlands craft fair and markets formed a backdrop for the event with many Scottish clan stalls and purveyors of Scottish fare adding to the array of produce which are a feature of the regular markets.

Scottish enthusiast Garry Barnsley said it says much for the toughness of character of pipers and drummers that even the thickest of Highland mists did not dampen their enthusiasm.

"These events take months in the planning and organising and we are all indebted to Pipe Major Parker and his collaborators for their initiative in promoting a premier annual solo piping, drumming and pipe band competition at the grand old Moss Vale Showground," Mr Barnsley said.

"They have enhanced the prestige of the Southern Highlands as the pinnacle of Scottish culture in Australia.

"And they have done it by complementing, not rivalling, Bundanoon's famous Brigadoon."