Brian McNeill

Brian McNeill is a Scottish folk musician performer, songwriter, composer, producer and musical director. He was a founding member of The Battlefield Band which combined traditional celtic melodies and new material.

Born in Falkirk on April 6, 1950, he learnt music on the violin before taking up electric guitar. McNeill now plays a range of instruments including guitar, fiddle, viola, mandolin, concertina and hurdy-gurdy. He played fiddle with The Battlefield Band from its formation in 1969 until 1990.

In the 1990s he toured extensively with the Scottish ensemble Clan Alba. Recently he has collaborated and toured with fellow member of Clan Alba, Dick Gaughan.

As a novelist he has published two books, "The Busker" and "To Answer The Peacock". He has also produced an acclaimed audio-visual show about Scottish emigration to America, "The Back O' The North Wind".

Apart from his visible contributions, McNeill is influential in Scotland and abroad as a producer. He has many production credits in the UK and North America including "Emigrant and Exile" for Eric Bogle with John Munro [The Great Scots Musicography ISBN 1 84183 041 0, 2002 Mercat Press, Edinburgh] and two CDs for fiddler John Taylor. He is also a prolific songwriter.

In recent years Brian McNeill has hosted the Saturday Session at the Cambridge Folk Festival, pulling together many interesting ad-hoc groupings from bands playing the festival that year. In doing so he has established a festival record for the most consecutive appearances in the program by an artist.

2008 saw Brian McNeill receive the first ever Fatea Magazine Lifetime Achievement Award, recognising, not only, Brian's work as a musician, arranger and producer, but also his work in education passing on his passion for music to rising stars of the next generation

Books

*"The Busker", Macdonald, 1989, ISBN 0356179435
*"To Answer The Peacock", Black Ace Books, 1999, ISBN 1872988326

Discography

Albums

* "Monksgate" (1978)
* "Unstrung Hero" (1985)
* "The Busker and the devil's only daughter" (1985)
* "The Back O' The North Wind" (1991)
* "No Gods" (1995)
* "To Answer the Peacock" (1999)
* "Live and Kicking" with Iain MacKintosh (2000)
* "Stage By Stage" with Iain MacKintosh (1995)
* "Horses for Courses" with Tom McDonagh (1994)

External links

* [http://www.brianmcneill.co.uk/ Official website]

References