Brian McNeill
THE BALTIC TAE BYZANTIUM - Tales of the Scots in Europe (2009)
TRACK LISTINGS
1. The Baltic Tae Byzantium 5.50 [listen]
2. Scotus 2.40 [listen]
3. A Far North Land 5.31 [listen]
4. Bothwell 4.29 [listen]
5. The Holland Trade 5.38 [listen]
6. Auld Man By The Fire 3.31 [listen]
7. The Gothenburg Reel /
John's Awa Tae France / Danzig Willie's Reel 4.04 [listen]
8. How The Foreign Winds Do Blaw / Madam Dae Ye Ken
The Dance? 4.42 [listen]
9. Back Tae Berwick Johnnie 3.44 [listen]
10.Bring The Lassie Hame 8.13 [listen]
11.True To The Forest 3.23 [listen]
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Brian McNeill's professional career spans more than three decades and he is acknowledged as one of Scotland's great musical forces -- as a songwriter, composer, producer and musical director, as well as performer. He is both “a master musician and a great writer," says Scotland’s Living Tradition Magazine.
An accomplished multi-instrumentalist, McNeill may be best known for his fiddle playing but he also plays guitar, mandocello, bouzouki, viola, mandolin, cittern, concertina, bass and hurdy gurdy. Born in 1950 in Falkirk, Brian began his musical training in his early teens with violin lessons. He forsook that for electric guitar and there followed a comprehensive musical education and “mildly misspent youth,” until his student years brought him to Celtic music. As a direct consequence, in 1969 he formed Battlefield Band, which became one of Scotland's best known ensembles. In 1990, Brian McNeill left the Battlefield Band to concentrate more on writing and solo projects.
Brian's new album, The Baltic Tae Byzantium, Tales of the Scots in Europe, follows fascinating tales of Scottish emigration across Europe, from shepherds and soldiers to Calvinists and queens. Originally commissioned by Celtic Connections (the international music festival in Glasgow), the album tells the stories of Scots who have made their mark all over Europe, among them Mary Queen of Scots, John Knox, General Tam Dalyell, Clementine Walkinshaw (Bonnie Prince Charlie’s mistress), and Brian’s own father, a soldier in World War II, who met Brian’s mother after the war when stationed in Austria. McNeill also looks at Scottish communities as a whole, including the wool traders with Veere in Holland and the farmers who took their skills to Poland.
