Added on Sunday 5 Feb 2012

Fred Morrison at Celtic Connections 2012

Morrison took to the Late Sessions stage for the BBC Radio at Celtic Connections 2012 on Tuesday 31st January with Tim O'Brien and other band members. Scottish piper Fred Morrison is known for playing in the Gaelic piping tradition of South Uist. He also plays the Great Highland Bagpipes, the bellows-blown reel pipes, the Irish Uileann pipes, and the low whistle. He is one of the world's leading pipers and is a renowned composer of music for the bagpipes. He has won gold medals in the Scottish competition piping circuit.? Morrison plays both eclectic and contemporary styles.? His father taught him through the traditional method of canntairachd, the sung vocables used to convey pipe music before notation. "I hear that singing in my head every time I play." Morrison was voted "Instrumentalist of the Year" in the Scots Trad Music Awards for 2004. He joined Clan Alba with Dick Gaughan and three years later with Scottish band Capercaille. He co-arranged the music for the film Rob Roy and co-wrote "Paracas"(Gaelic for "Rhapsody of the Gael") with the orchestral composer Mark Sheridan - premiered at Celtic Connections 2005. In 2006 he formed the Fred Morrison Band with Paul Jennings, Duncan Lyall, Douglas Miller and Innes Watson. Morrison's album Outlands was released in 2009.?

Photo by Pauline Keightley musicfootnotes.com