John McCusker

Few fiddlers in Scottish folk have moved as easily between the session room, the studio and the commissioned concert hall as John McCusker. Born in Bellshill in 1973, he took up the fiddle at seven and absorbed youth orchestras and cèilidh bands. As a folk musician, record producer and composer, he has shaped records for a wide range of artists.

At fourteen he formed Parcel O'Rogues with schoolmates, a name taken from Robert Burns's poem. At sixteen he turned down the Royal Scottish Academy to tour with the Battlefield Band, staying eleven years. His debut solo album came out on Temple Records in 1995, and in 2003 he won BBC Radio 2's Folk Musician of the Year award. In 2007 Celtic Connections and the Cambridge Folk Festival commissioned Under One Sky, which brought together Julie Fowlis and former Blur guitarist Graham Coxon. He toured it across the UK in late 2008, and in 2014 he contributed to Wenlock Hill, the album by Simon Fowler's project Merrymouth.