Live Music Now!, a charitable scheme founded by the late Lord Menuhin in 1977, will present a series of workshops for children and performances in Campbeltown and Gigha community venues on Saturday 27, Sunday 28, Monday 29 and Tuesday 30 March.

Fiddler Eilidh Campbell from Aberfoyle and guitarist Andy Webster will present a weekend of Scottish traditional music workshops with local school children leading to a performance involving the children who having taken part over the weekend.  All workshops and the shared performance will be held at the Argyll Arms, Main Street, Campbeltown. They will also perform in a number of community venues for older people and their guests from the wider community, adults with disabilities, pre-school children and frail elderly people in residential care, as follows: 

Saturday 27 March       10.00am           Workshop 1

Saturday 27 March       1.30pm            Workshop 2

Saturday 27 March       7.30pm            Function Suite, Royal Hotel, Campbeltown (older people’s concert + guests - free of charge)

Sunday 28 March         11.00am           Workshop 3

Sunday 28 March       3.30pm            Performance by children with Eilidh and Andy

Sunday 28 March         6.30pm            Auchinlee Eventide Home, Campbeltown

Monday 29 March       1.00pm            Community Hall, Gigha

Monday 29 March       6.30pm            The Care Centre, Campbeltown

Tuesday 30 March       10.30am           Woodlands Centre, Campbeltown

Tuesday 30 March       1.00pm            Campbeltown   Nursery Centre, Ralston Road, Campbeltown

Eilidh Campbell was brought up in Aberfoyle, in the Trossachs, and started playing the fiddle at the age of eight. She graduated from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow in 2001 where she specialised in ‘Music in the Community’, which involved her visiting schools – both mainstream and those for children with learning difficulties - and delivering music workshops.  She is also an experienced fiddle teacher, with experience in both group and individual tuition.

Now twenty-four, she plays with various bands, and has performed in many countries throughout Europe, the Czech Republic, Singapore, the USA and Scandinavia, and completed a six-week tour of New Zealand in 1998.

Andy Webster, age 25, has played guitar for over 16 years. He is adept at many styles of guitar ranging from classical to folk and funk. Specialising in the steel-string acoustic guitar, he has built up a sound reputation for himself especially in the Celtic and Scottish traditional circuit. To date, Andy has toured in countries as diverse as Russia, Turkey, France, Belgium, Italy and Canada, as well as touring in his own nation extensively. At present, he is a member of two professional bands: Brolum and Calasaig, who are regularly seen at major festivals such as Celtic Connections, Glasgow; and the Festival de Interceltique, France.

In June 2000, Andy graduated from the University of Strathclyde with a BA Honours Degree in Applied Music excelling in classical guitar, which he spent four years studying there. He is also a fine trumpeter, bassist and singer.

The South Kintyre/Gigha series of performances is the third of four similar tours, which also takes Live Music Now! to Mull, Islay, Jura and Colonsay. All events are funded by the Scottish Executive's Better Neighbourhood Services Fund and Argyll and the Islands Community Economic Development Programme, which has been awarded through Argyll and the Islands Enterprise. The Community Economic Development Programme is a scheme part funded by the European Structural Funds through the Highlands and Islands Special Transitional Programme 2000-2006.

Live Music Now! was founded by Yehudi Menuhin in 1977 with the two-fold aim of taking live music of high quality to everyone in our communities while simultaneously offering young professional musicians the invaluable opportunity of performing at the outset of their careers.       

Further information telephone 0131 332 6356 or e-mail scotland@livemusicnow.org