Scottish composer and musician Eddie McGuire entrusts his life’s work to the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland
The life’s work of an acclaimed Scottish composer and folk musician has found a new home at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Eddie McGuire has entrusted RCS’s Archives and Collections with a vast anthology of original music manuscripts, compositional notes, sketches and meticulously maintained performance memorabilia.
The archive not only chronicles his prolific output as a composer but also his career as a flautist and member of the Whistlebinkies, the seminal Scottish ensemble that played a key role in the revival of Scottish traditional folk music and who collaborated with music luminaries including classical violinist Yehudi Menuhin and avant-garde American composer John Cage.
Stuart Harris-Logan, Keeper of Archives and Collections at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, said: “Eddie’s archive represents a hugely important and influential voice in music. As a composer and a performer, Eddie has been involved at the very top level of Scotland’s cultural and performance output for decades.
“RCS Archives & Collections will be honoured to look after this unique and beautifully kept collection on long-term loan, and we are grateful to Eddie for his generosity in allowing us the privilege.”
Eddie, who was born in Glasgow’s Possilpark, studied composition with James Iliff (Royal Academy of Music 1966-70) and with Ingvar Lidholm in Stockholm in 1971. He received a British Composers Award (2003), Creative Scotland Award (2004) and has been featured composer at several international festivals.
The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s Proms performance of his Symphonic Poem Calgacus was selected for BBC Music Magazine’s CD The Very Best of the BBC Orchestras (1997).
Commissions and broadcasts have included those from St Magnus Festival, Edinburgh International Festival, Bath Guitar Festival, Edinburgh International Harp Festival, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Hong Kong City Chamber Orchestra, National Youth Orchestra of Scotland, Northern Sinfonia, Ulster Orchestra and BBC National Orchestra of Wales.
Eddie composed the score for Peter Pan, a three-act ballet, which was performed more than 120 times by Scottish Ballet between 1989 and 1995 and Hong Kong Ballet in 1996.
He has written concertos for guitar, trombone, violin, viola, bass and accordion as well as 24 preludes for various solo instruments.
In 2015, his Symphonies of Galaxies was premiered at University of St Andrews by its New Music Ensemble conducted by Bede Williams – a collaborative venture with the university’s Astronomy and Physics department.
Both CD collections of his music, on Delphian Records, have achieved ‘Editor’s Choice’ in Gramophone Magazine – Eddie McGuire: Music for Flute, Guitar and Piano (2006) and Entangled Fortunes (2015) performed by Red Note ensemble.
During his childhood, his father’s male voice choir rehearsed at the family home, and he had access to the local church organ. This gave him a lasting insight into choral music.
To celebrate the arrival of Eddie’s archive, students paid tribute to the Glasgow-born musician in a concert at RCS, staged by the RCS Composition Lab.
The programme included a performance of Eddie’s Improvisations of Calderon for flute and guitar, played by Shubbe Kabanda (guitar) and Megan Yeoh (flute).
The piece is a commentary on the elements of comedy and tragedy in the work of the Spanish playwright Pedro Calderon de la Barca, who died in 1681, and the music alternates between the two elements with a common central section.
In addition to Eddie’s piece, the concert featured a selection of newly commissioned works by composition students, many inspired by the city of Glasgow’s 850th anniversary.
