This week on A Prairie Home Companion This week on A Prairie Home Companion, we revisit a classic performance from 2000 where we traveled to Edinburgh, Scotland, for a show from Queen’s Hall. We welcomed Scotland’s own Battlefield Band, Boys of the Lough member Dave Richardson, and mystery novelist Ian Rankin. Also with us, the Royal Academy of Radio Actors (Tim Russell and Sue Scott), the Guy’s All-Star Shoe Band, plus the latest News from Lake Wobegon. Join us Saturday for a listen via our Facebook page at 5 p.m. CT (or click the link below). Listen to the Show >>>Like our Facebook page >>> More about this week’s featured guests
Although the group’s personnel changed over time, the BATTLEFIELD BAND spent more than four decades entertaining fans worldwide — touring extensively, including visits to Singapore, Australia, Syria, Jordan, India, Sri Lanka, and Egypt, as well as across Europe and Canada. Taking their name from the Glasgow district in which the group was formed, the band played an amalgamation of traditional Scottish music and modern composition. Critics said that the Battlefield Band combined “the classical Celtic music of the Scottish Highlands with the contemporary rock-oriented folk music of modern Britain.” Fiddle, bagpipes, and guitar are common instruments in Celtic bands, but the Battlefield Band is credited with being the first to add synthesizer. The lineup on this broadcast: founding member Alan Reid (keyboards, guitar), Mike Katz (Highland bagpipe), John McCusker (fiddle), and Davy Steele (guitar, cittern, bodhran). Philadelphia Folk” >>>Available music >>>
IAN RANKIN was born in the Scottish village of Cardenden and became a writer at an early age, writing his own comic books. He later turned to poetry and won several prizes by the time he reached university. At the University of Edinburgh, he began to write short stories and again won several literary prizes. He wrote his first three novels, the last of which introduced “Inspector Rebus,” while working toward a Ph.D. in English Literature. Through jobs with the National Folktale Centre and the magazine Hi-Fi Review, Rankin continued to write, experimenting with various genres. His most recent Inspector Rebus book is 2020’s A Song for the Dark Times,
“In Conversation” >>>Available books >>>
DAVE RICHARDSON grew up in Wallsend-on-Tyne, in the border country between England and Scotland. He became aware of the rich music heritage of the area in his mid-teens and began learning Northumbrian pipe tunes on the tin whistle. He joined the popular Celtic band Boys of the Lough in the early 1970s and, along with fellow band members Aly Bain and Cathal McConnell, contributed to the material written by the group over the years. A number of those tunes have been embraced by other artists. Richardson’s jig “Calliope House” is among the music featured in a production of Lord of the Dance.
“Boys of the Lough at the Lismore Bar 2003” >>>The Boys of the Lough available music>>> | 
