Tony McManus is a guitarist from Paisley, Scotland who plays finger-style acoustic guitar arrangements of tunes from Celtic music, classical music, and other genres. McManus emigrated from Scotland to Canada in 2003.
Anthony Edwin Phillips is an English musician, songwriter, producer and singer who gained prominence as the original lead guitarist of the rock band Genesis, from 1967 to 1970. He left in July 1970 and learned to play more instruments, before he began a solo career. His departure from Genesis on the eve of the group's breakthrough to mainstream popularity has led him to be popularly dubbed "the Pete Best of progressive rock".
Christopher William Parkening is an American classical guitarist. He holds the Chair of Classical Guitar at Pepperdine University under the title Distinguished Professor of Music.
John Renbourn was an English guitarist and songwriter. He was best known for his collaboration with guitarist Bert Jansch as well as his work with the folk group Pentangle, although he maintained a solo career before, during and after that band's existence (1967–1973). He worked later in a duo with Stefan Grossman
Horslips are an Irish Celtic rock band that compose, arrange and perform songs frequently inspired by traditional Irish airs, jigs and reels. The group are regarded as 'founding fathers of Celtic rock' for their fusion of traditional Irish music with rock music and went on to inspire many local and international acts. They formed in 1970 and 'retired' in 1980 for an extended period. The name originated from a spoonerism on The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse which became "The Four Poxmen of The Horslypse".
Karan Casey is an Irish folk singer, and a former member of the Irish band Solas. She resides in Cork, Ireland.
Nightnoise was a music ensemble active from 1984 to 1997. Their original blend of Irish traditional music, Celtic music, jazz, and classical chamber music inspired a generation of Irish musicians. They released seven albums on the Windham Hill label.
"Simple Gifts" is a Shaker song written and composed in 1848, generally attributed to Elder Joseph Brackett from Alfred Shaker Village.
Raymond Carlos Nakai is a Native American flutist of Navajo and Ute heritage. Nakai played brass instruments in high school and college, and auditioned for the Armed Forces School of Music after a two-year period in the United States Navy. He began playing a traditional Native American cedar flute after an accident left him unable to play the trumpet. Largely self-taught, he released his first album Changes in 1983, and afterward signed a contract with Canyon Records, who produced more than thirty of his albums in subsequent years. His music prominently features original compositions for the flute inspired by traditional Native American melodies. Nakai has collaborated with musicians William Eaton, Peter Kater, Philip Glass, Nawang Khechog, Paul Horn, and Keola Beamer. He has received 11 Grammy Award nominations for his albums.
Philip Aaberg is an American pianist and composer. He gained international recognition through a series of successful piano recordings released on Windham Hill Records. Although classically trained, Aaberg incorporates classical, jazz, bluegrass, rock, and new music elements into his compositions and musical structures. Although best known for his solo piano work, he is most at home in the chamber jazz genre. His compositions are noted for their "rigorous keyboard technique, diverse influences, and colorful compositional style."
Creid is the arranged soundtrack to Square's role-playing video game Xenogears. It was written by the game's composer Yasunori Mitsuda and performed by a musical ensemble dubbed Millennial Fair. It was released on April 22, 1998 in Japan by DigiCube, and re-released by Square Enix on June 29, 2005. Comprising ten tracks arranged from the Xenogears Original Soundtrack, the album is mostly done in Irish or Celtic music style, with minor influences of Japanese rock according to Mitsuda. Artists from Japan and Ireland were recruited for the project. Four of the five vocal tracks on the album were written by Junko Kudo and sung by Tetsuko Honma, while the title track "Creid" was written by Mitsuda and performed by Eimear Quinn.
Gourd Music is a record label featuring acoustic instrumental music with various ensembles of guitar, cello, flute, oboe, harp, fiddle, hammered and mountain dulcimer, banjo and mandolin.
Barry Phillips is a musician, arranger and producer of many recordings of Celtic, world and American folk music on the Gourd Music label.
Mícheál Ó Domhnaill was an Irish singer, guitarist, composer, and producer who was a major influence on Irish traditional music in the second half of the twentieth century. He is remembered for his innovative work with Skara Brae, the first group to record vocal harmonization in Irish language songs, and The Bothy Band, one of the most influential groups in Irish traditional music. His reputation was enhanced by a successful collaboration with master fiddler Kevin Burke, and his work with the Celtic groups Relativity and Nightnoise, which achieved significant commercial and critical acclaim.
Frederic Hand is a classical guitarist and composer.
Simon Mayor is an English mandolinist, fiddle player, guitarist, composer and humorist. He is noted for a series of instrumental albums featuring the mandolin, live performances with his partner Hilary James and his groups The Mandolinquents and Slim Panatella & the Mellow Virginians, and for writing and performing for children.
Jeff Johnson is a recording artist, composer and producer who has released numerous solo and collaborative recordings. Born near Portland, Oregon, he currently resides in the San Juan Islands in the state of Washington
First You Build a Cloud is an album by guitarists Andy Summers and Ben Verdery on the Rare Recordings label. The album consists of twelve guitar duets, with Verdery on acoustic and Summers on electric.
Windham Hill Records was an independent record label that specialized in instrumental acoustic music. It was founded by guitarist William Ackerman and Anne Robinson in 1976 and was popular in the 1980s and 1990s.
Benjamin Verdery is an American classical guitarist, composer and teacher. Verdery has performed at venues including Carnegie Hall, Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Lincoln Center, the Metropolitan Opera, and Wigmore Hall (London). He has played and recorded with a wide range of classical and other musicians, including guitarists William Coulter, Leo Kottke, Paco Peña, Andy Summers and John Williams, vocalist Hermann Prey, composer Anthony Newman, and his wife, flutist Rie Schmidt. New York Times classical music critic Allan Kozinn described Verdery as "one of the guitar’s grand individualists" and "an iconoclastic player," known as much for his devotion to new music and transcriptions of Jimi Hendrix songs as for inventive interpretations of Bach. As of 2021, Verdery had released 19 albums and been featured on several others. He has taught at the Yale School of Music since 1985.
