Celtic Entertainer of the Year '97
by Scottish Clans of North Texas & Celtic Heritage Society of East Texas
and honored as
Chieftain of the Games '04
by the Sweet
Home Celtic Festival and Highland Games, Sweet
Home, OR
Above left: Red with Trinity Dancers from Chicago, IL, North
Texas Irish Festival, Dallas, TX
Above right: Taking a much needed break, still with guitar in
hand (you call this a break?)!
With close to 275 performances to his credit in 1997,
Red McWilliams has taken the right steps to become one of the most recognized
names in Celtic music in the south and southwest. Combining a percussive
guitar with a rich baritone voice and a positive attitude has created the
perfect blend of "entertainer", the fact of which has been proven by being
awarded
"Celtic Entertainer of the Year, '97" by the Celtic Heritage
Society of East Texas and the
"Johnny Hailstones Entertainer of the Year, '97" from
the Scottish Clans of North Texas, Ft. Worth.
Red has also received awards and commendations from:
National Honor Fraternity of Community
and Junior Colleges
The Celtic Heritage Association
of Oklahoma, Inc.(Tulsa)
The Castle of Muskogee (OK)
Mobile (AL) International Festival
Bank One Corporation
The Denton (TX) Celtic Society
Project Children
Pennsylvania Game Commission
North Texas Irish Festival
Caledonian and St. Andrew's Society
of Seattle
Clan Donald Society, Pacific Northwest
Tartan Day Washington
Tacoma Scots Pipes and Drums
and won the Bonniest
Knees Contest at the Ozark (MO) Area
Celtic Gathering, June 3, 2000
& The Scottish Society of
Mobile (AL) Burns Night, February 4, 2006)
Ready to play at the drop of a hat (with some loose change
in it), he keeps his calendar full, due in the most part to the way he
moves from ballads to bawdy, from patriotic to parody, historical to hysterical,
only to be punctuated by off-the-wall comments, jokes, ribald humor and
snide remarks caused by something in his nature that drives him to "entertain"
his audiences and participation is highly encouraged. Red has been known
to get people from the crowd to sing a song,
tell a story, dance or just sing along. Basically, whatever
entertains them.
"Boldly going where no regional Celt has gone before",
Red has taken himself from the "ranks" to the "front lines" by going professional,
national and international. At last count, Red has performed on 3 continents,
5 countries, 28 states at around 55 Scottish Highland Games and Celtic
festivals with many coffee houses, pubs, clubs, restaurants
with quite a few miles in between. (Yep, stack up those
frequent flyer miles!)
During his career in Celtic music, Red has performed,
sung with and/or opened for acts such as
Battlefield Band, Brother, Men of Worth (Donnie MacDonald
and Jimmy Keigher),
Seven Nations, Sian James Band (Welsh triple harpist),
Joni Madden (Cherish the Ladies),
The Fureys, Noel Nash, Patrick O'Flaherty (Celtic Folk),
the late Tommy Makem and John Gary,
Alex Beaton, Wolfstone, Brendan Grace and others.
He has been featured in articles in such publications as:
Japan Times (Tokyo, Japan)
Ft. Worth Star-Telegram
Pittsburgh Post Gazette
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Kentucky New Era
The Celtic Connection (BC, Canada)
Dallas Morning News
Dallas Times Herald
Scottish Connection Journal
Odessa American
East Texas People
Lewisville News
Bank One, Texas' newsletter The Wire
Southwest Celtic
Music Association's
Ceili and others.
Red has performed, quite adequately, for groups large
and small
("Where three or four are gathered, there's always a
'fifth'"),
Scottish, Irish, Welsh, Japanese, Polish, Italian, Greek,
Hawaiian and every other Celtic grouping.
He has Headlined/Co-Headlined and has been the Master
of Ceremonies
of at least 55 festivals and games in the US, Japan and
Scotland.
Red's performance schedule in 2009 (at this time) includes
Alabama, Florida, Mississippi,
Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Washington with
possibilities of Scotland & the UK
(and looking ahead to the possibilities of Australia
in 2010)
Red has proudly associated himself with "Project
Children", a New York based organization which raises funds
to bring kids, Catholic and Protestant, from the "war zone" of Northern
Ireland for a six week stay in the US, "Dunvegan Foundation"
of Clan MacLeod raising funds to help build a geneological complex at Dunvegan
on the Isle of Skye in Scotland,
Tartan Day Washington, bringing awareness of our Scottish
heritage here in the US
and is the entertainment/ceilidh director for the Tacoma
Highland Games
Red wishes to thank and extends his gratitude to all of
the Scots and Irish who have helped make this all possible.
Without their and your support, there would be no "Red
McWilliams".
Look for him at an Irish festival or Scottish Highland games, a pub or an elementary, high school or college near you soon! By the way, if you see him broken down on the highway, please stop and help him, he's supposed to be somewhere!
Red
McWilliams
"The
Celtic Tradition Continues"