Ashley MacIsaac

Ashley MacIsaac

Ashley Dwayne MacIsaac (born February 24, 1975 in Creignish, Nova Scotia) is a Canadian professional fiddler from Cape Breton Island.

While MacIsaac's fiddle-playing is entirely traditional, he often sets it in contemporary rock songs with hip hop and dance elements. He has, however, also released several albums of more traditional folk music. Unlike most other left-handed violinists, he actually plays the fiddle left-handed.

His greatest mainstream success in Canada was his 1995 album Hi™ How Are You Today?, featuring the hit single "Sleepy Maggie", with vocals in Scottish Gaelic by Mary Jane Lamond.

MacIsaac published an autobiography, Fiddling with Disaster in 2003.

Biography

Family

MacIsaac's sister Lisa is also a touring fiddler and appears on his album Helter's Celtic. His cousins Alexis MacIsaac, Wendy MacIsaac and Natalie MacMaster are also touring fiddlers. Ashley MacIsaac is a distant cousin of The White Stripes guitarist and lead vocalist Jack White. The two met and MacIsaac opened for The White Stripes concert in Glace Bay.

Controversy

MacIsaac has sometimes been a controversial figure, who has often appears to use shock tactics to gain attention. For example, in 1999, he told a journalist for The New Yorker that his goal was to become "weirder than Michael Jackson".

He elicited a considerable amount of controversy in 1996, after being interviewed by Maclean's for their best of the year section. He told the Maclean's interviewer that he had previously discussed his sexual life, including his sixteen year old boyfriend and his enjoyment of kinky sex acts including watersports, in an interview with the LGBT newsmagazine The Advocate. For its part, The Advocate did not print any of the controversial assertions, but Maclean's nonetheless dropped him from its year-end honours list and instead wrote a disparaging article on him.

In the same year, MacIsaac toured the United States as an opening act for The Chieftains. Another opener, folk singer Nanci Griffith, dropped out of the tour. While it was widely reported in the media that Griffith objected to MacIsaac's musical style, Griffith indicated in a 1998 interview with Rolling Stone that her primary conflict was not with MacIsaac himself, but with the tour organizers over how much time was actually available for her to perform after MacIsaac was added to the bill.

In 1997, MacIsaac appeared on Late Night with Conan O'Brien, in a controversial performance during which one of his kick steps lifted his kilt high enough that his genitals were clearly visible to both the studio audience and the television cameras. MacIsaac stated that this was unintentional.

In 1998, he included one hip-hop song (including the word fuck) in a performance at an all-ages venue in Fort Erie, Ontario. Most press coverage of the incident gave the false impression that the whole show had been significantly more lewd and laden with swear words than it actually was.

Shortly thereafter, MacIsaac fought successfully to be independent of his record label and was dropped from Universal Music. He subsequently signed with the independent label Loggerhead Records for his 1999 album Helter's Celtic. During the promotional tour for that album, he indicated to the press that he had previously battled an addiction to crack cocaine.

On December 31, 1999, MacIsaac again gave a controversial performance at a show in Halifax, in which his entire performance consisted of a twenty-minute rant containing numerous expletives and, allegedly, several racist statements, which turned out to be actually verbal irony. A few days later, MacIsaac got into a media spat with Loggerhead after the label sent out a press release distancing itself from his actions.

Later in 2000, MacIsaac left a stage in Chatham, Ontario, after a patron approached him with a beer bottle, ready to throw it at the performer. Also the same year, MacIsaac told the Halifax Chronicle-Herald that he was on the verge of declaring bankruptcy, retracted the statement within a few days, and then actually filed for bankruptcy several months later.

In 2003, MacIsaac was again alleged to have made racist statements on stage, at a show where he reportedly accused an Asian woman in the audience of spreading SARS. He subsequently stated that the comment was intended as an ironic parody of racism, and sued the Ottawa Citizen for misrepresenting the statement as racist when in fact he was speaking out against racial profiling happening in Canada at the time.

Political involvement

In 2005, MacIsaac pursued a new direction, after signing on with Linus Entertainment (home to Gordon Lightfoot and Ron Sexsmith) forming a rock band with himself on lead vocals and guitar. He has declared an interest in politics and has stated, in a letter to the National Post, that he is studying constitutional law so as to pursue an entry into Canadian federal politics.

In the March 20, 2006, edition of the Halifax Daily News, MacIsaac declared himself a candidate for the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada. Some Canadian journalists, including Mike Duffy, characterized MacIsaac's campaign as a publicity stunt to promote his new CD Pride, which was released just a day after declaring himself a candidate. MacIsaac told the Canadian Press that he fully intended to mount a serious campaign, but on June 21, 2006, MacIsaac decided to no longer take part in the leadership race. However, he has not ruled out future attempts. His stated reasons for withdrawing from the race were a lack of French language skills, and his concern for other leading candidates' intentions on foreign policy.

In a comment to national press, another fiddler turned politician, Rodney MacDonald, the Premier of Nova Scotia, praised MacIsaac by stating it would be a nice thing to see him in federal politics. Both MacIsaac and MacDonald played in a group together in the late eighties called The Next Generation and have been friends for many years, starting out as the only two well-known young male step dancers from Cape Breton. MacDonald, however, is a Conservative while MacIsaac is a "life-long" Liberal.

eBay

MacIsaac is currently auctioning off 50% of all his future earnings on eBay. As of July 1, 2008, the highest bid was $1.5 million.

Trivia

• In the manga series Bleach, the author Tite Kubo gives main characters theme songs based on their personality, and MacIsaac's "Wingstock" is the theme of character Rukia Kuchiki.

Discography

• Close to the Floor (1992)
• A Cape Breton Christmas (credited to Ashley MacIsaac and Friends, 1993)
• Hi™ How Are You Today? (1995)
• Fine®, Thank You Very Much (1996)
• Helter's Celtic (1999)
• capebretonfiddlemusicNOTCALM (with Howie MacDonald, 2001)
• Ashley MacIsaac (2003)
• Live at the Savoy (2004)
• Fiddle Music 101 (with Dave MacIsaac, 2005)
• Pride (2006)

Filmography

• The Hanging Garden - Basil, wedding musician (1997)
• Power Play - himself (one episode, 1999)
• New Waterford Girl - town fiddler (1999)
• Nabbie no koi - Ashley O'Connor (1999)
• Marion Bridge - Mickey (2002)
• Life and Times - himself (one episode, 2005)

External links

• Ashley MacIsaac official website
• Ashley MacIsaac at IMDb
• Template:Myspace