By PAUL MILLAR
SCOTTISH performer Isla Grant tapped into personal tragedy, using it as an inspiration to revive her career after a near fatal car accident.
The acclaimed singer-song-writer is on a whistle-stop tour of Australia, taking in 21 venues in less than a month, with a one-night show at GPAC on 25 September.
“This is my life, it’s what I do and if I wasn’t doing this I would be at home twiddling my thumbs,” she says with a lilt from the Scottish border.
Music has been constant in her life; her father was a piper and a highlander and her mother could hold a tune while her grandfather was a fiddler.
She served her apprenticeship in the knockabout clubs in England’s north-east where she was told, “if you can work these clubs, you can work anywhere”.
She now works everywhere to meet the demands of a faithful, growing fan base.
But she admits that a car smash brought a sudden halt to her career. She had also recently married her husband Al, who performs with her.
Isla suffered internal injuries and a broken wrist and was told that she would probably never sing again.
She would wake up crying in the night and couldn’t listen to songs on the radio.
She had time on her hands during her recovery and instead of allowing the memories of the smash to slowly crush her, she wrote down her feelings and put them to music.
“My songs are about life and hopefully we paint a picture through our music,” she said.
“It’s what people like to hear, it’s simplicity and there is a truthfulness in my songs.”
She now performs a more easy listening style, respecting her country and folk backgrounds.
She records with CMR Records in Dublin, who also look after Foster & Allen, and has six albums to her credit. The first three, Only Yesterday, Mother and A Dream Come True achieved double platinum sales.
