In 2006, she was made a member of the Order of Canada, and in 2020, she was made a member of the Order of Nova Scotia. MacMaster was also awarded an honorary doctorate from Niagara University in New York in 2006. She has received a number of Canadian music awards, including several "Artist of the Year" awards from the East Coast Music Association, two Juno Awards for best instrumental album, and "Fiddler of the Year" from the Canadian Country Music Association. She performed two songs with the trio: "C-H-I-C-K-E-N" and "Grandpa's Farm". In 2004, MacMaster appeared on Sharon, Lois & Bram's 25th Anniversary Concert special titled " 25 Years of Skinnamarink" that aired on CBC on Januat 7:00pm. In recent years she has expanded her musical repertoire, mixing her Cape Breton roots with music from Scotland and Ireland, as well as American bluegrass. In 1999, she performed at the Juno Awards show in Hamilton. Both albums were initially released only on cassette, but Rounder Records omitted a few tracks and re-released as A Compilation in 1998. Her first album was self-produced, while her second was co-produced by John Morris Rankin ( The Rankin Family) and Tom O'Keefe (as per original cassette jacket). When she was sixteen she released her first album, Four on the Floor, and a second album, Road to the Isle, followed in 1991. MacMaster began playing the fiddle at the age of nine, and made her performing debut the same year at a square dance in Glencoe Mills, Nova Scotia. Leahy and MacMaster have seven children, and have performed and recorded together as a duo, and occasionally include their children, who also play fiddle, in their performances. In 2002, she married fiddler Donnell Leahy of the Leahy family band, and moved to Lakefield, Ontario. She is also distantly related to Jack White. She is the niece of the late renowned Cape Breton fiddler Buddy MacMaster and the cousin of two other fiddlers, Ashley MacIsaac and Andrea Beaton. MacMaster is the daughter of Alex and Minnie (née Beaton) MacMaster and the sister of Kevin and David MacMaster. CAPTION: Natalie MacMaster plays a mean Celtic fiddle and branches into folk-rock, honky-tonk and techno on "No Boundaries.MacMaster & Donnell Leahy performing together at the 2018 Burlington's Sound of Music Festival Appearing Wednesday at the Barns of Wolf Trap. (Prince William residents, call 690-4110.) "Fit as a Fiddle" (Rounder). To hear a free Sound Bite from this album, call Post-Haste at 202/334-9000 and press 8105. NATALIE MacMASTER - "No Boundaries" (Rounder). On other tunes, such as "Reel Beatrice," MacMaster is joined by a drummer, bassist and keyboardist who simply bolster her rhythms without changing them. Even when she's joined by a synth, drum machine and vocalist Cookie Rankin of the Rankin Family on a medley called "The Drunken Piper," the leader's fiddle cuts through the competition. These various musical fusions are handled with much better taste than one might suppose, for the pastoral lilt of MacMaster's violin sets the tone for every piece. The same approach can be heard on five of the 13 tracks on "No Boundaries," but MacIsaac's influence is felt on the other eight, in which MacMaster's lyrical fiddling is placed in various settings - folk-rock, honky-tonk, chamber-orchestra and techno-dance. "Fit as a Fiddle" was a straightforward collection of traditional Celtic fiddle tunes performed with undeniable flair and simple accompaniment. Rounder Records has now reissued her 1993 Canadian debut album, "Fit as a Fiddle," in the United States for the first time as well as her new recording, "No Boundaries." Watching her red curls bounce as the tall, slender girl fiddled and danced simultaneously has been a sight to behold. MacMaster has been a strikingly forceful Celtic fiddler ever since she started visiting the Washington Irish Festival as a teenager in the late '80s. Now Natalie MacMaster is trying to perform a similar alchemy on the same assets. ASHLEY MacISAAC is a youthful Cape Breton fiddler and step-dancer who parlayed these unlikely qualifications into a major-label contract and minor stardom.
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