Yard of Ale, Folk & Blues band, playing live at the Guildford Arms, West Register Place, Edinburgh City Centre, Scotland, UK

Yard Of Ale formed originally in 1972 and had ten successful years on the pub and club circuit, winning the TV Times "Pub Entertainers of the Year" award, doing well on ITV's "New Faces" and appearing on many television and radio shows including STV's "Thingummyjig" and BBC Scotland's "Scottish Radio Orchestra Roadshow". During this time they also supported, amongst others, Matt McGinn, Hamish Imlach and Billy Connolly and enjoyed an extended run at the Edinburgh Festival with the legendary Tim Hardin. Thereafter they went their separate ways........Alistair McDougald performing solo on the club cabaret circuit, Colin Mackenzie forming and playing with North Sea Gas folk group and Ian Lawson leading a successful rock band. In 1992 the group reformed for a project in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe with Bill Hill in which they performed acoustic music spanning 30 years........Skiffle, Folk, Protest, Calypso, Country and Contemporary. "One of the hits of this year's festival" - Danny Kyle, BBC Radio Scotland. Since then the band have been in great demand for concerts, folk festivals, corporate functions, pub, hotel and club gigs all over Scotland and on tour in Denmark and Ireland. Peter Gillan joined the band when Ian retired due to work commitments in 1998. Having spent many years as a singer/guitarist playing solo on the folk and country scenes, Peter's experience has added yet another dimension to the band. Walter Mowat joined Yard Of Ale in 2015. Walter has played in a number of folk and bluegrass bands over the years and also plays violin with the Really Terrible Orchestra. Ian Lawson and Colin Mackenzie still occasionally feature with the band for larger gigs and as emergency stand-ins.