Sheila Stewart

Sheila Stewart (7 July 1937 – 9 December 2014) was a Scottish traditional singer, storyteller, and author. She inherited a large number of traditional songs from older family members, including her mother Belle Stewart. Biography Born in a former stable of a Blairgowrie hotel to Belle Stewart, a Traveller singer and poet, and Alex, a bagpiper, Stewart was chosen as a child by her uncle to carry on her family's stories and songs. Performing at family cèilidhs for ten-shilling notes became more public performances in village halls, although the family collectively thought performing was "[producing] a natural function". In 1954, journalist Maurice Fleming and, later, folklorist Hamish Henderson arrived in town, looking for singers of traditional songs. Over the next twenty years, the Stewarts of Blair became a folk attraction on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. In 1976, Stewart and her family were asked by United States President Gerald Ford to sing in the White House for the bicentennial celebrations. On 1 June 1982, she was chosen to represent the travelling people during Pope John Paul II's visit to Scotland. She sang Ewan MacColl's "Moving On Song". In addition to writing her mother's biography, Queen Amang the Heather – The Life of Belle Stewart, in 2006, she published a series of booklets, titled An Ancient Oral Culture, which led to her autobiography, A Traveller's Life, in 2011.