Born in Scotland in 1981, Paul was immersed in a wealth of music from a very early age. At 17 he was invited out to St. Petersburg to perform in the Baltica Harmonica Festival and it was performances by artists there such as Yuri Shishkin and Oleg Sharov which inspired his change of focus to the greater possibilities of the free-bass button instrument. Over the last ten years he has developed his performance technique on the instrument with his inspiring teacher Djordje Gajic and also through master-classes with experts such as Owen Murray, Peter Soave and Jean-Louis Norton. Paul is a highly accomplished player and his current title of UK Virtuoso Champion is testimony to his breadth of skills across many competitions in both classical and Scottish music styles. With appearances at music festivals around Europe and live television performances in Russia and Finland, he has also performed in France, Italy, Greece and Bahrain. In 2011, Paul graduated from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, Glasgow with a first class honours degree. In 2010 he was Highly Commended for his performance in the Tony and Tania Webster Prize for rare Russian music, and he was winner of the acclaimed Governors Recital Prize. He was also one of the keyboard section finalists in the 2011 Royal Overseas League competition. Paul is an active concert performer and is also one quarter of “The Scottish Tango Ensemble”. He has adjudicated at competitions such as the NAAFC Musselburgh Festival and the NAO UK Accordion Championships, and teaches accordion at Fettes College in Edinburgh. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.