Neil Wilson’s finger work

YOU could have stood under my umbrella in Edinburgh... if I still had it with me.

I left it in a small room at St Mark’s church after chatting with a young Scottish classical guitarist, and being thanked for the interview in typical warm Scottish fashion.

The non-stop drizzle was eased by a brilliant Edinburgh Fringe Festival performance by the afro-sporting Neil Wilson, 28, on his Spanish handmade Antonio Marin Montero classic guitar.

Tucked in a small grey lot on a row of double-storey buildings on Castle Terrace, the simple Unitarian church played host to Wilson’s passion and virtuosity on, among other pieces, Astor Piazzola’s La Muerte Del Angel (“normally played on the piano” says Wilson), Joaquin Rodrigo’s Ivocation Et Danza and Tarrega’s Capriche Arabe.

He also played some Bach and John Dowland but his delivery of Isaac Albeniz’s Sevilla kept his 50-strong audience, seated in the pews, quite still.

It was a warm, romantic evening. His father, Robert, told me when giving me a ride to my next assignment: “You noticed he has small hands for a guitarist? But his stretch is wider than mine.”

Robert used to play the guitar aarges ago, and had tucked away the instrument while raising his family of two boys. The guitar fell out of the cupboard one day and the three-year-old Neil made it his choice toy.

Ask the young man, who also teaches guitar at a Glasgow university, about his music, and he waxes on — in his strong Glaswegian accent — about playing with the legendary Billy Bass Nelson and The Fonksquish Mob.

Nelson, 57, is the bass man behind the sound of George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic.

Wilson still remembers playing with The Fonksquish Mob and touring with Pink as its lead guitarist in 2006, when the band played to a capacity crowd at Wembley Stadium.

He also gave me his new, and autographed, CD called Neil Wilson The Guitarist At The Pirrie Hall. A good exchange for an umbrella, I thought.