McGuire studied composition with James Iliff at the Royal Academy of Music in London from 1966 to 1970 and then with Ingvar Lidholm in Stockholm in 1971.
His father played folk violin and was a member of a male voice choir which sang arrangements of Scottish Gaelic and Irish songs at charity concerts.
[1] As a student at the Royal Academy of Music McGuire won the Hecht Prize (1968) and the National Young Composers Competition (held in Liverpool University in 1969).
[8] In 2004 he received a Creative Scotland Award[9] which allowed him to create the work Defying Fate.
In 2015 Delphian Records released Entangled Fortunes[15] performed by the Red Note Ensemble and once again featured in Gramophone magazine 'Editor's Choice'[16]