Diagnosis of serious illness at the age of thirty curtailed his live performances, although he completed a further two albums in the studio.
[5] Martyn Bennett spent the first five years of his life in the Codroy Valley, where Gaelic and traditional music were parts of the local culture.
[8] They stayed briefly on Mull, before moving to Kingussie, where he had his first lessons in playing the Great Highland bagpipe from David Taylor, who was also his history teacher.
[10] During the final year of his studies he was diagnosed with testicular cancer, but he recovered after six months of treatment and graduated in 1993.
[14]He took part in the summer festival of the city of Nantes in historic Brittany (France) in July 1994, perhaps his first concert outside the UK.
He released his first album, the eponymous Martyn Bennett, in 1995 on Eclectic, a small Edinburgh-based independent label.
[18] He performed at the party held at Stirling Castle for the European premier of the movie Braveheart on 3 September 1995.
[25] Scottish celebrities attended his performance at the Buddha Bar in Paris, ahead of Scotland playing Brazil in the opening match of the 1998 World Cup.
[26] At Edinburgh's Hogmanay celebrations at the millennium, his band Cuillin played at the Castle Esplanade, supporting Texas.
[1] Mackay's Memoirs was played at the celebrations that took place in Princes Street Gardens, alongside the opening of the new Scottish Parliament in July 1999[4] and at the 2004 Mòd[30] He was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma in November 2000.
[11] After this diagnosis he recorded his fourth album Glen Lyon which was first released on the Foot Stomping' label in 2002.
[29] Following a relapse and an unexpected splenectomy in January of that year, Bennett proposed; the ceremony took place in her mother's kitchen.
Illness left him feeling disconnected from his music and one day, in a fit of rage, he destroyed many of his instruments − pipes, fiddles and whistles.
[4] He brought together samples of unaccompanied traditional Scottish folk singers, his own bagpipe and fiddle playing, with and electronic drum beats.
[39] The news was held back from the Edinburgh Music School pupils who were recording Mackay's Memoirs the following day.
[24][40] Around the same time the Martyn Bennett Trust was set up by his family and friends,[41] as a commemorative fund to help young musicians.
[42] The 2006 Celtic Connections programme included a Martyn Bennett Day, held on 14 January, with events to celebrate his work.
[47] This event was organised by the Martyn Bennett Trust, with musicians invited to workshops during the day, finishing with a concert in the evening.
[17] In 2013 Creative Scotland announced they would fund an annual prize for new music composition, named in his honour.
[55] A stage show, Grit: The Martyn Bennett Story, was created as part of the 2014 Commonwealth Games cultural programme.
[61][needs update] To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Bothy Culture, and the 25th anniversary of the Celtic Connections festival, Lawson and the orchestra, now containing some 100 traditional folk, classical and jazz musicians, performed the show Bothy Culture and Beyond at the SSE Hydro, Glasgow on 27 January 2018.