As the founder of the City of Bristol Pipes and Drums band, Jimmie Mc-Queen was a familiar figure in the city for more than a decade.
In his full-dress kilt outfit, Jimmie cut a fine figure every year playing the bagpipes with the band at Bristol's Armistice Day commemoration.
Others will remember him at the moment back in 2002 when he brought The Mall at Cribbs Causeway to a standstill, playing a lament to mark the funeral of the Queen Mother.
But in February 2009, Jimmie's world was turned upside down when he suffered a rare spinal abscess.
NFL-HatsAt first the infection made him feel sick, but within days it became clear that the abscess was threatening his life.
After complex surgery to remove it, Jimmie was left paralysed from the neck down. But over the past year, he has battled back in a remarkable recovery at the National Spinal Injuries Unit at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in Buckinghamshire. Now the 67-year-old is planning a special concert to raise money for the unit.
The event, which will be held in Clevedon later this year will, of course, feature the pipe and drum band he formed in the city more than a decade ago.
"The staff at Stoke Mandeville have been incredible," he says. "It's been a year of hell, and it would be easy to get down about it, but they don't allow that - there is a real sense of being driven forward all the time.
"The paralysis I suffered as a result of the operation was not permanent, and so I was encouraged every day to spend many hours in the specialist gym at Stoke Mandeville, to try to get my body working again.
"There are normally around 120 patients in the unit at any one time - mostly young people who have suffered motorcycle or rugby accidents.
"When you see them working to get back on track, it gives you a real push, too.
"But now I want to give something back to the unit, so it was only natural to ask my fellow band members back in Bristol to help."
Jimmie, who is currently staying with family in Stevenage, spent 12 months at the specialist unit before being released last month.
"I am now able to use a wheelchair, which is a great improvement on the kind of paralysis I went through immediately after the operation." Scotsman Jimmie - who worked as a compliance manager at HMP Ashfield in Bristol in the late 1990s - was working at an immigration centre at Heathrow Airport when he was struck down by the unusual condition.
"I was coming home to Bristol for the weekends, but staying near Heathrow all week for work," he says. "Then one morning I woke up feeling terribly sick. It didn't go away as the day went on, and by the end of the week I was having all kinds of tests to try to find out what was wrong with me.
hollister"It soon became clear that the operation to remove the abscess was essential, but that it would have a drastic effect on my mobility," he says. "Basically, I was unlucky, but you have to move on with your life."
Jimmie hopes the concert will prove the perfect way to close a terrible chapter of his life on a positive note.
The performance, which will take place at the Baptist Function Hall, Station Road, Clevedon, on September 18, will feature the Abertillery Orpheus Male Choir, performing alongside the City of Bristol Pipes and Drums band.
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