Irish audiences are well familiar with McNamara's work as music director of
RTÉ's
The Late Late Show for 20 years. In
1994 and
1995 he signed up with the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service (
RÚV) and rearranged Iceland's
Eurovision Song Contest entries. He conducted the
RTÉ Symphony Orchestra on the final night for the live performances of these entries during the
Eurovision Song Contest which was hosted in Ireland in both these years. He was also the musical director of the
1997 Eurovision Song Contest, held in Dublin. In 1998, he helped found
The Irish Tenors, which group has been highly successful. He was their music director in five of their albums and three
PBS specials and toured with them throughout the United States,
New Zealand and Australia. Their album
Ellis Island rose to number one on
Billboard's World Music listing. McNamara is the composer of a four-part movement classical work entitled
Beatlesymphony, which is based on
Beatles melodies and has been performed internationally. He has written an
ABBA piano concerto, a
Rolling Stones overture and a
Simon and Garfunkel suite. He is the producer/musical director of
The Young Messiah – Messiah XXI which is an adaptation of
Handel's
Messiah. The CD and DVD of this work was released on 3 October 2006. The production starred
Gladys Knight,
Roger Daltrey,
Chaka Khan,
Jeffrey Osborne, the Irish Philharmonic Orchestra & Choir and the Visual Ministry Gospel Choir. On 18 October 2002, McNamara staged and produced a performance of this music in
Warsaw,
Poland as part of a Gala Event for the
President of Poland and dignitaries. His work with John McDermott entitled
A Time to Remember was released as a
PBS special and on CD and DVD and that album was number one on
Billboard's World Music list. In 2002, McNamara created the group The American Tenors. Their
PBS special was filmed in Los Angeles, California, at the
Kodak Theatre. Within the first few weeks of its release, The American Tenors album was at number five on
Billboard's Crossover Classical Chart. They also released a slightly different version of their album in Ireland. McNamara has made albums with The Irish Tenors, The American Tenors,
Ronan Tynan, John McDermott, David Agnew,
Rebecca Storm and Mary Lowe, among many others. He was the music director and toured with
LeAnn Rimes during her 2004 Symphonic Christmas tour. In 2005, he was the music director of the
Argent Mortgage Orchestrated concert series, which included shows with
LeAnn Rimes,
Seal,
Jewel (singer) and
Duran Duran. He has conducted some of the world's leading orchestras, including the
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the
Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and the
Boston Pops Orchestra and conducted the
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra for
Ben Folds's three-concert orchestral debut in the United States. ==Personal life==