Various threads bring these different artists and
musicians together.
Matt Vernon and Cleveland Williams organised the
first fundraising recital for the Highveld Diocese AIDS project in 1998
- at a time when Iain was involved in the administration of outward
giving for the parish of Holy Trinity and St Mary's in Guildford where
Matt was curate. Matt sang Iain's setting of Psalm 22 (which is on the
first CD) at the Guildford Diocesan AIDS Day Service in Holy Trinity in
December 1999.
Paul Wheeler, Iain Cameron and Derek Ridgers were
all involved in Stoney Ground at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in
1969 - an idea developed by the saxophonist and ergonomist Steve
Pheasant who died in 1996. Derek and Iain lived in the same street in
West London and were both in the 2nd Heston Scout Group. Steve's
literary executor and obituarist , Peter Buckle, was one of the first
people to buy Serious Music for the Highveld.
Steve, Iain and Paul went on to form the band,
Wild Oats, at Cambridge in the same year that the first Stoney Ground
was put on at Edinburgh. Paul Bell, Cathy Bell's father, played drums in
this band. When Iain resumed songwriting in the mid 1990s Cathy agreed
to try out some of the songs and in return Iain recorded a MIDI sequence
of the string quartet she wrote for her A Level Music exam.
Lawrence Fisher, the bass player in Fellthru, is
the son of Rob and Wendy Fisher who Iain first met when he was playing
in the Steve Pheasant Bebop Quintet at the White Hart in Drury Lane in
the 1970s.
In the middle of the 1990s Robin Frederick
discovered that one of her early songs had been incorrectly attributed
to Nick Drake whom she had met at Aix in France in 1967 before coming to
England to stay with John Martyn. John sings Robin's song Sandy
Grey on his first LP, London Conversation.
Paul Wheeler had
introduced Nick Drake to John Martyn at about this time although he did
not meet Robin until she came to the UK to appear at a memorial concert
at the Barbican. Some of the comings and goings at this time are
described in Iain's article Meeting Nick on the Nick Drake Files. Paul
Wheeler appears on John Martyn's sceond LP, The Tumbler, and one of his
poems appears on the sleeve. Paul's song "Give Us A Ring" appears on
John's album "Road to Ruin". Phil Manzanera covered Paul's "Blue Grey
Uniform" on his album "Listen Now". Paul studied poetry with J H Pynne
who also taught Cathy Bell.
Gilbert
Isbin read
Meeting Nick on the Nick Drake files when he was working on his CD
of Nick's compositions and approached Iain to review the completed CD.
How did news of the Highveld Project reach Guildford? The Bishop -
David Beetge - came to visit Guildford in 1998 when he was in the UK for
the Lambeth Palace Conference and his work caught the imagination of a
number of people there.
Iain and Paul Bell
have just made contact with the two other surviving members of Wild Oats
Jon Cole and Richard Jones both of whom are now working with Information
Technology. Jon Cole went on from Wild Oats to lead The Movies and their
story is to be found at
www.rekindle.co.uk/band.htm.
Richard Jones
joined Principal Edwards Magic Theatre after leaving university and then
rejoined the band he had been with before he came up to Cambridge Climax
Chicago Blues Band which by this time had achieved international success.
At the time when The Wild Oats members
got together in Cambridge it seemed like we were the first rock-n-roll
generation at the ancient university. That isnt strictly true Dick
Heckstall Smith who played sax in the Graham Bond Organisation studied
agriculture there in the 1950s and in the early 60s it was where Ginger
Baker first played with Jack Bruce.
Someone is trying to compile a comprehensive history of Cambridge Rock and
you can find the chart at
www.geocities.com/happysurfer1. Its quite a task.
Cathy Bell
has
just completed her final year as a Choral
Exhibitioner at Caius College Cambridge where she studied
English under the direction of Dr J H Prynne. She was
President of the Music Society and in March 2002 gave a recital of
songs by Strauss, Holloway and Wolf. She graduated with a
double first in June 2002.
Robin Frederick
Robin
Frederick has written and produced over two hundred songs for
television and record albums. From 1994 to 1997 she was Director of
A&R at Rhino Records where she oversaw production of numerous albums
including the SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK box set and THE NEW AGE COLLECTION.
She is past president of Los Angeles Women In Music and co-founder
of Indie Nation, a music conference for independent recording
artists.
Robin's latest album, WATER FALLS DOWN (which includes "You Are
Here") has been described by critics as "...a suite of brilliantly
performed songs." (Music Connection), "Wonderfully moody and
atmospheric..." (MakeaStar.com), "Like Enya but more grounded..." (ArtistLaunch.com).
To listen to streaming audio or purchase this album, visit
www.robinfrederick.com
Hot addition - see Robin's offer for
non-profit groups to perform "You Are Here" royalty-free-
click here
Musical
influences: Sade, Enya, Sting, Everything But The Girl. Robin's work
has also been influenced by the songwriting innovations of Nick
Drake.
For more
information, read
NICK DRAKE - A PLACE TO BE. Originally published in MOJO Magazine,
this article explores Drake's pioneering use of offset melodic
phrasing, cluster chords, and more.
Cleveland Williams
Cleveland
was born in the Bahamas but has lived in the UK for several years. He
performs regularly both in opera productions and baritone recitals.
Two years ago he started fundraising for AIDS and HIV work in the Highveld.
His next recital for the cause will be on 9 November at the United Reformed
Church Guildford on Portsmouth Road.
Gilbert Isbin
Belgian
acoustic guitarist Gilbert Isbin draws on a range of styles from classical,
to jazz, blues, ethnic and freeform music . Working with a number of
collaborators from Europe and the USA he has recorded ten albums so far
which have attracted attention all over the world.
Currently Gilbert
performs solo and with the
Gilbert Isbin Group ,the Isbin/Colpaert/Loisel Trio and the
worldfusion Ghatam Trio. He has written music for films, has
published his original guitar music and is a guest columnist for a
number of guitar publications. He is working on a new solo guitar
album for the Traurige Tropen label to follow up his successful
album of Nick Drake treatments and on a commission from the
Quartetto Chitaristico Italiano for a guitar quartet.
As a teenager Paul
Wheeler played in various London clubs including 'Les Cousins', a
meeting place for many of the '60s singer-songwriters. He worked
with John Martyn on THE
TUMBLER .
In 1968 he won a scholarship to read English at Cambridge
University, where his friends included Nick Drake. He played with
various musicians in Cambridge including Fred Frith and Iain
Cameron, and was part of the band Wild Oats.
On leaving Cambridge he lived on John and Yoko's estate for a while,
where his wife was working as personal assistant. After a short
spell as a Civil Servant, he continued to make music with the band
Ghosts.
Since 1978 he has worked as a management trainer with International
companies, while continuing to write and play music. He now lives in
Brighton, on the south coast of England.
His latest CD is
Seachanges which includes the tracks he contributes to Easter Highveld
Plundafonix.
are a young five piece band based in
the Cambridge area. They play an energetic form of punk-ska and have a
growing fan following.
Iain Cameron
works on training strategy for the automotive
industry. He writes and records in a "Downtown" style drawing on
jazz and other 20th century music from the USA. He frequently works
with guitarist Peter Crowther as part of the Worshipspace
alternative liturgy programme at St Mary's Guildford. His online
diary is at the Fraktured web.
Derek Ridgers
studied (with Freddie Mercury) at the same art college that
Pete Townshend attended. His documentary photographs of the start of the
punk movement in London in 1976 are of major importance and his work has
appeared in a wide range of UK magazines.
Matt Vernon served as a curate at Holy Trinity and St.
Mary's, Guildford from 1997 to 2001. He now is a Chaplain at St. John's
Cathedral, Hong Kong. St. John's Cathedral runs an HIV Education Centre
Its manager, Elijah Fung attended the Anglican AIDS
Conference in South Africa in 2001.
Matthew Mills
is preparing for a PhD in
composition at RHUL. His works in progress include Trois paroles de Jacques Prevert:
settings for baritone voice and chamber ensemble to be premiered 2nd March
2000; ...alone, surrounded by darkness and
silence..., rhapsody for violin and orchestra;
and String Quartet No. 2. His other activities include freelance work as a
teacher, pianist and conductor, including appearances with Royal Holloway
Wind Chamber Ensemble (January 9th) and Playing Week Orchestra (January
14th).
Matthew has recently founded the
Royal Holloway New Music Ensemble, and he will conduct their inaugural
concert in the Picture Gallery on Friday 2 March at 7.30 p.m. He also
continues to serve as Assistant Editor for the
Journal of the Beethoven Piano Society of Europe,
for which a number of articles and reviews are in preparation, and has
recently accepted an invitation to become a trustee of the Dudley Piano
Competition. Contact:
m.j.mills@rhul.ac.uk
Mark Graham
studied
music and played in local bands around Cambridge, UK before becoming a
recording engineer and eventually manager of
Spaceward
Studios (the list of artists who recorded at Spaceward is long - The
Stranglers, Julian Cope, Dave Stewart & Barbara Gaskin, The Soft Boys, Stiff
Little Fingers, Toyah, Iron Maiden, Gary Numan, Jakko Jakszyk, Phil Miller
and Boo Hewerdine - to name but a few). Mark (and Spaceward) subsequently
moved into computer graphics and today Spaceward Graphics Ltd are best known
as developers of "Satori"
which is award-winning, resolution-independent, 64bit, paint & image-editing
software for Windows.
Mark is also a consultant web and new media designer and
has recently collaborated with composer and music scholar Andrew Keeling to
produce a CD-ROM - "A
Musical Guide to Larks' Tongues In Aspic by King Crimson", published by
Spaceward and, hopefully, only the first of a proposed series of insightful,
interactive, musical guides. Mark has also designed and built "The
FraKctured Zone" - a website ostensibly devoted to "Fracture" and "FraKctured"
by King Crimson, but where several of the musicians featured on this page
keep online
diaries.
Mark plays nylon string and digitar guitar and is currently
writing and recording an album with Ed Harbud.
has
just completed her final year as a Choral
Exhibitioner at Caius College Cambridge where she studied
English under the direction of Dr J H Prynne. She was
President of the Music Society and in March 2002 gave a recital of
songs by Strauss, Holloway and Wolf. She graduated with a
double first in June 2002.
Robin
Frederick has written and produced over two hundred songs for
television and record albums. From 1994 to 1997 she was Director of
A&R at Rhino Records where she oversaw production of numerous albums
including the SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK box set and THE NEW AGE COLLECTION.
She is past president of Los Angeles Women In Music and co-founder
of Indie Nation, a music conference for independent recording
artists. 
Cleveland
was born in the Bahamas but has lived in the UK for several years. He
performs regularly both in opera productions and baritone recitals.
Two years ago he started fundraising for AIDS and HIV work in the Highveld.
His next recital for the cause will be on 9 November at the United Reformed
Church Guildford on Portsmouth Road.
Belgian
acoustic guitarist Gilbert Isbin draws on a range of styles from classical,
to jazz, blues, ethnic and freeform music . Working with a number of
collaborators from Europe and the USA he has recorded ten albums so far
which have attracted attention all over the world. 
As a teenager Paul
Wheeler played in various London clubs including 'Les Cousins', a
meeting place for many of the '60s singer-songwriters. He worked
with John Martyn on THE
TUMBLER .
are a young five piece band based in
the Cambridge area. They play an energetic form of punk-ska and have a
growing fan following.
works on training strategy for the automotive
industry. He writes and records in a "Downtown" style drawing on
jazz and other 20th century music from the USA. He frequently works
with guitarist Peter Crowther as part of the Worshipspace
alternative liturgy programme at St Mary's Guildford. His online
diary is at the Fraktured web. 
studied (with Freddie Mercury) at the same art college that
Pete Townshend attended. His documentary photographs of the start of the
punk movement in London in 1976 are of major importance and his work has
appeared in a wide range of UK magazines.
studied
music and played in local bands around Cambridge, UK before becoming a
recording engineer and eventually manager of