John Tams | |
---|---|
Background information | |
Born | Holbrook, Derbyshire, England | 16 February 1949
Genres | Folk |
Occupation | Actor/singer |
Instrument(s) | Guitar, Melodeon |
Years active | 1970s–present |
Website | www |
John Tams (born 16 February 1949) is an English actor, singer, songwriter, composer and musician born in Holbrook, Derbyshire, the son of a publican. [1] He first worked as a reporter for the Ripley & Heanor News later working for BBC Radio Derby and BBC Radio Nottingham. Tams had an early part in The Rainbow (1988), and may be best known for playing a regular supporting role in the ITV drama series Sharpe , as rifleman Daniel Hagman. He also co-wrote the music for each film (18, as of November 2008) alongside Dominic Muldowney.
Tams was a member of Derbyshire folk group Muckram Wakes in the 1970s, then worked with Ashley Hutchings as singer and melodeon-player on albums including Son of Morris On, and as a member of the British folk rock group Albion Band. Splitting with Hutchings in the 1980s, he formed Home Service. In the following decades, Tams spent time fronting Home Service (Best Live Act at the BBC Folk Awards 2012) or in a duo with Barry Coope (Duo of the Year 2008). In 2015 it was announced that Tams was retiring from Home Service.
Tams was born in Holbrook, Derbyshire, the son of a publican. He left school at 15 without any qualifications and went to Chesterfield Technical College where he spent two years on a GCE course, concentrating on the arts. He first worked as a reporter for the Ripley and Heanor News, and then as an editor on the Belper News - where he notably interviewed the then deputy prime minister George Brown - and for the Alfreton Observer. He also worked for BBC Radio Derby and BBC Radio Nottingham, and as a freelance reporter for the Melody Maker and the New Musical Express . [2]
There was a strong musical background in his family and by the age of eleven he was playing the E flat horn in Riddings Brass Band, and began playing the guitar in his teens. [2]
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(March 2017) |
Tams was a member of Derbyshire folk group Muckram Wakes in the 1970s, then worked with Ashley Hutchings as singer and melodeon-player on albums including Son of Morris On, and as a member of the British folk rock group Albion Band. Splitting with Hutchings in the 1980s, he formed Home Service. In the following decades, Tams spent time fronting Home Service (Best Live Act at the BBC Folk Awards 2012) or in a duo with Barry Coope (Duo of the Year 2008). In 2015 it was announced that Tams was retiring from Home Service. [3]
He spent many years working at the National Theatre as a Music Director and as an actor. He appeared in the ITV series Sharpe as Chosen Man Daniel Hagman for five years, and co-wrote the music with Dominic Muldowney. In December 2009, Tams released a single of "Love Farewell" with the Band and Bugles of the Rifles. The recording of this song, dating from the Peninsular War, was for the benefit of Help for Heroes, a charity dedicated to supporting injured British service personnel and their families. He is recipient of many awards and honours including six BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards; he has been nominated for an Olivier Award for War Horse and was part of the creative team that won Best Play at the Tonys on Broadway. He has been awarded Honorary Doctorates from the University of Sheffield Hallam and Derby. He is currently working on Jericho for ITV as both an actor and with music. He is regarded by many as one of the unsung heroes of folk music. His song "Rolling Home" is sung across the world. In 2012 he performed at Horse Guards for members of the British Royal Family singing "Only Remembered," and the next year he sang to an estimated television audience of 53 million when he performed "Only Remembered" to the Queen, the Royal Family, Heads of State, serving and retired soldiers and their families at the Royal Festival of Remembrance live from the Royal Albert Hall.
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(March 2017) |
In 1974, Tams and Neil Wayne went to County Clare to make field recordings of highly regarded traditional players of the concertina. The recordings were issued on the "Free Reed" label in the '70s. These recordings then became very scarce until 2007 when all the tracks were issued as a 6-CD set called The Clare Set.
Tams was a musical director and actor at the National Theatre from 1976 to 1985 and then again from 1999 to 2001, working on such shows as The Mysteries , Lark Rise to Candleford , Glengarry Glenross , The Crucible , Golden Boy , The Good Hope and The Mysteries Revival in 1999. He was a member of the creative team headed by Bill Bryden.
He also worked as a music consultant at Shakespeare's Globe on Holding Fire (opened July 2007), and collaborated with Adrian Sutton on the music for War Horse (opened October 2007) at the National Theatre. [4] War Horse has been described as the most successful show ever staged by the National and has resulted in several awards. It received six nominations for the Olivier Awards, including one for the Best Sound, for Tams and fellow team members Chris Shutt and Adrian Sutton.
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(March 2017) |
Tams had an early part in The Rainbow (1988), and may be best known for playing a regular supporting role in the ITV drama series Sharpe , as rifleman Daniel Hagman, one of the "Chosen Men" in the 95th Rifles – a whimsical, sober, former poacher always ready with a deadly eye behind a Baker rifle, a folk remedy for an ailment or a song for a weary heart. He also co-wrote the music for each film (18, as of November 2008) alongside Dominic Muldowney.
In 1996, Tams and Muldowney released the best-selling album Over the Hills & Far Away: The Music of Sharpe to accompany the series. This album has sold over 120,000 copies.
Tams has released three solo albums to date, Unity (2000), [5] : 80 Home (2002) and The Reckoning (2005); all of which have met with critical acclaim. At the 2006 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, Tams won Best Album for The Reckoning, Best Traditional Track (for Bitter Withy) and Folk Singer of the Year. [6] Tams is the only artist to have won the Album of the Year award twice, the first time was with his first solo album Unity in 2001. [6] At the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards 2008 he and singing partner Barry Coope were presented with the prestigious Best Duo award from actor Sean Bean, alongside whom he acted in the Sharpe TV series. [7] Tams has now received ten nominations, resulting in six BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards.
The book accompanying the Topic Records 70th anniversary boxed-set Three Score and Ten lists Unity as one of its classic albums, and [5] : 80 two of Tams’s tracks appear in the collection: Bitter Withy from The Reckoning is track 16 on the first CD; and Unity (Raise Your Banners High) from Unity is track one on the fifth CD.
In 2006 Tams became musical director of the BBC Radio 2 2006 Radio Ballads, an updating of Ewan MacColl's Radio Ballads. The series was short-listed for two Sony Radio Awards in 2007. In the event it won a Sony Gold Radio Academy Award for Song of Steel and a Bronze award for Thirty Years of Conflict. It has been nominated for a Clarion Award. The song Steelos, written by Tams for the Song of Steel episode of the 2006 Ballads, was nominated Best Original Song at the 2006 Radio 2 Folk Awards. Currently, Tams is also working on a stage version of Steelos to be performed at the Magna Centre in the Rother Valley in 2009. He worked on John McCusker's commission 'Under One Sky' alongside Graham Coxon, Roddy Woomble, Julie Fowlis and others.
In November 2007 Tams was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Sheffield Hallam University, [8] then in January 2009 another Honorary Doctorate from Derby University. [9]
In November 2015 Tams was presented with a Gold Badge from the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS). [10]
Tams is married to Sally Ward, a Derbyshire Funeral Celebrant. [11]
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(October 2012) |
Ashley Stephen Hutchings, MBE, sometimes known in early years as "Tyger" Hutchings, is an English bassist, songwriter, arranger, band leader, writer and record producer. He was a founding member of three noteworthy English folk-rock bands: Fairport Convention, Steeleye Span and The Albion Band. Hutchings has overseen numerous other projects, including records and live theatre, and has collaborated on film and television projects.
Shirley Elizabeth Collins MBE is an English folk singer who was a significant contributor to the British Folk Revival of the 1960s and 1970s. She often performed and recorded with her sister Dolly, whose accompaniment on piano and portative organ created unique settings for Shirley's plain, austere singing style.
June Tabor is an English folk singer known for her solo work and her earlier collaborations with Maddy Prior and with Oysterband.
The BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards celebrate outstanding achievement during the previous year within the field of folk music, with the aim of raising the profile of folk and acoustic music. The awards have been given annually since 2000 by British radio station BBC Radio 2.
Rise Up Like the Sun is a British folk rock album released in 1978 by The Albion Band. The album is in part a collaboration between John Tams on vocals and melodeon and Ashley Hutchings on electric bass. This is not the first album on which the two worked together but it remains the most fulfilling for listeners. To build the sound Hutchings brought in two of his former compatriots from Fairport Convention, Dave Mattacks on drums and tambourine and Simon Nicol on vocals and electric and acoustic guitars. In addition another ex-member of Fairport, Richard Thompson, contributed songs and backing vocals. Having assembled the principal contributors and an ambiance that encouraged their friends to drop in, Hutchings gave Tams the freedom to act as the project's musical director. They were joined by Philip Pickett on shawms, bagpipes, curtals and trumpet, Pete Bullock on synthesiser, piano, clarinet, sax, and organ, Michael Gregory on percussion, Ric Sanders on violin and violectra and Graeme Taylor on electric and acoustic guitars. Kate McGarrigle, Julie Covington, Linda Thompson, Pat Donaldson, Martin Carthy, Andy Fairweather-Low and Dave Bristow make guest appearances.
Phil Beer is an English multi-instrumentalist, composer, producer, and one half of English acoustic roots duo Show of Hands.
The Albion Band, also known as The Albion Country Band, The Albion Dance Band, and The Albion Christmas Band, is a British folk rock band, originally brought together and led by musician Ashley Hutchings. An important grouping in the genre, it has contained or been associated with a large proportion of major English folk performers in its long and fluid history.
Chris Wood is an English songwriter and composer who plays fiddle, viola and guitar, and sings. He is a practitioner of traditional English dance music, including Morris and other rituals and ceremonies, but his repertoire also includes much French folk music and traditional Québécois material. He worked for many years in a duo with button accordion/melodeon player Andy Cutting: Wood & Cutting were one of the most influential acts on the English folk music scene. Q Magazine gave their "Live at Sidmouth" album four stars and put the duo "at the forefront of the latest wave of British music acts". One of his first recordings was playing bass and percussion on "Jack's Alive" (1980) the first album by the Oysterband.
Liege & Lief is the fourth album by the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. It is the third album the group released in the UK during 1969, all of which prominently feature Sandy Denny as lead female vocalist, as well as the first to feature future long-serving personnel Dave Swarbrick and Dave Mattacks on violin/mandolin and drums, respectively, as full band members. It is also the first Fairport album on which all songs are either adapted (freely) from traditional British and Celtic folk material, or else are original compositions written and performed in a similar style. Although Denny and founding bass player Ashley Hutchings quit the band before the album's release, Fairport Convention has continued to the present day to make music strongly based within the British folk rock idiom, and are still the band most prominently associated with it.
Lewis Frederick William Caddick was an English folk singer-songwriter and guitarist, particularly noted for his songwriting and as a member of the innovative and influential group Home Service.
No Masters is a British record label, based in the north of England, specialising in folk with a political edge.
Over the Hills & Far Away: The Music of Sharpe was released in 1996 as a companion to the Sharpe television series. The recording features performances by various artists, including British folk musicians John Tams and Kate Rusby, composer Dominic Muldowney, and The Band and Bugles of the Light Division, performing traditional songs along with selections of original music from the programmes.
Muckram Wakes was an English folk band, from the north-east Midlands of England.
Steve Tilston is an English folk singer-songwriter and guitarist.
Chris While is an English songwriter, singer and musician, known particularly for her vocals and live performances. She has worked as a solo artist, a songwriter and as a member of a number of duos and groups. Her music is often classified as English folk, but contains strong American influences.
Julie Matthews is an English singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and record producer. She has been a member of British folk duos and groups and is acknowledged internationally as a major songwriter, with her work being covered by a wide range of artists and groups. Her music is often classified as English folk, but contains strong American influences.
Son of Morris On is a British folk rock album released in 1976 under the joint names of Ashley Hutchings, Simon Nicol, John Tams, Phil Pickett, Michael Gregory, Dave Mattacks, Shirley Collins, Martin Carthy, John Watcham, John Rodd, The Albion Morris Men, Ian Cutler, and the Adderbury Village Morris Men.
Swan Arcade were a British folk music vocal group formed in 1970. "A leading light of the British folk revival" they sang a wide variety of songs, including blues, pop and rock and roll, as well as traditional folk music, mostly performed a cappella. Swan Arcade also performed with The Watersons as the Boggle Hole Chorale, and The Watersons and Martin Carthy as Blue Murder. They finally disbanded in 1988, but one of their members, Jim Boyes, still performs as part of Coope Boyes and Simpson.
Lucy Victoria Ward is an English singer-songwriter from Derby, England. She performs, with a voice described as expressive and powerful, traditional English folk songs as well as her own material. Three of her albums, Adelphi Has to Fly, Single Flame and I Dreamt I Was a Bird, have been critically acclaimed and have each received four-starred reviews in the British national press.
Phillip Henry and Hannah Martin are an English folk music duo. In 2017, they renamed themselves Edgelarks and released an eponymous album.