David James Mattacks is an English rock and folk drummer. Best known for his work with Fairport Convention, Mattacks has also worked both as a session musician and as a performing artist. Apart from playing the drums, he is also a versed keyboard player and occasionally played the bass guitar on studio recordings.
Fairport Convention are an English folk rock band, formed in 1967 by guitarists Richard Thompson and Simon Nicol, bassist Ashley Hutchings and drummer Shaun Frater They started out heavily influenced by American folk rock, with a setlist dominated by Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell songs and a sound that earned them the nickname "the British Jefferson Airplane". Vocalists Judy Dyble and Iain Matthews joined them before the recording of their self-titled debut in 1968; afterwards, Dyble was replaced by Sandy Denny, with Matthews later leaving during the recording of their third album.
John Michael Kirkpatrick is an English player of free reed instruments.
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.
The Albion Band, also known as The Albion Country Band, The Albion Dance Band, and The Albion Christmas Band, were a British folk rock band, originally brought together and led by musician Ashley Hutchings. Generally considered one of the most important groupings in the genre, it has contained or been associated with a large proportion of major English folk performers in its long and fluid history.
Henry the Human Fly is the debut solo album by former Fairport Convention guitarist Richard Thompson. It was released on the Island label in the U.K. and the Reprise label in the U.S.A. in April 1972. The album was reissued by Rykodisc in 1991.
No Roses is an album by Shirley Collins and the Albion Country Band. It was recorded at Sound Techniques, and Air Studios in London, in the summer of 1971. It was produced by Sandy Roberton and Ashley Hutchings. It was released in October 1971 on the Pegasus label.
Anthems in Eden is a 1969 album by Shirley and Dolly Collins, with the Early Music Consort of London, directed by David Munrow. The album originally consisted of a 28-minute set of folk songs plus seven other individual pieces performed by the same group. The musical arrangements for these eight pieces included early music instruments, such as viols, recorders, sackbuts and crumhorns. In 1976, six new songs were recorded with a different assortment of accompanists, to replace the original seven individual songs. This 1976 album consisting of the 28-minute set plus the six new songs was released by Harvest Records under the title Amaranth. Subsequent releases have combined all fourteen pieces under the original title, Anthems in Eden.
Simon John Breckenridge Nicol is an English guitarist, singer, multi-instrumentalist and record producer. He was a founding member of British folk rock group Fairport Convention and is the only founding member still in the band. He has also been involved with the Albion Band and a wide range of musical projects, both as a collaborator, producer and as a solo artist. He has received several awards for his work and career.
Battle of the Field is a folk rock album by the Albion Country Band, recorded in summer 1973 immediately prior to the band's breakup and only released in 1976 following public demand.
Barry Dransfield, is an English folk singer, fiddler, cellist and guitarist. He has appeared as a session musician on numerous albums by other artists, and has released his own albums as well. The Rout of the Blues (1971) was voted Melody Maker folk album of the year. His 1972 album for Polydor simply called Barry Dransfield was voted the rarest folk album in Record Hunter, worth approximately £400. Unlike most fiddlers he is comfortable playing in the "off the chest" position, instead of under the chin.
Grandson of Morris On is a thematic album produced by Ashley Hutchings and others.
The Prospect Before Us is a British folk rock album, by The Albion Dance Band, which was released in 1977 on the EMI Harvest label.
The Guv'nor vol 4 is a compilation of recordings by Ashley Hutchings.
The Guv'nor vol 1 is a compilation of recordings by English folk musician Ashley Hutchings.
The Cropredy Box is an album by Fairport Convention recorded at their annual live concert in Cropredy, Oxfordshire, England to celebrate the band's thirtieth anniversary in 1997. Featuring many songs for which the band had become noted, the set also features performances from many former members including violinist Dave Swarbrick, original vocalist Judy Dyble, and Ralph McTell. Commentary is provided by their first manager, Joe Boyd, and Ashley Hutchings.
The Etchingham Steam Band were a folk group formed by Ashley Hutchings and Shirley Collins in England in 1974 after the Albion Country Band had disbanded in late 1973. They were named after village Etchingham in Sussex where Hutchings and Shirley Collins, his then wife, were living. The band's name was a reference to their acoustic nature, formed during a time of power cuts in the mid-1970s that caused problems for any band using electrical instruments or amplification.
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.
In Concert, November 1975 is a live album by Richard and Linda Thompson, released on Island Records in 2007. It is a document of the pair's second tour as headliners, which took them through the United Kingdom during the autumn of 1975. Like every other album by the pair, it did not make the charts in either the UK or the United States.
Stroll On is the debut album by British singer-songwriter Steve Ashley. It was released in April 1974 in LP format on Gull Records and was critically acclaimed in the UK, being awarded “Contemporary Folk album of the Year” in the leading monthly folk magazine, Folk Review. It has been described as "a masterful, beautifully textured and gentle epic" and "a masterpiece of its kind – a beautiful, rich and deeply atmospheric collection of very English songs, like a musical impression of Dickens, Victorian Christmas cards and Thomas Hardy’s Wessex with a running concept concerning seasonal change". According to the music collectors' magazine Goldmine, it is "one of the key albums in the entire history of English Folk Rock".
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