Milton Keynes is a city and the largest settlement in Buckinghamshire, England, about 50 miles (80 km) north-west of London. At the 2021 Census, the population of its urban area was over 256,000. The River Great Ouse forms its northern boundary; a tributary, the River Ouzel, meanders through its linear parks and balancing lakes. Approximately 25% of the urban area is parkland or woodland and includes two Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs).
Wavendon is a village and civil parish in the south east of the Milton Keynes urban area, in Buckinghamshire, England.
Dame Cleo Laine, Lady Dankworth is an English jazz and pop singer and an actress, known for her scat singing and for her vocal range. Though her natural range is that of a contralto, she is able to produce a G above high C, giving her an overall compass of well over three octaves. Laine is the only female performer to have received Grammy nominations in the jazz, popular and classical music categories. She is the widow of jazz composer and musician Sir John Dankworth.
Sir John Phillip William Dankworth, CBE, also known as Johnny Dankworth, was an English jazz composer, saxophonist, clarinettist and writer of film scores. With his wife, jazz singer Dame Cleo Laine, he was a music educator and also her music director.
Donald Percy Rendell was an English jazz musician and arranger. Mainly active as a tenor saxophonist, he also played soprano saxophone, flute, and clarinet.
Allan Anthony Ganley was an English jazz drummer and arranger.
James Charles Marshall known as The Father of Loud or The Lord of Loud, was an English businessman and pioneer of guitar amplification. His company, Marshall Amplification, has created equipment that is used by some of the biggest names in rock music, producing amplifiers with an iconic status. In 2003 Marshall was awarded an OBE at Buckingham Palace for "services to the music industry and to charity". In 2009 he was given the Freedom of the Borough of Milton Keynes for his work in the community.
Alexander William Tamba Dankworth is an English jazz bassist and composer.
The Shakespeare in Washington Festival was a cultural festival held in Washington, D.C. from January through June 2007 in honor of the works of William Shakespeare.
This history of Milton Keynes details its development from the earliest human settlements, through the plans for a 'new city' for 250,000 people in northern Southeast England, its subsequent urban design and development, to the present day. Milton Keynes is the largest settlement and only city in Buckinghamshire, founded in 1967. At the 2021 census, the population of its urban area was estimated to have exceeded 256,000.
Alisha Sufit was the English singer-songwriter with the 1970s Magic Carpet, whose eponymous first album was released on the UK Mushroom label in 1972. The Mushroom label is not to be confused with the Australian label of the same name, and was led by Vic Keary from the late 1960s from Chalk Farm Studios in Belmont Street, London.
Richard Durrant Dip RCM, ARCM, FLCM is an English guitarist and composer. He studied guitar, cello, and composition at the Royal College of Music in London between 1981 and 1986. Since his debut at the Purcell Room, London in July 1986. Richard Durrant has gained an international reputation as one of the great guitarists of his generation. He has pursued both performance and composition in an unconventional career that has avoided categorisation and he has built a faithful, ever expanding audience who warm to his unpretentious manner and natural skills of communication. He is one of the only classical guitar virtuosi who performs standing up.
Joanna Eden is an English jazz singer, songwriter and pianist.
The Concorde Club was launched in 1957 in Southampton by jazz aficionado Cole Mathieson, and is the oldest jazz club under the same management in the United Kingdom. Its standing in the UK jazz world has been recognised by the August 2009 award of the inaugural Blue Plaque, following a nationwide vote among jazz followers and musicians organised by the Brecon Jazz Festival. The award, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Miles Davis classic album Kind of Blue, is to honour the jazz establishment considered to have done most for the development of jazz in the United Kingdom. On August 8 2012, the club celebrated its 55th anniversary with a concert featuring the Alan Barnes All Stars during which Barnes presented an illustrated history of the Concorde. He told the capacity crowd: "There are very few businesses, let alone a jazz club, run by the same person for 55 years. Cole has done more than most to promote jazz."
Malcolm Edmonstone is a British jazz pianist and pop arranger. He studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where he became Head of Jazz. Edmonstone provided orchestral arrangements for Gary Barlow’s 2020 album Music Played by Humans. He has conducted and arranged for the BBC Concert Orchestra numerous times for BBC Radio 2, featuring vocalists Rick Astley, Katie Melua, Mark King, Ruby Turner, Tommy Blaize, Tony Momrelle and Heather Small. In 2020 he was Music Director at the National Theatre for Tony Kushner’s adaptation of The Visit (play). In 2016 he made his BBC Proms debut, arranging and conducting for Iain Ballamy and Liane Carroll.
Jacqueline Caryl Dankworth is a British jazz singer. She is the daughter of jazz singer Cleo Laine and musician John Dankworth.
Joe Stilgoe is a British singer, pianist and songwriter.
Frank Holder was a Guyanese jazz singer and percussionist. He was a member of bands led by Jiver Hutchinson, Johnny Dankworth, and Joe Harriott.
The National Jazz Archive is a collection of materials pertaining to jazz and blues that is kept at the Loughton Library in Essex, England. The archive was founded by British trumpeter Digby Fairweather in 1998 and contains visual and print materials from the 1920s to the present.
Avril Margaret Dankworth was an English music educator who established the week-long summer Avril Dankworth Children's Music Camps for children aged between 7 and 17 in Wavendon, near Milton Keynes, in mid-1970. She also sung, taught music, authored multiple books and helped introduce the idiom in school music curriculum.
