The Hornet Comic 1975

TV Times 1983

Hello Magazine, 1992

Home and Ideas - 1994

The Marquee Folk News

The Newcastle Opera House

Radio 2 Web Pages Review

Ralph McTell on
Huw and Tony Williams

Southsea Folk Festival 2001

This is Lancashire

BBC Online
Zest of the West Festival

RALPH, ALBERT & SYDNEY
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.... from .... "Thirty Years of the Cambridge Folk Festival"
the definitive history of the world's premier acoustic music event
compiled and edited by Dave Laing and Richard Newman
from Chapter Four ... "Views from the field"
Ralph McTell
My brother Bruce was managing me when I was asked to play the 1969 Cambridge Festival. I had virtually no experience of playing outdoor venues and I was nervous of the occasion and in awe of contemporaries like Jansch, Renbourn and Harper.
I used to sit down to play, partly to conceal my knees knocking, but mostly because playing fingerstyle it's easier if you are firmly anchored. I cannot remember what I played but at some point I announced one of my newly recorded songs from the Spiral Staircase LP. The song was Streets Of London and before I'd got to the end the whole audience were singing along. How did they know it? The album had only been out a few weeks. The emotional impact on me was overwhelming and I was feeling both euphoric and choked by the end of it. This was the biggest audience I'd ever played to and though I've played bigger places since and audiences often sing along, I will never forget this experience.
I'm not sure when I actually became aware of Ken Woollard. He always appeared as an avuncular, almost paternal figure. He had a tremendous sense of reality. I'll always remember one occasion I was on some huge tour or other and he was promoting the concert for me in Cambridge. The show was sold out and Ken was there when we arrived. He cheerfully enquired, "How are you son?"
"Oh, I'm alright Ken," I said. "But I'm a bit tired" (hoping to understate it).
"A bit tired," he said, raising an eyebrow. "My fucking heart bleeds for you!"
We both burst out laughing. The way he said it was both mocking and gentle. He was reminding me of my good fortune and success and it put me back on my feet.
I've played the Cambridge Festival several times and lots of concerts in the town and whether or not Ken was promoting, he always turned up to say hello and ask how it was going. I always found some bit of news to tell him but I never ever complained of being tired. Thanks, Ken.
To say I've never really found it easy to play Cambridge is an understatement as I've never found it easy to play any festival. The first thing to remember is that the audience hasn't come only to hear you. Folk festivals are a celebration for people who share a love of all types of acoustic music, so you have to retain a certain humility and work just a little bit harder - after all you are just part of a whole! If you make new friends that's a bonus, but because the Cambridge Festival is the premier British festival, the edge is all the more noticeable. Apart from meeting your fellow professionals and semis, I sometimes get the feeling that half the audience are writers, strummers and pickers too. I love being there but I never take it for granted.
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Finger Tips
Snippet that appeared in ‘Jackie’ magazine

Folk singer Ralph McTell eats several ounces of meat jelly a day, you’ll be thrilled to hear.  He told me that this is because he likes playing his guitar, not with finger picks, but with his own long and strong nails.

“You can’t feel the guitar properly with picks,” he said.  “You’re not close enough to it somehow.”

Ralph’s advice to would-be guitarists is that after six weeks of a daily jelly diet, you’ll find your nails in the really good shape that’s needed for guitar work.

I checked with Vicki, our Beauty Editor, and she said that the information is correct.  In fact, she says that if you eat a square of ordinary jelly a day it’s just as effective and not quite so yucky!  
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With the success of “Streets of London” behind him, 
Ralph McTell now walks . . . The Streets of Success
Article appearing in children’s “Look-In” magazine
February 1975

When solo singer and former street busker Ralph McTell rose high in the charts with his superb melodic single ‘Streets of London’, it was the chart breakthrough that had taken him eight years to achieve.  But Ralph’s not in it for the glamour, as Look-In’s Richard Tippett found out when we spoke to him recently.

Ralph was first asked about the re-issue of ‘Streets of London’, a song he’d written some years ago and had previously only recorded on an album, although some forty other singers have recorded cover versions, thus giving the ‘Streets’ a colourful history.  “My manager suggested releasing it as a single,” said Ralph.  “Contracts had prevented that before, but now it was okay, and within a couple of days the whole thing had been arranged.”  The single itself was not just a re-release – it was treated to a new arrangement.  “Some old friends of mine helped me out on it,” commented Ralph.  “In fact it was Prelude (the group who had a hit with ‘After The Goldrush’) while I was on guitar, harmonica and vocals.”

STARDOM

It was about then that Ralph spoke about stardom.  A few years ago he had been quoted as saying that he didn’t really desire all the trappings of “the big time” and he explained that his attitude hadn’t much differed: “I think being a big star is a state of mind, and if I am a big star now, my attitude has not changed.  I don’t think I’ve been affected by what’s just happened.  I don’t do star type things – I haven’t got a yacht or a big car, and I don’t go to clubs or discos, I much prefer pubs actually.”

So what is Ralph hoping to base his future success upon?  “It would be nice if it could be records, but I don’t know whether that will happen.  I’ve always worked as a touring musician, and I would like that to continue – to get out and meet the people.  But having record success is good because it’s a secure base for a career.”

HALL OF FAME

Despite his non-appearance in the charts until now, Ralph has packed the Royal Festival Hall and the Royal Albert Hall in London for his concerts.  He takes his songwriting seriously.  “It can take anything from two days to six months to pen a song,” said Ralph, “because it’s important for me to make sure the words are right.  Lyrics can take a long time to work out – I get the tune fairly quickly.  The “song” that took me six months to write was a concept piece called “The Ferryman” – a mammoth piece of work.”

Ralph’s known the hard side of the business too.  In the old days, he was a busker and used to hitch his way across Europe.  It often proved highly unrewarding because more than once he was arrested by the law, and made to spend the odd night in a prison cell!

It was memories of Ralph’s experiences in Paris that led, oddly enough, to his writing “Streets of London”.  “It was observations from Paris, coupled with my knowledge of growing up in London, that inspired the song.”  What an inspiration that has turned out to be . . .

If you want to see and hear more of Ralph McTell, then why not go along and see him on his forthcoming British tour, which starts this month, and takes in about thirty venues.  He’s come a long way since his busking days . . .

FANTASTIC COMPETITION!
25 RALPH McTELL ALBUMS MUST BE WON

Ralph McTell, the man with the number one hit ‘Streets of London’, has just released his latest album entitled, ‘Streets’.  It’s full of gentle, lilting numbers similar in style to those that have helped Ralph pack out the Albert and Festival Halls in London for his concerts.

All you have to do to enter this week’s great record competition is read over the five questions below, and complete your answers in the spaces provided on the coupon – not forgetting to include your name, address and age.

The senders of the first 25 correct answers pulled from the postbag after Thursday February 20 1975 will each receive a copy of Ralph McTell’s album.

 QUESTIONS 
1.   Which group did the backing vocals on ‘Streets of London’?
2.    Name one of the venues in London where Ralph has performed successful concerts.
3.  Which piece of work took Ralph six months to write?
4.   Which continent did Ralph hitch across when he was a busker?
5.    About how many other artists have recorded ‘Streets of London’?

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The Hornet Comic
Hornet File on Ralph McTell
The Hornet Comic No 611, 24 May 1975, Price 4p.

Is Ralph a Scot?
No.  He’s from Farnborough, Kent.  His real name is Ralph May.  He took his showbiz name from one of his first singing idols, Willie McTell.

His birthday?
December 3, 1944.

Family background?
Ralph tells us he has gypsy ancestors, on his father’s side.  His father, who was a mechanic, died when Ralph was a boy.  Ralph is managed by his younger brother Bruce.

Ralph’s first job?
He says, “The army – if you can call that a job.  I joined when I was 15 – having been in the cadets at school, but I didn’t like it and after a year my mother borrowed the £50 to buy me out.  I worked to pay it back at £1 a week.”

What first interested him in music?
Finding he could play the mouth-organ as a boy!  Later he listened to discs by country/folk stars Jack Elliott and Woody Guthrie.  He began teaching himself guitar not long after.  He also began writing songs.  That was when he was 17.

Where did he get his guitar?
He bought it himself – a second-hand one for £4.50.  He says, “I didn’t realise at first that you had to change the strings.  Mine got very rusty and did my fingers no good.”

Is Ralph married?
Yes.  His wife, Nanna, is Norwegian.  They met in Paris where she was working.  Their son is eight, their daughter three.  They live in Putney, London.

His first performances?
In between visits to the continent he worked on building sites in Croydon, Surrey, where his family had moved by then.  He also had a spell at teacher training college.  While there he had an introduction to a music publisher who helped him get a recording contract.  So Ralph gave up the idea of being a teacher.

When was “Streets of London” written?
Over nine years ago in Ralph’s busking days.  He wrote it half in London, half in Paris.  He had featured it on an album and it had been recorded by scores of other performers before he had a hit with it on the Warner Bros label.

How long did he have to wait for his first hit?
Nine years!  Then “Streets of London” did the trick for him recently, but Ralph is such a good performer his shows had always been packed out anyhow.

His hobbies?
Holidays in the sun and meeting people (“I always like it when people come up and say hello after a show,” Ralph tells us).

Sport?
Ralph says he’s mildly interested in football – and follows Chelsea, Fulham and Crystal Palace.

I enjoyed seeing Ralph on Top Of The Pops.  He certainly doesn’t go in for glitter!
Ralph likes denims and usually wears his everyday clothes when performing.  But for TOTP he DID go as far as buying a new pair of trousers!

 How much difference has his hit made to his personal life?
Very little.  Says Ralph, “Money doesn’t interest me very much.  Frankly I’ve never felt freer than when I was broke.”

Anything he dislikes about showbiz?
Flying.  He says it scares him stiff.

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TV Times
14-20 May 1983
Monday: Alphabet Zoo
Ralph McTell: From Rebel hero to nursery-rhymer.  Now they call him mellow fellow.
By Michael Cable

The scene is one of cosy, domestic bliss as Ralph McTell sits at the head of the big kitchen table and dishes out home-baked pizza to his wife Nanna and their four children.

The setting strikes one as oddly incongruous – too comfortably suburban for a have-guitar-will-travel folk singer who stared his career by busking around Europe from Paris to Istanbul, who worshipped at the feet of the legendary American protest singer Woody Guthrie, and who fiercely resisted every attempt by the music business establishment to turn him into a Top 10 family entertainer.

But as McTell acknowledges with a rather sheepish grin, he has mellowed considerably since the days when he was so horrified to find himself unexpectedly at No 1 in the pop charts with his classic Streets of London, that he vanished into exile, threatening never to play again.

It is only quite recently, he admits, that he has been able to come to terms with the fact that he can no longer convincingly live up to his own image of himself as a rebel folk hero.

And it is Alphabet Zoo – the Monday children’s series on ITV in which he appears, along with Nerys Hughes, as resident composer and singer of nursery songs – that has helped to convince this shy, gentle, happy family man that he can afford to start being himself.

“When the idea of the series first came up I was very hesitant about it because it represented such a drastic change of direction for me and I was worried that it would totally blow my credibility on the folk circuit,” he explains.

“But in the end, I was forced to face some home truths about myself.

“In my mind I was still the same jean-clad, angry young folk and blues singer that I was back in the Sixties.  But every now and then I see a photograph of myself or catch sight of my reflection in the shaving mirror and I realise that the public must have a very different image of me. 

“I’m a family man with a nice house who spends a lot of time at home, goes to the pub occasionally and watches Fulham play football on a Saturday afternoon. 

“I’m 36 with a 36-inch waist, I’m part of the older generation and whether I like it or not I’m an established figure on the music scene.  There’s no point in pretending any more. 

“Once I had swallowed that there was no problem about saying yes to Alphabet Zoo.  And, as everybody forecast, once I got into it I really enjoyed working on the programme.” 

McTell wrote the 26 songs for the series in less than two months.  “I normally write only 10 or 12 songs in a year, so I was under a fair bit of pressure,” he says. 

“Particularly so when the story-lines started pouring through the letter box day after day, faster than I could churn out the songs.  In the end I finished the last one on the final day of shooting and had to sing the lyrics off the autocue.” 

When it came to selecting four of the 26 for an EP record, McTell enlisted the help of his own children – Sam, 15, Leah, 11, Tom, 6 and four-year old Billy – and some of the children at Billy’s nursery school as a sort of juke box jury. 

McTell has come a long way since, at 17 and with £5 in his pocket and a few Woody Guthrie songs in his head, he set out on that first European busking trip.  It lasted only two weeks before he was arrested on Munich railway station and repatriated. 

On later excursions he wandered all over Europe with his guitar.  He actually wrote Streets of London while busking in Paris. 

It was there that he met Danish-born Nanna.  “She started off as my ‘bottler’,” he says with a grin, going on to explain that a ‘bottler’ is someone who carries the hat round for a busker. 

“I didn’t have one when I arrived in Paris but another busker I met there had two – a Red Indian girl and Nanna – and fortunately he agreed to loan Nanna to me.” 

The third song McTell wrote – featured on his debut album, Eight Frames a Second – was called Nanna’s Song, and the couple have been together ever since. 

With his quiet, retiring nature, Ralph McTell never had any real desire to push himself further up the scale of stardom – until recently. 

“In a way, Alphabet Zoo has opened my eyes.  It could be the start of something new and really interesting for me.  There is already talk of a new TV series about songwriters and who knows what else may follow?”

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COMBINING 25 YEARS OF MUSIC AND MARRIAGE
Hello Magazine
21st March 1992 (Issue No. 195)
It is a double celebration for balladeer Ralph McTell, who wrote and recorded the world-wide hit, Streets Of London, and has travelled from busking outside theatres to starring as an international concert artist.
"Not only my silver anniversary as a recording artist," he says, "but my silver wedding, too.
"To mark those 25 years I'm touring Britain, from Cornwall to Skye, giving 48 concerts throughout March and April.
"I hardly ever stop travelling. I've grown to appreciate home comforts when I can get them." Ralph lives in Putney and has a Norwegian wife, Nanna, whom he met in Paris.
"Ours is a madhouse. We've got four children and I'm strongly bonded to them. I was present when they were born and even held them before my wife did so.
"I'm proud of them - all great kids. Sam, is at St. Martin's Art College taking a degree in film, Leah, 21, is reading English at Queen's Belfast: Tom, 15, and Billy. 14, are at local schools "They occasionally come to one of my concerts, but I don't ever drag them out.
"Nor does Nanna go on tour with me. It's my work and how many wives go along when their husband is working?"
She was there, though, when he started to write the Streets Of London. "That was in Paris," he laughs, "and was originally called the Streets of Paris. "But I thought London had even more of a problem with the homeless so I changed it. It's not my favourite song, yet certainly my biggest success commercially."
"The man who writes and sings songs about care, concern, childhood and unemployment, has 300 numbers in his repertoire.
"I do 18 to 20 during a concert," he says, "but I could sing on for three hours.
"Once this British tour is done. I'm playing in five European countries and then Australia.
"After that I return for festivals, and will probably work in America and Canada, plus Germany and Italy, before starting another English tour."
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Plenty to Sing About
Article that appeared in Home and Ideas Magazine November, 1994 
Twenty years after his song about London became a hit, Ralph McTell still loves his home city.  
Peter Robertson went to meet him.

It’s his hit, Streets of London, for which singer/songwriter Ralph McTell is best known – so it comes as no surprise to find him living in the capital. However, Ralph’s corner of London – upmarket SW13 – is nothing like the poor, run-down areas of the city he laments in his song.  In fact, he and his family live in an avenue rather than a street, in a large Victorian house with a big garden. 

It’s quite a change for the man who grew up in a council flat in Croydon and spent the early years of his marriage living in a caravan.  “This is a house beyond my wildest childhood dreams,” says Ralph, who also has a holiday home in Cornwall.  “I remember thinking as a child how lucky my family was to get a council place.  We lived in a pretty squalid flat before we were at last rehoused after 10 years on the housing list. 

“It was between two Croydon power stations, and close to the sewage farm, the glue factory and the council dump.  It was so polluted you had to wipe the clothes line before you could hang anything out! 

“I still have to pinch myself to realise I live here,” he adds.  “There’s so much space and warmth.  But I haven’t changed just because I live in a big house.” 

Ralph and Nanna, his Norwegian wife of 27 years, moved into their present home in the mid-70s, but only recently discovered that Elizabeth Taylor used to live there in the 50s.  Their next door neighbour, until two years ago, was ‘King of Farce’ Brian Rix, and Ralph insists, “No, he didn’t run in and out slamming doors with his trousers around his ankles!” 

Ralph still works hard – at the moment he’s preparing a new album and planning a major project with his close friend, singer Mary Hopkin.  But although he enjoys making music as much as ever, the main incentive behind it all is his family. 

“I’d much rather be a good Dad than a great artist,” says Ralph, who has four children – daughter Leah, 23, and sons Sam, 27, Tom 17 and Billy, 16.  “The family is very important to me and I’m proud to say that we have a very happy home here.” 

The family picture is completed by Kelly, their elderly dog, and Albert, a talkative parrot, who’s been known to mimic entire telephone conversations and sing, “Please release me let me go!” 

“I’ve always felt that a family should have pets,” says Ralph.  “There’s such a lot of pleasure to be derived from them.”   

However they do have one drawback . . . “Unfortunately even in a house this size, there’s no peace when the phones are ringing, the kids are here, the parrot is shrieking and so on.  I find it hard to concentrate on work.”   

You don’t have to look far to find evidence of Ralph’s musical career.  His grand piano takes pride of place in the living room where the shelf unit is packed with records and cassettes.  And a collection of guitars covers an entire wall in his office.   

“I’ve about 15 guitars now, and although they’re not very valuable, each one has something special about it for me. 

“I don’t play loud music,” claims Ralph.  “When I lived in the council flat the only time I could play was when the neighbours had gone to bed at around two o’clock.  So my songs had to be slow and quiet.” 

The noisiest place at his present home is the bottom of the garden, which backs onto a main railway line.   

“I sometimes play my guitar there, but the trains tend to disrupt my thoughts,” he says with a wry smile. 

Ralph has landscaped his garden and built a pond which has a familiar shape . . . “Well, I thought I’d done it kidney shaped”, he claims, “but a friend took one look at it and said, ‘I see you’ve made your pond like a guitar’.  I can see what he meant but that wasn’t my intention.” 

With a sizeable house and garden as well as a large family to look after, Ralph and Nanna lead a busy life.  “We live in a kind of ordered chaos most of the time.  The children are supposed to do certain chores around the house, but they usually ignore them!  Once in a while they can be bribed to clean one of the windows or something.  Nanna does most things. 

“This is a busy house,” continues Ralph.  “All the kids’ friends are free to come and go – and they do.  There are always people here at the weekend.” 

Ralph and Nanna enjoy inviting friends into their home.  “Billy Connolly has been a friend of mine for 20 odd years and often used to call in for a cup of tea.   He’s a great banjo player and he would sit and play his new tunes for us. 

“We’ve had a few monster parties here in the past few years, although we don’t give as many formal dinner parties as we used to,” adds Ralph.  “I’m a pub man really, I like to go along to my local for a couple of pints.” 

The family is clearly blissfully content, and it’s hard to imagine Ralph and Nanna ever leaving their home.  “It represents all I’ve saved for,” admits Ralph.  “I don’t think Nanna and I could live here without the children, but if I bring the subject up they all say, ‘You’ve got to stay here, it’s our home’. 

“Ideally we’d like either a smaller house in this area with a little garden, or an apartment, then maybe we could buy a place in a slightly warmer climate, perhaps France, as well . . . 

“But wherever else we go, we’d still keep a base in London,” insists Ralph.  “I feel like a Londoner and I would never leave the place entirely.  I just couldn’t do it.”  
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Ralph McTell & Magna Carta
Head 2nd Marquee Folk Concert
Marquee Folk News
June 10th, 1972
Two of Britain's most popular contemporary Folk artistes, head this year's MARQUEE FOLK CONCERT, at Platt Fields Park, Rusholme, Manchester, on Saturday, June 10th. Ralph McTell, straight from a prestige performance at London's Royal Festival Hall, with Mary Hopkin, appears for the second time at what someone described as this exciting new concept in folk entertainment.
There has never been anything quite like a concert of this sort before, as all the hundreds who came to the last one will witness.
Indeed thousands heard the B.C.C. Radio Manchester broadcast from the Marquee last year, which was reckoned by many to be one of finest folk programmes ever heard on the air.
McTell launches a new single on the "FAMOUS" label called "Teacher Teacher", which coincides with his appearance at the Marquee. His prestige has never been higher, with a recent tour of the States, and a mention in "Variety" - "one of the brightest young folksingers on the British scene," plus countless appearances on British radio and television. He has recently released a song book priced £1.25, and will be appearing at the Robert Patterson Oxford Festival with Mary Hopkin.
McTell was born in Farnborough. He left school at 15, to join the Army. He realised all too soon that this was not the life to him. After his mother bought him out for £50, he left England to go to Paris, busking with a friend, and only £5 in his pocket. After visiting Europe he returned to England , staying several months in an isolated caravan, miles from the nearest main road. His songs as someone once commented are "Fragments… impressions… not solutions." They are statements, observations, and descriptions of what he sees and believes. We reckon him to be one of the finest of today's contemporary singers.
MAGNA CARTA have made several appearances in the Manchester area, but never before at MARQUEE. A new album has just been released called "Magna Carta in Concert" recorded live in Amsterdam in November of last year. Their previous Vertigo album called "Seasons" went straight into the charts and was widely acclaimed at the time, by music critics, and was broadcast in its entirety by the B.B.C.
They have featured in an evening of poetry and music with Poet Laureate Robert Graves, and early in 1971 visited America for a nationwide tour, that began with a concert with the National Youth Orchestra in Washington, D.C. Magna Carta include Chris Simpson, who comes from Harrogate and write all of their material and Glen Stuart, a Londoner with a five octave range voice. They return from a tour of Scandanavia before appearing at the Marquee Concert.
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RED SKY Autumn Tour 2000
Newcastle Opera House
Tuesday 7th November 2000
from The Newcastle Opera House Web Site
We expected a fabulous show and that is what we got. In all the years that Ralph has been touring, his performances rarely drop below 100% and this one was no different. A very enthusiastic audience were treated to over two hours of McTell magic. Superb written songs, superbly sung, the oldies and the new ones from his cracking new album RED SKY. With songs and tributes to other great writers such as Dylan, good banter between the numbers, the time flew by (always a good sign). This particular show was a late and welcome addition to Ralph's already busy Autumn tour, but the Opera House has requested that we are first on the list for next years trip around the UK. Well done Ralph, it really was a fabulous evening.

This is the background details .........

Ralph McTell is one of the biggest names in the business and we are delighted to see him back at the Opera House. This show is part of Ralph's multi date autumn tour which takes him to very corner of the country, but not Scotland. Ralph was disappointed that he was unable to get north of the border this time, but Newcastle is but a stones throw from bonny Scotland and we almost speak the same language!
Anyway, Ralph's long awaited new album, RED SKY will be released for the tour. If you would like to no more about Ralph and get full details of his albums, books and what's happening, pop over to his web site where we pinched his biog. details. It's www.folkcorp.co.uk/mctell/welcome.htm but don't forget to come back to the Opera House.
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Radio 2 Folk and Acoustic Web Pages
March 2002
RALPH McTELL 
National Treasure 
Leola TPGCD21 
Major songwriter as he is, this album sees McTell honour his first loves - the blues and resophonic guitars - with an album of (mainly) covers. Add a lean, stripped-down style to a blissful weaving of intimate, honeyed voice with gripping, authentic guitar; apply to a batch of well-picked classic songs and you get an album that's an instant classic itself.

Opener Stagolee gives the game away in seconds: the blues never sounded so alive. Songs are drawn from various sources, from vintage bluesmen Mississippi John Hurt and Robert Johnson to latter-day master Eric Bibb and songwriter Alan Tunbridge. McTell himself makes composer credits only twice - on an arrangement of Mendelssohn like you've never heard before, and on his own An Nans Tewl Hyr Dhe'n Mor (Long Dark Valley To The Sea) - a spooky, resonant piece out on the edge of Scaryland: McTell standing at the crossroads with Johnson. A couple of tracks in concert remind us what a class live act he is too: Tunbridge's National Seven is anchored on Michael Chapman-like echoey picky slides and the country blues of Blind Boy Fuller's Weeping Willow was never served so well.

The sublime National makes its presence felt like a wild angel on all but a couple of tracks where McTell's old 1934 Gibson L1 sneaks in, and minimal guesting from Steve Turner's National, Leah May's BVs and Sam May's harmonium add just a sweet measure of flavouring. Woody Guthrie's Hard Travelling winds up an album that reinforces McTell's status as one of the outstanding performers of the acoustic movement - new or old. Three decades on from Streets Of London, Ralph McTell is indeed as described by his pal and fan Billy Connolly recently, a National Treasure. 
Mel McClellan - March 2002
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The Music of Huw & Tony Williams
by Ralph McTell
from the Huw & Tony Williams Web Site
Huw and Tony Williams (not related but closer than brothers), first got together at school in South Wales and have been involved in music ever since. They first entered my world as special guests on my 1992 'Silver Celebration' tour, and I booked them on the basis of hearing just one song: i.e. the beautiful Gabriel's Carol. I am seldom impressed so deeply, and to my delight there were more beautiful songs to come. In performance, great songs create an aura of reverence from the stage, but Huw and Tony's 'mateyness' showcases their songs in a totally unpretentious way and as an audience we are still laughing at one of their funny songs when our breath is taken away by one of their beautiful, moving ones: i.e. I Can Jump Puddles or Rosemary's Sister. They entertain us and if proof were needed for this, even at the end of my tour the road crew that weren't otherwise engaged could be found at the side of the stage, continuing to enjoy their performances. This is probably the essence of Huw and Tony, they genuinely look as though they enjoy each others company and spontaneous ad libs. There is an uncanny way they anticipate each other musically. They love their time on stage, and bring an unaffected warmth to their shows.
Huw is a wonderful songwriter and the amount of cover versions of his songs would make many seasoned songwriters jealous. Both Huw and Tony are excellent guitarists, and Tony's bass playing and harmony singing gives the boys an instantly recognisable sound that is very much their own. Tony is also an excellent writer and one of their collaborations We Stayed Awake remains a favourite of mine. I am personally delighted with the steady progression of their careers and I'm proud to have been associated with their growing success. When I was told the boys didn't drink that much I was quite worried, but the 'constant kettle' and cups of tea were a great comfort on the road.
To summarise: Great songs, good humour, terrific rapport with their audience, great tea makers and they even tap dance!
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