Photos: Gary Williams

September 2003 - July 2004

June 26th 2004
Three busy weeks, loads of gigs both in England and Prague.
Thanks to all who came to the shows in England especially the Clarendon Hall gig which for me was a real highlight. It was great to play to such an appreciative audience. The band were in fantastic form ... it was such a pleasure to play the songs with them. Thanks also to Robin Bibi for letting us crash his blues jam night at The Grey Horse in Kingston.
For those of you who read my "Get Rhythm" articles, there's quite a lot about the Prague Fringe Festival in this coming months edition. Star of the Festival for me was Teo Castellanos and his one man show "NE 2nd Avenue". Irish readers might like to know he'll be at the Dublin Fringe this year
The live recording we did with Renes' band turned out well ...so too the Video.
If I can get a decent enough connection, I'll try and post it some where on my site.
I played a festival in Nespecky about 40km outside of Prague with the Tonny Blues Band a couple of weekends ago. Lovely people, weather a bit iffy,usual quota of festival casualties (in particular a guy dressed like a Native American complete with plaits and headdress!) but it managed to stay fine for our set.

Next Monday I'm going to record some guitar and vocal versions of 5 of my songs.
Work is really picking up here. I've got 4 festival appearances booked for the summer.

June 2nd 2004
The Prague Fringe Festival starts this week and on Thursday and Sunday I'm going to check out a total of 10 shows to review for Get Rhythm Magazine.
The Peter Gabriel gig was fantastic. Very visual.. brilliant lightshow.. and PG was on top form he'd even learned a little Czech so that he could talk to his loyal, sell out audience. Thanks to Hels Smith in Prague and Annie Parsons in England for organising my Press Pass. The gigs with Rene Trossmans Band are going well. Last night we shot a 3 camera live video and did a live recording.

Congrats to Cami and David, fans and friends from Toronto, on their engagement!

DONT FORGET
The Band have a gig in Twickenham on June 16th. We'll be playing at The Clarendon Hall with Jackie McAuleys' Poormouth as part of the Twickenham Music Festival.You can get tickets by phoning 020 8977 7558

Click this link for poster details of our gig and the whole event

May 16th 2004
What a busy few weeks! The Czech Republic joined the EU on May 1st and there was music throughout the city. The UK were very ably represented by Courtney Pine and His Band, The Levellers and Shooglenifty.
I went to the Courtney Pine gig and was knocked out. Apart from being an amazing player he is such a showman.
Things are looking up for me here, I've been asked to join the Rene Trossman Band as singer. Rene is a Blues and RnB guitarist from Chicago and the band has a Wednesday night residency at U Maleho Glena. I've got some solo gigs at a couple of places.
On Monday 17th I'm going to see the Peter Gabriel gig in Prague... I've got a Press Pass as I'm covering it for "Get Rhythm" magazine.
I've got visitors for the next week too. In early June my mate from London Papa George is out here gigging and staying with me.
I'm coming back to England in June for a week to do a series of gigs. I'll post all the details on the gigs page.

April 29th 2004
Had a great week in England! It was really lovely to see my family and friends, and a surprise for my Mum and Dad as they didn't know I was coming.
Whilst I was in England, I bought a Trace Elliott Acoustic Guitar amplifier (yes I know I 've got one already ... but this one is much smaller!) and brought it back back here.
The gig at Paradise was fantastic, really good turn out, and well appreciated. Thanks to all of you who made the effort to come. I'll be back in June.

I've been busy here. There are lots of gigs on the horizon starting in May. I have been offered a regular gig at a venue called "Red Hot and Blues" in the centre of town and I'm talking to three other venues.

On the English front, the band have a gig in Twickenham on June 16th. We'll be playing at The Clarendon Hall with Jackie McAuleys' Poormouth as part of the Twickenham Music Festival.

Click this link for poster details http://www.parkgrove.demon.co.uk/tmn/index.html

April 12th 2004
I'll be playing in 1 Paradise Road in Richmond Surrey on the night of April 18th.
Start at about 8:30.

April 10th 2004
The last Maly Glena gig was a stormer! The busiest I've ever seen it. The guys played wonderfully well and the vibe in the club was fantastic. I sold a bunch of CDs. Got to bed about 3am - elated! We're going to make a live demo at Romans studio on Monday, then on Tuesday I'll be back in England for a week.

April 6th 2004
Tomorrow I play my last stand-in gig at U Maleho Glena. I'll be there with my original trio ( Petr Dvorsky Double Bass and Roman Pokorny Fender Telecaster). Plus, maybe a couple of special guests. The gig last week was a real success. My friend Peter Hughes, who is also the guvnor of The Porterhouse in Covent Garden, came over to Prague for a couple of days especially for the gig (I'd like to think) and bearing gifts in the form of a bottle of 10yr old Bushmills ..slainte Peter!

I am writing a series of Diary articles for the magazine "Get Rhythm2" , about life in Prague its Musicians and Venues. My first article appears in this months (April) edition and is a brief introduction to Prague city life and the important contribution music makes to daily life here.
I finished writing my second this afternoon. 1600 words. Provisionally entitled "Guma and the Gig Police" it focuses on the story of Vladimir "Guma" Kulhanek a legend in Czech rock music. He's one of life's real characters and we had great fun together comparing life as a musician in London with life as a musician in Communist Czechoslovakia in the 1970s. Get Rhythm is available country wide in the UK but has its core readership in the North East.

March 23rd 2004
Played a very swish cocktail bar last night with Ukrainian Double Bass player Taras Voloschuk. The gig went really well and we been asked back. It was our first gig together ...he asked me the night before.
To illustrate what a small it is, there was a group from England in the bar. Turns out that one of them used to come and see Grahame and I at The Vanni in Windsor!

March 18th 2004
The gig last night was fantastic. We played three sets, including some covers and some originals, the audience were great and wouldn't let us go. We've been rebooked for the next two Wednesdays. A Czech couple who used to come to Crosses Corner in Windsor to see the band turned up last night after having read about the gig on this page. It was a 5 hour return journey for them.

Details of the other gigs are on the gigs page. I'm off to the Rudolfinum tonight for an evening of Ravel and Debussy .

March 16th 2004
I've been here now for close to six weeks. Thank goodness the weather is picking up at last. The first four weeks were so cold.. not Canada cold but colder than Helsinki some days (according to the international edition of The Guardian), a biting wind too. The sun has been out the last few days so that's great.

What's even better is I have got my first gig !!!
I'll be playing at U Maleho Glena tomorrow night with my new trio Petr Dvorsky on double bass and Roman Pokorny on guitar. Great players ..regarded by some as the best in Prague.
This gig came out of the blue. I'd been talking to the owner, and he was a little sceptical about whether or not it would work, because it's a pretty straight ahead Jazz and Blues venue, then their regular Wednesday night guy went and broke his hand and will be out for at least three weeks. So he called me this morning and the guys can do it too..I'll report back.

March 1st 2004
I'm slowly settling in to life in Prague.
You'll be able to read all about my exploits in some articles I'm writing for the magazine "Get Rhythm". I've been to loads of gigs in the three weeks since I arrived. Mostly Jazz and Blues, but also to some Classical concerts courtesy of a friend who plays 'cello for the Czech National Symphony Orchestra. Saw the Beethoven 1st Piano concerto recently..the soloist was a 13yr old Czech Kid
Great Player too. Saw him in the Foyer afterwards and said "Thanks you were great" in tourist Czech. The poor lad turned crimson.

It's damn cold here, I'm starting to get used to it, but it ain 't easy.
Start rehearsing with a band next week for a gig at the end of March. Going out tonight with Vlasta Redl, one of the best known Czech musicians (and serious drinker ..ooh er)

February 5th 2004
I move to Prague on Sunday the 8th of Feb.
I hope to do a number of things including, joining a Czech Band as a singer guitarist, forming my own band to play my material and to find premises to open a small acoustic music club a la Bluebird Cafe or Kashmir Klub.
Check in for regular updates.
A change will do me good. I need to write more, so this move will really help.
I'm taking my brand new and very wonderful Lowden guitar .
The Czech Republic is somewhere I've played regularly over the past eight years,
I have friends there, and am already collaborating with a band on some songs for their forthcoming cd album.

September 29th 2003
Internet radio station radioio has picked up "HereAfter" and it's a featured essential album this week ..along with Randy Newman. I'm planning a trip to Prague in November and not Nashville..I'll do that in the New Year.

September 10th 2003
"Before I was Famous" has been picked up by radioio (www.radioio.com) the largest subscriber internet radio station in the world and is a featured cd (one of Zoes' Essentials) this week. They love the demo of "Trust Me" that I recorded in my shed! " So pure your ears will perk up thinking he's singing just for you. Great songwriting!" To quote Zoe Montana who writes the acoustic page.

I'm now doing the bulk of my website work my self.
Thanks as ever to "Stevie Ray" Creasy for his work in the past.

We've now added a totally secure online shop via PayPal where you can buy the CDs, and there's a new and improved look to the navigation.

Finally, I also have complete control over my guestbook now so at last I can put paid to all the spammers that have plagued the guestbook with their crap ads for online gambling, Viagra and the usual stuff that most of us get as spam in our e-mail.

Take Care.