Page 34 - May 2022

Bryan Robinson
https://www.bryanrobinson.co.uk
At 13 years old I was on stage at school, playing Bach’s lute suite number one. Suddenly, my mind went blank. Fortunately, I managed to improvise a rapid ending and finish it. Most of the punters weren’t Bach fans and appeared not to notice, the rest were far too polite to say that I’d screwed up. I love Bach’s music and still regularly enjoy screwing it up... in private.
After learning to play so many extended jazz chords at college, I found it impossible to play a ‘humble’ G chord...for years. I’ve fully recovered now though.
I once tried to teach my father the guitar. He was a willing student, but his hands were just too big, like shovels; his father had been a platelayer on the railways and a part time, bare- knuckle boxer. Fretting a single string just wasn’t possible. But, he could easily open any jar lid, no matter how tight...
I currently own about 20 guitars – but, they’re all very different...OK!?
The first solo concert I ever did on guitar was for my grandad, when I was 10 years old. I played ‘Apache’ by the shadows on my cheap old electric guitar through a Zenta amplifier. When I finished he said – ‘mmm, I suppose you want some pocket money now’. I’ve been thrilling audiences ever since...
Ed Bickert, the wonderful jazz guitarist was once spotted feeling the weight of guitar amps in a music shop, uttering, “I don’t like the sound of that one”...at the heavy ones.
Brad Simmonds
Brad Simmonds wants to bring old time country music of Nashville to Newfoundland, Canada. Brad is a sold out recording artist and he says there’s
nothing like the feeling he got leaving
a Tim Horton’s and hearing someone
playing his music in their car. Brad grew
up in Charlottetown Newfoundland
(Terra Nova Park), where most of his
family was musical. He’s played since
he was 5 years old, when a group of
his friends gave him his first guitar
and he taught himself to play. In his
late teens and early 20s, Brad made
his rounds playing the bar scene, but
he abandoned his dreams of fame to
support his young family, going into
construction. Music was put ‘on hold’
until recently. In 2018, Brad was several
years into a new domestic life with his
second wife, Mel,( whom he met online) when he offered Facebook live streaming of his singing. His followers
choose songs for his debut picker CD, ‘Old Habits’, which sold out within 10 days of its release in May 2019. Brad’s a gifted musician who can play almost any tune he hears, singing beautifully in his unique bass vocal range. However, since returning to his passion for music, Brad and Mel have become an overnight singer/songwriter duet with an ever-growing popularity. He says he’s determined to keep learning new technology because it’s helped him to develop his profile on social media. In fact, Covid helped Brad to regain his focus on music. Brad is busy assisting his wife in developing her businesses Keto Newf and The Shed~PoweHouse Inc. , but the couple’s biggest passion outside of family is developing their music. As the title of a song his wife wrote on a visit to Nashville a few years back says, Brad
can definitely sing out ‘It’s My Time!’