Bruce Welch born 2 November 1941

Bruce Welch OBE (born 2 November 1941 as Bruce Cripps) is an English guitarist, songwriter, producer, singer and businessman best known as a founding member of the Shadows. 

Welch's parents (Stan Cripps and Grace Welch) moved him to 15 Broadwood View, Chester-le-Street, County Durham. Welch's mother died when he was aged six, and he grew up with his Aunt Sadie. After learning to play the guitar, he formed a Tyneside skiffle band called the Railroaders when he was fourteen. His Rutherford Grammar School friend Brian Rankin (later to be known as Hank Marvin) joined the group, and they travelled to London in 1958 for the final of a talent competition. Although they did not win, they joined with members of other entrant bands and formed the Five Chesternuts with Pete Chester (born 1942), son of comedian Charlie Chester, on drums. 

Upon moving to London, Bruce Welch and Hank Marvin briefly operated as the Geordie Boys before enlisting in an outfit called the Drifters In September 1958, Welch and Marvin joined the Drifters, later to become the Shadows, as Cliff Richard's backing band. As well as success with the Shadows, Welch acted as producer for (among others) Richard and songwriter for his ex-fiancée, Olivia Newton-John. He also released a solo single, "Please Mr. Please", which was not commercially successful, though the song has been covered by several recording artists (most notably Newton-John, who would take it into the top 10 of the US pop and country charts in 1975). 

Welch wrote several number 1 hit singles for Richard and for the Shadows. Among tunes or songs written or co-written by Welch are the Shadows' hits "Foot Tapper", "Theme for Young Lovers", and "The Rise and Fall of Flingel Bunt", Marvin Welch & Farrar's "Faithful" and "My Home Town", and Cliff Richard hits "Please Don't Tease", "In the Country", "Summer Holiday", "I Love You" and "I Could Easily Fall (In Love with You)". He was also the musical consultant for the West End musical Buddy – The Buddy Holly Story. 

                             

Welch often played acoustic guitar on the Shadows' recordings, either in tandem with an electric rhythm guitar or as an alternative, but whatever the particular arrangement, the resulting interlocked playing was always unique. And it always worked in pure electric terms when presented in concert. He was involved in every incarnation of the Shadows except for the 1969 Japanese tour. 

From 1970 to 1972 he was part of the music group Marvin, Welch & Farrar. The distinction was that while The Shadows were famous for their instrumental work, Hank Marvin, Bruce  Welch & John Farrar were a trio, vocal harmony group. They have been favourably compared to USA folk close harmony group Crosby Stills Nash and Young and The Hollies. The Shadows represented Great Britain in the Eurovision Song Contest 1975. They finished second with Let Me Be The One. 

After the Shadows disbanded in 1990, with Marvin deciding to tour with his own band, Welch's plans for his own tours did not fully materialise until 1998, when he formed Bruce Welch's Shadows (originally called 'Bruce Welch's Moonlight Shadows' – a name that was dropped after 1998). The group featured former Shadows bassist Alan Jones and keyboardist Cliff Hall, with Bob Watkins on drums. Phil Kelly and Barry Gibson (owner of Burns Guitars) shared lead guitar duties until Gibson's departure in 2000. Daniel Martin replaced Phil Kelly for the 2012 Shadowmania. 

In 1998, he produced Shadowmania, a one-day show comprising various Shadows tribute bands, with his own band topping the bill. Due to the event's success he presented it annually until 2012, missing only 2004 and 2009 due to tours with the reformed Shadows. 

At Shadowmania 2011 he included a 'Tribute to Jet Harris', his former band member who had died from cancer in March of that year. At Shadowmania 2012, Phil Kelly could not appear because of illness and was replaced by session guitarist-songwriter Daniel Martin, and Justin Daish, leader of The Shadowers (Jet Harris' final backing band). 

Welch, who lives in Richmond, London was appointed OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) in the 2004 Birthday Honours list for services to music. Although Bruce Welch is pretty much retired, The Shadows are far from forgotten.  

(Edited mainly from Wikipedia)

Jerry Lordan born 30 April 1934

Jeremiah Patrick "Jerry" Lordan (30 April 1934 — 24 July 1995) was an English songwriter, composer and singer. 

Born in Paddington, Lordan started in music while still a child, teaching himself to play both the piano and the guitar. Like so many others with these precious skills; it assured his popularity during his National Service in the RAF where he was frequently called upon to entertain. His initial attempts to enter the world of professional music included becoming half a duet called "Lee & Jerry Elvin" who actually cut one single on the Fontana label. Despite the failure of this and other forays into the world of entertainment, Jerry set about writing his own songs. 

Jerry's musical work at this time, 1958, didn't pay the rent but he managed to get a few of his songs made into demos while working for a London advertising agency. These drew interest from Decca who used one of Jerry's songs to launch the career of a young singer called Mike Preston. The song, "A House A Car And A Wedding Ring" did not sell particularly well, but gave sufficient encouragement to Jerry to carry on writing. However, another career launch by Decca a few months later consolidated Jerry's songwriting credentials- this was "I've Waited So Long" by another newcomer- Anthony Newley. 

 

 

 

                           
 

Jerry's records weren't big hitters perhaps, and his style was rather gentle 'Pop' rather than rock and roll. However, his work was distinctive and found itself a following. Produced  by George Martin, his first six singles were released between 1959 and 1962 and the first three of these, "I'll Stay Single" (# 26), "Who Could Be Bluer" (# 17) and "Sing Like An Angel" (# 36) charted in the UK, all in the first six months of 1960. Although Jerry would have no more hits in his name, within a month of his last exit from the chart he would make a yet greater impact on British popular music. 

Among Jerry's songs were a handful of numbers without lyrics. One of these was an instrumental called "Apache" which was recorded by the popular UK guitarist Bert Weedon. As things transpired, it was fortunate that Top Rank had not been in any hurry to release Bert's rather bland interpretation of the number. Up until that time, Cliff Richard's backing group 'The Shadows' had not been successful on record without their famous lead singer.  

The group was looking for something to put on the flip side of a recording of "Quartermaster's Stores"- a number suggested by Norrie Paramor- and probably destined to the same fate as their first three releases. Through a chance meeting with Jerry- brought together while on tour- "Apache" was suggested despite already having been canned by Bert Weedon. The rest, as they say, is history. Although Top Rank rushed their version into the shops following the Shadows' release, and despite the strength of the number, Bert Weedon sank almost without trace. The reaction to the Shadows version was amazing and "Apache" was to provide the template for a very long string of subsequent successes by the group. 



Jet Harris 23, Tony Meehan 19 & song writer Jerry Lordan 28

"Apache" is the number for which Jerry will always be best remembered although he wrote many more instrumentals for the Shadows- including "Wonderful Land" and "Diamonds" for Jet Harris & Tony Meehan- both of them number 1s. Unsurprisingly, Jerry neglected his own fading recording career and concentrated on songwriting instead. The hits flowed fairly steadily through the 1960s with "I'm A Moody Guy" for Shane Fenton, "I'm Just A Baby" for Louise Cordet, and "Good Times, (Better Times)" for Cliff Richard among them. 

Things started to go less well for Jerry as the 1960s gave way to the 1970s. The end of that decade saw his life at its lowest ebb and he reached a point when he no longer felt able to write any more. Fortunately, Jerry did eventually start to write music again, but he never managed to rekindle his past success, although his older work was still recorded, across the 1970s and beyond, by the likes of Link Wray, the Edgar Broughton Band, Hot Butter, Cilla Black, and the Incredible Bongo Band. 

Sadly, Jerry Lordan died on July 24th 1995 and Britain lost one of its most talented songwriters and surely the creator of the most memorable instrumental of them all.

(info mainly from 45rpm.org)
 

Tony Meehan born 2 March 1945

 

Daniel Joseph Anthony 'Tony' Meehan (2 March 1943 – 28 November 2005) was a founder member of the British group The Shadows with Jet Harris, Hank Marvin and Bruce Welch. He played drums on early Cliff Richard and The Shadows hits and on early Shadows instrumentals.

Before the advent of the Beatles, the Shadows were one of the most successful and influential British pop groups of their time, although their musical credibility is often forgotten in the light of later appearances in films alongside Cliff Richard. Moreover, Meehan's distinctive and innovative drumming formed the backbone of the band's musical style and influenced a generation of younger musicians.

Born in Hampstead, north London, Meehan took up the drums at the age of 10, and three years later made his first public appearance at a dance hall in Willesden. Equally interested in classical percussion, he played the timpani with the London Youth Orchestra in 1957. Soon afterwards, he was offered a job in a touring band at £25 a week, and was granted six months' absence from school. He never returned, having found work on the London cabaret scene playing at such venues as Churchill's and the Stork Club.

Like numerous other teenagers, he was also drawn to the heavily rhythmic world of skiffle. He performed with the Worried Men and the Vipers, whose constantly changing line-up included future broadcaster Wally Whyton and future Shadows guitarist Jet Harris. Meehan also briefly backed rock'n'roll singers Vince Taylor and Tony Sheridan.

His big break came at the end of 1958 when guitarists Hank Marvin and Bruce Welch needed a replacement drummer for their group, the Drifters, which was due to tour with Cliff Richard, then the country's newest pop sensation. With Harris already on board as bass guitarist, Meehan was offered the job, and the next three years was a period of almost non-stop performing and recording, both with Richard and with the group as they established themselves in their own right as an instrumental combo.

Their first record, cut in January 1959, was Richard's Livin' Lovin' Doll, closely followed by the group's debut single, Feelin' Fine. After threats of a lawsuit from the managers of the American vocal group of the same name, the Drifters renamed themselves as the Shadows.

 

To hear Tony’s ‘chops’ check out ‘See you in my drums’ on the album ‘The Shadows’. It’s light years away from Sandy Nelson’s ‘Let there be drums’. Tony Meehan plays some stuff there which even 53 years after he recorded the track in one take, still sounds fresh and new.

 

 

 

 

In October 1961 - and still only 18 - Meehan left the group to pursue a career as a composer and record producer, a role he had become fascinated by while working at the Abbey Road studios with the Shadows. He negotiated a pioneering independent production deal with Decca, under which he would bring acts to the company. His first success was I'm Just a Baby, a coy number by Louise Cordet, daughter of the owner of the fashionable Saddle Room club in London's West End. He also branched out as a session drummer for Frank Ifield, Billy Fury and John Leyton, among others.

However, Meehan was soon back on stage, this time in partnership with Harris, who had left the Shadows following disagreements with Bruce Welch. As Jet Harris and Tony Meehan, they had instrumental hits with Diamonds (which replaced the Shadows' Dance On at the top of the pop charts in January 1963) and Scarlett O'Hara, both produced by Meehan. Diamonds also included Jimmy Page on acoustic rhythm guitar. The brief career of the Harris-Meehan group came to an end after Harris was injured in an accident involving a bus and a car, in which he was travelling with his pop-star girlfriend, Billie Davis.

Meehan decided to go it alone and launched the Tony Meehan Combo in early 1964. While the group recorded conventional pop tunes (their biggest hit was Song Of Mexico, by Apache composer Jerry Lordan), they had a jazz-oriented stage show that featured future Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones and future Miles Davis guitarist John McLaughlin. "We were doing the sort of thing that Chicago and Blood, Sweat And Tears came up with later" Meehan later told an interviewer, "but we were booed off the stage when we did our jazz things."

 

 

The combo was dissolved in the mid-1960s, and Meehan concentrated on production work for the next decade. Among his credits were albums by the soul artist PP Arnold, the American singer-songwriter Tim Hardin, the British singer John Howard and Roger Daltrey, of the Who. Meehan was less active in the music business after the 1970s, though he made a rare public appearance in 1999 at a Shadows convention sponsored by Bruce Welch signing autographs for hundreds of fans - but not joining Jet Harris and the others on stage.

 

 

 Meehan quit the music industry in the 1990s for a major career change as a psychologist, as a result of a lifelong hobby/interest. He worked in London at a local college lecturing psychology until his death.

 

Tony Meehan died on November 28th 2005 at St Mary's Hospital South Wharf Road, Paddington, London as a result of head injuries, following a fall down the main staircase at his London flat in Maida Vale. (Info mainly from The Guardian. "Song Of Mexico" from Lord of the Boot Sale blog)

 

Cliff Richard's The Event in 1989 had special guests and Jet Harris & Tony Meehan Guested and played 'Move It'