I'm a multi-instrumentalist with nearly forty years experience making music, studying, performing, recording and teaching primarily Afro-Brazilian and Afro-Cuban percussion and songs.
I've always been and continue to be very active within the UK Samba community, teaching at many Samba Encontros and also at many broader arts and music festivals. I've formed and acted as musical director for many UK samba groups and Blocos-Afros and have performed with many UK bands. I play and have played in both Brazil and the UK for Afro-Brazilian dance/choreography masters including Rosangela Silvestre, Irineu Nogueira, Vera Passos, Vania Oliveira, Jaguaracy Mojugbá and the sadly deceased Augusto Omolu.
It was in about 1979 I first discovered the two master percussionists Airto Moreira and Nana Vasconcelos, one quickly led to the other. One morning I woke up to the album '500 Miles High', Live at Montreux 1974, being played loud by my sister in the next room. It was Flora Purim's amazing group, Ron Carter on Bass, David Amaro on guitar, Roberto Silva on drums and Airto Moreira on percussion. That record changed my life, my world. I woke up to Airto playing Berimbau and Caxixi's, improvising, singing from deep in his belly. Something happened that morning, I felt a connection with what I heard in a way I'd never experienced before. It was something deep, otherworldly, or maybe just this worldly in a way I'd never found. Looking back I'd say it was God sent.
I'd been playing for a long time already, as a boy, fascinated by sound and rhythm I played anything I could, and as a teenager I'd begun drumming and playing percussion with local bands. Somehow I managed to get hold of some of the instruments I'd heard on recordings of Airto Moreira, Nana Vasconcelos and Trilok Guru and I began to experiment, to learn. Through all this time I'd also been playing with a couple of the new Samba Groups that had begun in London, Bristol, Manchester and Birmingham. My journey into Candomblé began then too (see the 'About Candomblé' page for information on that). Soon after I discovered the beautiful photographs of Pierre Verger, his portraits of the people, the life of the city of Salvador da Bahia in Brazil's North-East. That was it, I had to go there.
I was soon on my way to Brazil for what was the first of many study trips. For years I'd heard the word Candomblé mentioned by fellow percussionists and it quickly became clear this, whatever it was was at the heart of everything Brazilian I found myself studying. After many trips and years of study in Salvador da Bahia, I was initiated into Candomblé and made an Ogan Alabé, a drummer for the Orixas, the African/Brazilian deities of Candomblé.
Some of this and a documenting of the life and times of Salvador and its people, over the past twenty years, form part of my work as a photographer. A link to my photographs can be found on the Films/Photography page.
As well as my involvement with making, teaching and performing Afro-Brazilian and Afro-Cuban music, I've always produced my own music, usually by experimenting with, mixing up and rearranging traditional percussion styles and creating original works. A link to some of my music can be found on the Audio page.
I currently live in Bristol, England, and as well as continuing to write and record my own music, I have several ongoing performance projects, including Bristol based Samba-Reggae group Ilu Axé and Candomblé music performance group, Orin Asé.
