Brian Walkley

 

Hello, I'm Brian. I'd like to welcome you to my website. I have been lucky to have been involved with many interesting things over many years, so please read on, and I hope you like it. I`m sure there will be many more exciting things to come in the future, maybe as a result of you visiting this website!

 

 

                                                                      POTTED BIOGRAPHY

 

Brian was born in Maidstone, in the south east of England and his parents moved to more interesting Brighton on the south coast when he was 9 years young. He started to learn the drums shortly after, at first from his father who also taught him the accordian and some piano. Brian's first professional job on drums was with the first class band on the 'Queen Mary' which was still doing the regular crossing between Southampton and New York at the time. He then spent a year on another Cunard ship, the 'Carinthia', and studied 'Method Jazz Drumming' in New york with well known drum teacher Stanley Spector. This put him in the right direction, or 'ahead of the pack' as Stanley put it.

 

Back in England in 1965 he didn't play much jazz at first as he became the drummer with Gary Farr and the T-Bones, a Brighton based rhythm and blues group with a Friday residency at London's famous Marquee Club. He then toured the country, made many records and TV appearances and got to accompany Stevie Wonder, T-Bone Walker, Sonny Boy Williamson and British artists Julie Driscoll, Brian Auger and Jeff Beck. The T-Bones featured Keith Emerson on Hammond organ, later of The Nice and Emerson Lake and Palmer fame. Brian enjoyed living through the 'Swinging London' period.

 

After this he joined a French blues group for 10 months and came back to London where he filled in for a month with Bluesology, a group run by singer Long John Baldry and sax player Elton Dean. The young pianist Reg Dwight later took parts of those names for himself and became Elton John!

 

In 1967 Brian played for 10 months with Brighton's popular Syd Dean Orchestra, then after a while in Los Angeles playing drums dressed as Dracula, and some months back in London with a Jamaican soul band (who hated reggae by the way!), he went off to Germany, playing on American bases mostly. In 1968 he went back to Paris again and stayed on the continent for many years playing in all sorts of bands in many countries, mostly for a Swiss agency, with a lot of jazz gigs in Paris in between. He was usually based in Paris, since he had got married there!

 

Later in the 70's and 80's he was often sent by the Swiss agency to Thailand, Japan and later to Hong Kong. Also in the 80's he was sometimes a compere / translator for big business conferences in Geneva, Switzerland. This gave him confidence for speaking in public. In 1989 he went to live permanently in Hong Kong where he was teaching and playing lots of jazz with some very good musicians. He also accompanied American singer Michel Hendricks for a week. Her famous jazz singer father, Jon Hendricks came to give his congratulations. Actually Brian had already played for a few famous female singers, including Adelaide Hall, Josephine Baker, Bertice Reading and once a very successful informal session with Eydie Gorme and her husband Steve Lawrence on piano.

 

Whilst in Hong Kong he had small parts in 3 films and 2 soap operas, and bigger parts in 15 TV commercials (sometimes with Cantonese diologue). He had already been an extra in 'Dallas' when they were filming there in 1985.

 

All this travelling, 15 years in Europe (mostly France and Switzerland) and 10 years in the far east (8 in Hong Kong) has built up a knowledge of 7 languages plus a smattering of 5 others, which he still finds useful even after having wandered back to cosmopolitan Brighton in 1994 and then to London in 2006 where he now plays drums regularly at local well known jazz venues.

 

Teaching, playing, acting, public speaking and of course all those languages(!) has kept him busy over the years.

 

Brian is still open to any offers, for drumming or acting. Please make contact if interested.