Tuesday 20 July 2010

David Dowding and the very early days


Of all the people I have spoken to so far, David's musical involvement with Roger Taylor goes back the furthest. Thats him on the left with Roger and Mike Dudley rehearsing in New Mills, where his parents owned a farm.

Being in the same class at Truro School (2B to be precise) he knew Roger in 1961 when he still only possessed a single drum (imagine how many he has now!!!) They would rehearse with this solitary drum and a cheap Spanish guitar in Roger's garage.

The first name he remembers them using was 'The Cousin Jacks' (a colloquial term for a Cornish miner) which temporarily became 'Beat Unlimited' in around 1963 when Mike Dudley joined them on rhythm guitar.

The thing about both these bands is that they were instrumental bands - along the lines of The Shadows - not because they couldn't sing (Roger after all had been a chorister at Truro Cathedral)  but because for a long time there was an issue with the fact that none of their voices had broken.

He remembered some interesting things about Truro School, and particularly music teacher Kenneth Pelmear.

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