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Biography Part One | A Star-Gazey Dreamer I began playing the trumpet in the school orchestra. At twelve I gave up on brass because my older brother said, “you’ll get lots of girls if you play the guitar”. After giving up on the guitar two times I finally had a breakthrough when I learnt how to play the melody to Blowin’ in the Wind – third time lucky I’d say! It wasn’t until August 2006 that I truly discovered what Folk Music is. I had traveled up to The Green Man Festival somewhere in the Welsh Countryside by myself. It was here that I encountered Bert Jansch, a guitarist who I’d been told was “as good as Jimi Hendrix”. I started wandering around the campsite listening to people singing old songs around the campfire. I went for a ramble singing a melody to the wind; there were some very tall sunflowers around. So I finally put away my electric guitar and focused on songs, only songs. I was teaching the guitar to make a living, reading inspiring books and learning more about my instrument. My confidence grew as a singer singing in his own voice about things that had affected me. Then Chris Monger asked me to travel to his bedroom studio for a demo… It was late October and autumn was all around. Chris had set up some microphones, I had brought my Taylor 514CE and a portable recording device with some sounds on it. Suddenly we were listening to Ryan Adams Heartbreaker very loudly, drinking beer, adding e-bow and playing with keyboard textures. Having another person’s sudden creative input made such a huge difference, finally it was sounding like it was always meant sound. Whilst Chris was mastering, I was busy making sure that the album would also look like it was always meant to look. Written by Dan Sandman | June 2008 Part Two | A Snowy English Winter Christmas time and all of our good friends were in the upstairs room of a pub in Camden. We were all gathered to celebrate the release of my second album, An English Summer. Mince pies were shared, the Dan Sandman Band were there and I finished the set off with an unreleased Christmas song. Britain was in the midst of it’s coldest winter for decades whilst we were releasing an album with a beautiful yet sadly diminishing photograph of an English sunset. I remember those three august days of recording very well. It was one of those times when all of the hard work felt worthwhile, everyone was enjoying the process including the guest musicians who all turned up on time. The remaining tracks I recorded solo at my mum & dad’s house with some ambience added by the band’s fifth member - edi09. Chris Mongerwas the producer which I guess made me the director waving my hands around preping the crew for action. There’s a few Pictures that as usual tell a thousand words. Chris Waring (bass / banjo), Richard Austin (drums) and I did lay down a few of musical undercoats but mostly the album was recorded completely live. The idea was to capture the live sound we’d been working on the past year. It’s February 2010 now, it’s cold with a bright future ahead. My muse is still very much keeping herself alive playing the strings of music upon a soft wind. As one thing leads to another, the wind changes the timbre of it’s voice. Written by Dan Sandman | February 2010 |
