About

My parents gave me a Silvertone guitar for Christmas when I was a shy ten-year-old living in Grand Junction, Colorado. It was an amazing time to be a new guitarist: the day after Christmas, “I Want to Hold Your Hand” by The Beatles was introduced in the United States. Peter, Paul & Mary had hits with Bob Dylan Songs. Toward the end of 1964, Simon & Garfunkel released Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. I was utterly seduced by those acts and countless others and any chance that I would lead a conventional life had evaporated before I was 12 years old. My great good fortune was the fact that, except for music, I had no apparent marketable skills so I spent several decades working as a poor but happy musician. Taradiddle taps into the spirit and energy (and the poverty and happiness) of the music that has defined my life since that Christmas morning all those years ago.

When I was seven, I wrote a letter announcing to my mother and the world that I was going to be an ice dancer or a singer. While my progression as a Life Artist didn’t include ice dancing, the enthusiasm for singing remained and co-existed comfortably with my passions for nature, wildlife and teaching. As a child, I was quite taken by the music of Heintje (a guilty pleasure!) but that youthful enthusiasm gave way to songs whose lyrics were a bit deeper. I’ve always wanted to communicate the joy and emotion to others that music has given me. The songs I sing – around campfires, in the elementary schools where I’ve taught, and so on – tend to have messages I believe in. Over the years, I’ve been part of some rewarding musical adventures, including my work as half of Andy & MO, a duo that recorded and performed original pop music in Swiss German for kids. With Taradiddle, my musical aim is what it’s always been: to bring a bit of joy and harmony to the world.

Not being great at football (or soccer), I found that playing guitar in romantic settings was just as powerful a way to get girls to notice me. I got hooked by early Donovan songs, with a good helping of Bob Dylan and a bit later a heavy dose of Leonard Cohen, and all of these proved to work a charm. As my parents insisted on me doing an honest day’s work rather than becoming a singer and actor, I spent the next decades in a day job, which I loved, as a teacher of English and of English linguistics, but with music always a mainstay, centred around the acoustic music and the songs – mainly – of the British Isles (with occasional forays into Americana, blues and rock’n’roll). And then Taradiddle happened, the result of a number of extremely happy accidents, in fact, a dream come true: vocal harmonies in a repertoire of songs that is based on whatever eclectic pleasures – “sort of seriously” cultural as well as straightforwardly guilty – explored and enjoyed together with two genuinely lovely friends.