Brian Laurence Bennett (born 9 February 1940) is an English drummer, pianist, composer and producer of

popular music Popular music is music with wide appeal that is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. These forms and styles can be enjoyed and performed by people with little or no musical training.Popular Music. (2015). ''Fun ...

. He is best known as the drummer of the UK

rock and roll Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock-n-roll, and rock 'n' roll) is a Genre (music), genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It Origins of rock and roll, originated from African ...

group

the Shadows The Shadows (originally known as the Drifters between 1958 and 1959) were an English instrumental rock group, who dominated the British popular music charts in the pre-Beatles era from the late 1950s to the early 1960s. They served as the bac ...

. He is the father of musician and Shadows band member Warren Bennett.

Early life

Bennett was born in Palmers Green, North London, England. Educated at Hazlewood Lane School, Palmers Green, London and Winchmore Council School, he finished school at the age of sixteen to play drums in a

Ramsgate Ramsgate is a seaside resort, seaside town and civil parish in the district of Thanet District, Thanet in eastern Kent, England. It was one of the great English seaside towns of the 19th century. In 2021 it had a population of 42,027. Ramsgate' ...

skiffle Skiffle is a music genre, genre of folk music with influences from American folk music, blues, Country music, country, Bluegrass music, bluegrass, and jazz, generally performed with a mixture of manufactured and homemade or improvised instruments. ...

group performing for holiday makers. After returning to London he studied drums with Max Abrams and became the in-house drummer at The 2i's Coffee Bar in

Soho SoHo, short for "South of Houston Street, Houston Street", is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City. Since the 1970s, the neighborhood has been the location of many artists' lofts and art galleries, art installations such as The Wall ...

and was a regular performer on Jack Good's TV show '' Oh Boy!''

Early career

He then became a member of Marty Wilde's Wildcats in 1959. After a successful period with the Wildcats, during which he appeared on their

instrumental An instrumental or instrumental song is music without any vocals, although it might include some inarticulate vocals, such as shouted backup vocals in a big band setting. Through Semantic change, semantic widening, a broader sense of the word s ...

record without Wilde (recorded as the Krew Kats), "Trambone", he backed

Tommy Steele Sir Thomas Hicks (born 17 December 1936), known professionally as Tommy Steele, is an English entertainer, regarded as Britain's first teen idol and rock and roll star. After being discovered at the 2i's Coffee Bar in Soho, London, Steele recor ...

for some of his London stage performances.

The Shadows

In October 1961 he joined

Cliff Richard Sir Cliff Richard (born Harry Rodger Webb; 14 October 1940) is a British singer and actor. He has total sales of over 21.5 million singles in the United Kingdom and, as of 2012, was the third-top-selling artist in UK Singles Chart histo ...

and the Shadows as the replacement for Tony Meehan. The Shadows were known for their instrumental songs, mainly;

Apache The Apache ( ) are several Southern Athabaskan language-speaking peoples of the Southwestern United States, Southwest, the Southern Plains and Northern Mexico. They are linguistically related to the Navajo. They migrated from the Athabascan ho ...

(1960), F.B.I. (1961), Wonderful Land (1962), and Foot Tapper (1963), among many others. The band split up briefly between 1968 and 1973, but was reformed by Marvin, Welch and Bennett. He stayed with the group throughout all of their subsequent line-ups, and in May 2005 took part in the Shadows' European tour. During a show in

Reykjavík Reykjavík is the Capital city, capital and largest city in Iceland. It is located in southwestern Iceland on the southern shore of Faxaflói, the Faxaflói Bay. With a latitude of 64°08′ N, the city is List of northernmost items, the worl ...

, Iceland he sustained what was thought to be a minor injury to a finger. A splinter from a drumstick pierced under his fingernail on his right hand, he removed it with a pair of old pliers and applied a plaster. A few days later after arriving in Paris, France he was in so much pain he called a doctor. The doctor diagnosed a bad infection and recommended Bennett go to hospital immediately. Thinking it would be a short visit he attended only to find out that it would involve a minor, but very painful, operation to remove the poison. He was due to be playing on stage that evening and had already missed the soundcheck. He arrived at the theatre 15 minutes before the show with his right-hand bandaged and still numb from the anesthetic. He managed to play for the whole show using an altered playing style. In addition to his work with the Shadows he has also appeared in

's backing band and plays piano and occasionally

vibraphone The vibraphone (also called the vibraharp) is a percussion instrument in the metallophone family. It consists of tuned metal bars and is typically played by using Percussion mallet, mallets to strike the bars. A person who plays the vibraphone ...

. In 1967, Bennett released a solo album of jazz music, entitled ''Change of Direction'', in mono and stereo (neither charted). This was the first solo album by a member of the Shadows. In the 1970s, music by Bennett was selected for several Radley Metzger films, including '' Barbara Broadcast'' and '' The Opening of Misty Beethoven''.

Other works

Bennett has enjoyed a parallel and successful career as a composer of library music, issuing multiple LPs with production music labels such as Bruton and KPM. He was also a member of Steve Gray's WASP ensemble, which recorded library music for the KPM 1000 Series.Oliver Lomax. ''The Mood Modern'' (2018), pp. 328-47 This has resulted in the use of his music for many popular TV theme tunes including

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

sports themes such as ''

Rugby Special ''Rugby Special'' was the main rugby union highlights programme on the BBC in the UK. The show ran from 1966 and past presenters included David Vine, Keith Macklin, Cliff Morgan, Chris Rea (rugby union), Chris Rea, Nigel Starmer-Smith, Bill Beaum ...

'' ("Holy Mackerel") and BBC Golf ("Chase Side Shoot Up"), Channel 9 Australia's cricket theme and police drama '' Bluey'' theme tune ("New Horizons"), the sitcoms '' Robin's Nest'' and '' Birds of a Feather'', '' The Ruth Rendell Mysteries'', '' Pulaski'', '' Square Deal'', '' Close to Home'', '' Murder in Mind'' and, with his son Warren, composed and played the incidental music in ''

New Tricks ''New Tricks'' is a British television police procedural comedy drama, created by Nigel McCrery and Roy Mitchell, produced primarily by Wall to Wall (until its final year, when it was handled by Headstrong Pictures), and broadcast on BBC On ...

''. Two of his most famous works were "The Journey" and "Just a Minute" written under the alias James Aldenham and used for the '' ITV Schools on 4'' broadcasts between 1987 and 1993. He scored the British-German film '' The Harpist'' in 1999. He is also an orchestral conductor, having learned how to arrange and conduct music for orchestras from a correspondence course. His son Warren Bennett formerly played keyboards for the band Glass Ties, and is also a composer and producer.

Honours

He was appointed OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) in the 2004 Queen's Birthday Honours List for services to music. Bennett runs a home recording studio, Honeyhill studios, in Radlett, Hertfordshire. In November 2009, at the age of 69, Bennett completed a 50th Anniversary reunion world tour with Cliff Richard and the Shadows.

Discography

Albums

*Brian Bennett – Change of Direction – LP/CD – Columbia/see4Miles *Brian Bennett – Illustrated London Noise – LP/CD – Columbia/see4Miles – 1969 *Collage – Misty – – LP/CD – DJM/see4Miles *Brian Bennett Band – Rock Dreams – LP/CD – DJM/see4Miles – 1977 *Brian Bennett Band – Voyage (A Journey into Discoid Funk) – LP/CD – DJM/see4Miles – 1978 *Heat Exchange – One step ahead – LP/CD – EMI/see4Miles *

Ruth Rendell Mysteries ''The Ruth Rendell Mysteries'' is a British television crime drama series, produced by Television South, TVS and later by its successor ITV Meridian, Meridian Broadcasting, in association with Blue Heaven Productions, for broadcast on the ITV ( ...

– LP/CD *Ruth Rendell Mysteries (volume.2) – LP/CD *Ruth Rendell Mysteries (Wexford) – LP/CD *Drumtrax (house library. ) – CD *Nomads of the wind – CD *Global sunrise – CD. *The Works – (Box set of 4CDs). *Greatest Guitar hits (volume 1) – CD *Greatest Guitar hits (volume 2) – CD * Living Britain – CD *Official Bootleg album – CD

Singles

*Canvas/Slippery Jim De Grize – 7" – DB 8294 – Columbia. *Ridin The Gravy Train/Bubble Drum (Thunder company) – 7" – DB 8706 *Chase side shoot up/Pegasus – 7" – 6007040 *Thunderbolt/Clearing skies – 7" – DJS10714 *Saturday night special/Farewell to a friend – 7" – DJS10756 *Girls back home/Jonty Jump – 7" – DJS10791 *Pendulum force/Ocean Glide – 7" – DJS10843 *Top of the world/ Soul Ice – 7" – DJM10981 *Shake down/Your gonna love this – 7" – EMI 2988 *Shake down/Your Gonna Love this – 12" – 12EMI2988

Music labels (non-commercial)

*Themes Records – LP *KPM – solo & w/others – LP *Bruton – solo & w/others – LP/CD *Music House – solo & w/others – CD *Reliable Source Music – CD

Filmography

*'' Luxo Jr.'' – music: "Chateau Latour", "Finesse", "Quicksilver" *'' Light & Heavy'' – music: "Chateau Latour" *'' Surprise'' – music: "Quicksilver"

Production credits

* Dennis Waterman – ''Downwind of Angels'' – LP – DJF 204830 – DJM – 1976 *Dennis Waterman – ''Dennis Waterman'' – LP – DJF 20513 – DJM – 1977 *

Demis Roussos Artemios "Demis" Ventouris-Roussos ( ; , ; 15 June 1946 – 25 January 2015) was a Greek-Egyptian singer, songwriter and musician. As a band member, he is best remembered for his work in the progressive rock music act Aphrodite's Child, but as a ...

– ''The Demis Roussos Magic'' – (CD) – BX 523-2 * Drake – "

Summer Sixteen "Summer Sixteen" is a single (music), single by Canadian rapper Drake (musician), Drake, released to promote his fourth studio album ''Views (album), Views'', although it was not included on that album. The song premiered on OVO Sound Radio and wa ...

" – 2016

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Bennett, Brian English drummers British male drummers English pianists English record producers English rock drummers English composers British rock and roll musicians People from Palmers Green 1940 births Living people Officers of the Order of the British Empire Ivor Novello Award winners People from Radlett The Shadows members English conductors (music) British male conductors (music) British music arrangers People educated at Winchmore School British male pianists 21st-century British conductors (music)