John Dawson Read is an English singer-songwriter. Born in

Wokingham Wokingham ( ) is a market town and civil parish in Berkshire, England. It is the main administrative centre of the wider Borough of Wokingham. At the 2021 census the parish had a population of 38,284 and the wider built-up area had a populati ...

, Berkshire, England, Read first came to prominence in 1975 with his debut album ''A Friend of Mine Is Going Blind'', released on

Chrysalis Records Chrysalis Records () is a British independent record label that was founded in 1968. The name is both a reference to the pupal stage of a butterfly and a combination of its founders' names, Chris Wright and Terry Ellis. It started as the Ell ...

. The album's title song was written by Read for a friend of his who suffered from

muscular dystrophy Muscular dystrophies (MD) are a genetically and clinically heterogeneous group of rare neuromuscular diseases that cause progressive weakness and breakdown of skeletal muscles over time. The disorders differ as to which muscles are primarily affe ...

. Read credits his friend with having been a writing inspiration for years, as well as being responsible for his debut album, having sent Read's songs to publishers. Read's second album, ''Read On'', was released in 1976, again on Chrysalis. Around this time, his song ''Such Is the Mystery'' was featured on

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 ...

's acclaimed album I'm Nearly Famous. After this release Read seemed to disappear from the music business. Fans had little success finding information on Read until singer-songwriter Michael Johnson put an MP3 of "A Friend of Mine Is Going Blind" on his website. Many Read fans began communicating through the site, and this was one factor which encouraged Read to re-enter the music world after spending most of the time between 1976 and 2005 in a business partnership in marketing. Read credits his discovery of Pristine Audio as being "the second most influential factor in ‘getting back into it.’" Andrew Rose of Pristine Audio remastered ''A Friend of Mine Is Going Blind'' and ''Read On''. In 2005, Read released his third CD after a nearly 30-year absence from the music world. This CD, entitled ''Now...Where Were We?'' begins with "Days of Sweet Remembrance (reprise)" from the album ''Read On''.

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Read, John Dawson Year of birth missing (living people) Living people English male singer-songwriters English singer-songwriters People from Wokingham Chrysalis Records artists