biography

Beginnings

Born in the Isle of Man but brought up in a variety of southern English cities, I have always been a musician at heart and felt most at home inside the artistic and creative community. My father was Director of Music in the Royal Marines and I inherited his love for music and some of his talent. I was playing piano at three and a passionate lover of classical music from about seven.

My family moved from the south coast to London when I was 12 and life moved rapidly into top gear. In the heady days of the 60s, I was blown away by Chuck Berry, Steve Cropper, Robert Johnson, B.B. King and Eric Clapton, and through them fell under the spell of the blues. A passion which lasts to this day.

I learned guitar by following the guitar heroes of the day around London clubs and just watching them play - EC, Jeff Beck, Peter Green, Jimi Hendrix, Mick Taylor... What an education! Whenever blues legends came to town... B.B. King, Buddy Guy, John Lee Hooker, Freddie King, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters... I was there, soaking it all up. By the early 70s I was playing guitar in a succession of moderately successful bands on the UK blues club and college circuit.

A few years of one-nighters and a couple of festivals later, I ducked out of London, looking for Kerouac's elusive Road (or was it Bilbo's?), and settled in the Isle of Man, one time home to Archibald Knox and Mackay Hugh Baillie Scott, heroes of the Arts & Crafts and Art Nouveau movements.

Celtic roots

There is a deep affinity between the Celtic lands of Scotland, Ireland, Cornwall, Wales, Brittany and Mann which is unfathomable. I feel closest to Scotland. My first trip to Edinburgh was love at first sight. I am awed by the Highlands and the open friendship of the people. These landscapes hold the memory, wisdom, poignance and celebration of the Celtic soul. And the music... one phrase on the uilleann pipes is enough to transport your heart and soul back across hundreds of years of Celtic history and mythology. Soraidh bhuam gu Barraidh.

Getting settled

I ran a bookstore for a few years, settled into the island's artistic community, and eked out a meagre but very happy living selling books, music and coffee. And playing with local musicians. Finally having to find a real-life, grown-up job, I went to work in the finance sector.

I now live in a rambling, crumbling Victorian house, with two gorgeous daughters, my collection of Fender, Gibson and Martin guitars, keyboards, an embarrassingly huge and eclectic music and book library, Art Nouveau and Arts & Crafts paraphernalia, a black cat (I ain't superstitious, to quote Howlin' Wolf!), a tortoiseshell cat with an identity crisis and a goldfish.

Working in design and pre-press

In 1987, I introduced a desktop publishing function into the company I worked for and started producing all their marketing material in-house, including product brochures. From early design through to pre-press. After initial, fairly disastrous experiences with PCs, we bit the bullet and invested heavily in Macs and never looked back.

I and my assistant at the time collaborated with design agencies and print shops and we became expert in the established digital pre-press tools - QuarkXpress, Photoshop, Illustrator, Freehand... The pre-press function I introduced to the company all those years ago is still the principal method by which all its literature is produced.

In 2000, I extended my skills to web design, becoming fully conversant in HTML and CSS, and built the corporate web site for the company I worked for. In 2002, the web site was voted one of the best financial services sites by readers of Investment Adviser.

Look & Feel...

I set up Look & Feel in 2001 as an outlet for my web and print design skills. It was originally part of a collaborative community of designers and programmers and for several years I was house designer for an Isle of Man-based IT consultancy. I now handle all Look & Feel commissions myself, targetting my services mainly at the Island's artistic community.