Tune bank

Joe, more than most people, didn’t take long to fathom out because he was so clear himself aboutwho he was. He hated waste and was sensibly frugal. He once worked out that the cheapest key to play in for fiddlers is E, because your fingers hit the less frequently used...

I thought I’d met Joe for the first time at Newcastle University in 1977 but it turned out that we’dplayed football against each other a few years before for our respective teams; Leek High school vs Leek College of FE. We had a lot of things in common - Leek...

The image below is from, We Don't  Want the Peanuts We Want the Plantation, Dance Band's first cassette and booklet.  The picture on the front was taken on 19th July 1982 (Joe had just turned 22) in Eldon Square Newcastle, at a rally in support of the Health Workers'...

There have been a few tunes penned in tribute to Joe here's two by Tom Oakes in a set done by the Auvo Quartet. And dots for second tune 'The Topiarist'

Thanks to Ieuan Einion, who was in Red Music with Joe, who sent this link to Joe singing and fiddling with The Country Pickets on the LP Which Side Are You On, Music for the Miners of the North East...

LOST FIDDLERS OF THE GRENADINES   The story started for me in 1972 with a book called ‘Black Music of Two Worlds’, by John Storm Roberts; I fantasised about the small bands of the small Caribbean islands ever since, using the information in theatre work and...

I came across this picture of Joe's good friends The Boat Band, Greg Stephens and Kate Barfield on a trip they made, with Any Old Time's Dave Hennessey, inspired by Joe's visits too Cariacou and Petit Martinique. The fiddler Harrison Fleury was a guy Joe had met and...

Hello, welcome to Joe's Tunebank News page. On here we will post up about any developments with the site.    For example, there an extra bunch of DAT recordings Joe made of some tune sessions in the Grenadines, which we plan to turn into MP3s to be available soon. let...