By 1974, Art Nouveau had become a cabaret band , with Terry Welsh on bass the only original member from the early days. They featured a girl called Sue on keyboards and vocals.
In 1974, they appeared on the second series of talent show, New Faces , singing The Lightening Tree (cover of the Settlers song which was also a TV theme tune, I think it was Programme Follyfoot). They won their heat and went through to the All Winners Final where they were on with Showaddywaddy.
By 1975 / 76, they had metamorphasised into a bit of a curious (but decent) Rock / Cabaret band . The line up was Terry Welsh on Bass, Roy Rogers on Drums, Paul Munroe on Guitar and a lad from Keighley, Pete Brook, on keyboards and Lead Vocals.
Their set had an eclectic mix of material e.g. they opened with Happy Together which bizarrely ended with a snatch of screaming guitar playing Bach's Jezu , Joy of Man's Desiring and then segued into cover of Vanilla Fudge's version of You Keep Me Hanging On ! Then came sugary sweet ballad Feelings (Maurice Albert). Other songs in the set included Rudy off Supertramp's Crime of the Century and Life on Mars.
In 1977, aged 18 , I took over from Pete Brook on Keyboards and Phil Platt replaced Paul Munro on guitar and Lead Vocals. Phil left the band around Christmas 1977.
Before we looked for another guitarist, in Feb 1978, we were offered a gig in Dubai but we needed a girl singer and our agent put us together as a trio with Marie Smith from Love Lane and formerly a backing singer with Polly Brown (Picketty Witch and Sweet Dreams).
The agent had taken a flyer and told the Dubai bookers that he had a band called Silver Blue so all the contracts had been drawn up in that name , so that's what we became and the Art Nouveau name pretty much ended at that point.
We got back from Dubai in the summer and did some gigs in the UK for a few weeks but the rest of the band wanted to get back out to the lucrative work in Dubai so we parted company. I wanted to try and get a bit of a name in the UK so I joined Wayne Fontana and the Mindbenders and had great fun for the next 3 years with them. The rest of the band carried on under the name Laissez Faire and Pete Brook rejoined them with his wife , Nettie, also singing.
The guy who was there from beginning to end was Terry Welch . A lovely guy . He sadly died about 10 years ago. There were many of the guys who had played in the various incarnations of Art Nouveau at the funeral and in typical fashion we were all smiling as he disappeared through the curtains to the strains of "Always Look in The Bright Side of Life".
In the '90's , a few of the guys who had been in the band in the early days, e.g. Larry Edwards (vocals), Rod Dunford (trumpet), Brian Pearson (great drummer), Pete Taylor (guitar) got back together in a band called Souled As Seen , doing classic Stax / Atlantic soul covers. I played with them for a while in the formation period. I think they are still going , though Brian retired about 10 years ago.
As for me, in the 80's I played with 2 of the other guys in the Mindbenders when I was with them (Ken Anders and Neil Reading) in a band called Baktrak , who are listed elsewhere on here. In the 90's amongst lots of other things , I played with the guitar player from the Mindbenders , Dave Lowarch, in a band called Steve's Garage and these days , now in my '50's, I'm playing keyboards with John Lees Barclay James Harvest.
Jez Smith
3/5/10
I was put in touch with the band through the Allan Arnison Agency of Stockport.
I've also read the sad news about Terry and regret missing his funeral but then again I live in Warrington now and lost touch with everyone a long time ago.
Is the Greg Francis listed the same man from whom I got some Dots when I went solo as Christopher Wren circa 1977?
I am at present still singing as Compere at Derby Ward Labour Club in Bolton
Arthur Dixon
2/8/10
Just a quick note to Arthur (aka Christopher Wren)- it is indeed I - one and the same, and I hastily apologise for those 'Dots' ... I'm sure they were pretty naff. I'd only just started to teach myself arranging at that time - I learned very quickly though, once I left Manchester in 1979.
If it compensates in any way Arthur, I did improve to the extent that, I wrote most of the arrangements for the Miss World Orchestra between 1981 - 86, and have gone on to write film scores in Hollywood, conduct the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, playing my 'pop' arrangements, and now I conduct the National Concert Orchestra of Great Britain. This year so far, we've backed the 'Meatloaf' tour with Steve Steinman, and toured with a Vienna Proms concert.
Quite an interesting variety of music - but I still miss the 'soul music' !
Cheers.
Greg Francis
14/9/10
My dad Roy Rogers was the drummer in 1978 I think and was wondering if there was any recordings and how to get hold of them.
Lee Rogers
11/11/10
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