Blowzabella

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Blowzabella are an English band who play hurdy-gurdies, bagpipes, melodeons and an array of acoustic instruments to produce an inimitable, driving drone-based sound influenced by British and European traditional dance music.

1 History
2 Lineups
3 Discography
4 External links

[edit] History

The band was formed in Whitechapel, London in 1978 by Bill O'Toole (bagpipes, flutes) from Sydney, Australia and Jon Swayne (bagpipes, flutes) from Glastonbury, UK. The band broke up in 1990, but reformed in 1996 as on occasional band.

[edit] Lineups

The first musicians that were invited to join either came from London or were living there at the time - Juan Wijngaard (hurdy-gurdy, flemish bagpipes) who taught the band some of the first tunes they played, Chris Gunstone (bouzouki, tapan), Sam Palmer (hurdy-gurdy) who took over from Juan in 1978, and Dave Armitage (melodeon, bombarde, percussion). Dave Roberts (melodeon, percussion) joined in late 1979 when Bill O'Toole returned to Australia. Since then, the lineup has been through many changes. Sam Palmer (b 1950) was co-author of the book "The Hurdy Gurdy" (1980), with Suzanne Palmer. It was the first major study of this once-obscure instrument to be written in the twentieth century. Nigel Eaton went on to play hurdy gurdy as a backing instrument in Page and Plant's album "No Quarter" (1994).

Later members included Andy Cutting (melodeons) and Nigel Eaton (hurdy-gurdies).

The band broke up in 1990, but reformed in 1996 as on occasional band. The current lineup is Blowzabella is: