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A Work In Progress . . .

Born in Mitcham, in the south of London, England, on March 14, 1947, this grocer’s son was only eighteen months old when he began picking out tunes like "Home Sweet Home" on the family piano. He became proficient enough on his own to make his first appearance at the London Coliseum by age six.

At this time, the young Budd developed an interest in jazz, becoming deeply influenced by jazz pianist Oscar Peterson and displaying the dazzling dexterity of the great Art Tatum. Later in his career, Budd would also cite jazz pianists Bill Evans and Herbie Hancock as influences.

By the time Budd was 12, he was giving concerts and playing events on a regular basis. Upon leaving school at 16, he formed a trio with Steve Clarke on bass and David May on drums and secured a six-month engagement at the Green Man on Blackheath, then a year at the Lilliput in Bermonsey.

His trio was busy playing every kind of gig available in London: clubs, hotels, even U.S. Army camps. In 1965, Pye Records released his first single ("Birth of the Budd") and Budd had begun to earn his reputation around town as house pianist at the Bull’s Head in Barnes.

Multitalented drummer Chris Karan soon joined Budd's trio and accompanied the pianist - often quite imaginatively - for nearly every recording and performance thereafter.

By 1967, Budd’s trio was featuring the talents of young bassist Dave Holland. It was at a Budd club performance where audience member Miles Davis heard the young bassist and lured Holland to the United States for a substantial and influential jazz career of his own. 

In April 1967, Budd’s manager, Douglas Stanley, arranged to have the Roy Budd Trio perform "Pick Yourself Up" on the ITV show Sunday Night At The London Palladium. It turned out to be Roy Budd’s breakthrough, capturing the attention of popular television host, David Frost, and Pye Records staff producer, Tony Hatch (Petulia Clark, Searchers).

Frost immediately featured Budd on his show, The Frost Report, and Hatch invited the pianist to a contract with Pye Records. Hatch produced Budd’s first full-length album, Pick Yourself Up!, a trio-with-strings affair that ultimately left the pianist dissatisfied. But Budd recorded another 12 records of jazz, film music and light orchestral music for the label over the ensuing decade.

Next, Budd arranged with Pye to record an album of popular music - which he accomplished with The Sound of Music - in exchange for the opportunity to do an album of his choice. That album, Live At Newport (South Wales), was a showcase for his trio (with Holland and Karan) playing in front of an audience and endured as a source of great pride for the pianist.

During these years, as the pianist began to acquire notoriety and attract greater publicity, he stated that his goal was to become an international concert artist and eventually move into the film music world. Meanwhile, he kept an exhausting schedule, playing radio shows, live gigs, a vaunted performance at Festival Hall and such British television shows as the Val Doonican Show and Morecambe and Wise.

In 1969, Budd met songwriter Jack Fishman and the two struck a friendship that was to become fortuitous. By mid-1970, Budd's manager, Douglas Stanley, left to head a production company in Australia.

Fishman arranged to manage Budd's career thereafter and secured a three-year contract for the pianist to record with MCA Records. It is unknown if anything was recorded for the large conglomerate, but company used its option to drop Budd after only a year. Fishman walked away with the last laugh, betting the Managing Director that Budd would become an internationally renowned writer of film music.

Fishman's prediction eventually came to pass. But it was achieved under the oddest, most All About Eve like circumstances. Budd had heard that director Ralph Nelson was looking for an English composer to score his controversial film, SOLDIER BLUE.

According to writer and researcher Geoff Leonard, Budd strived to get the job by assembling a tape of little-known music composed by such film music greats Jerry Goldsmith, John Williams, Max Steiner, Dimitri Tiomkin and Lalo Schifrin. Sending the tape off to Nelson, Budd had the audacity to claim the music was his own. That's how Roy Budd got his first film job.

SOLDIER BLUE, an anti-war film harshly criticized for its violence, featured Candice Bergen, Peter Strauss and Donald Pleasance in a depiction of events at the American battle at Sand Creek in 1864, when hundreds of Cheyenne Indians were brutally killed.

Budd immediately recognized that he lacked sufficient understanding and skills necessary to the art of scoring a film or conducting the 65-piece Royal Philharmonic Orchestra that would be heard in the film. He quickly studied the The Henry Mancini Book Of Sounds And Scores, relied on Fishman's support and encouragement and developed his marketable habit of working quickly.

The budding film-music composer persevered, eventually crafting a work of surprisingly melodic guile. Pye Records opted not to issue Budd's score for the film, but gave the pianist an opportunity to record jazz covers of six of his themes from the film (most notably, "How Wonderful Life Is" and "Fields of Green, Skies of Blue") together with several pop covers.

The album, issued as ROY BUDD PLAYS HIS MUSIC FROM "SOLDIER BLUE" & OTHER INTERNATIONAL FILM THEMES was the first of Budd's recordings to be heard outside of British confines and the first international recognition he received. At about this time, he also recorded pseudonymously for Pye Records as John Brown Jr., cutting two slabs of rip-roaring funk innate of merely promoting a new electric organ (an instrument he's only been rarely heard to record with).

More to come... 

Thanks to James Pringle, David May, Dave Holland and Douglas Stanley for assistance.

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