Steve Gray
Piano, Keyboards (and Sax!, 1981-1994)
"When I was 12, and had been playing the piano for 2 years, I was asked if I should like to join the Middlesbrough Municipal Junior Orchestra.
Unfortunately they hadn't a vacancy for a pianist so I became the second bassoon. My talent as a bassoonist led to my being promoted to third saxophone (baritone) and finally principal (and only) trombone. (The trombone section was re-named 'The Silent Service). During my stay in the saxes the section leader was Ron Aspery, who later founded the influential blues group 'Back Door' and who gave me the scar that can be seen at the top of my nose to this day. I asked him if he would like to join my band.
"Who's in it?" he asked.
"Me and you"
Later we enlarged the band by 50% with the addition of Malcolm Cope, who had a trumpet, and we built up a repertoire of the popular songs of the day; such as 'Softly, Softly', a hit for Ruby Murray, who is now famous as the rhyming slang for curry. The professional world beckoned, and I became, from Mondays to Fridays, the pianist in the orchestra of the Middlesbrough Empire; and at weekends the bandleader at the Kirklevington Country Club: an arrangement which baffled the artists appearing at the Empire who found themselves faced with the necessity of a full-scale rehearsal on the Saturday for the benefit of the pianist coming in for that evening.
This situation couldn't last, and so I left home, played in some bands, got into session work, joined SKY and lived happily ever after."
Since Sky's demise, Steve has maintained a busy compositional schedule, including a guitar concerto and other arrangements for John Williams. He's not very often seen on stage.
Francis Monkman
Piano, Keyboards (and Guitar!, 1979-1980)
See here for more.
Francis went to Westminster School
where he studied organ and harpsichord. During
this time his first musical ambition blossomed; that
of conducting a Mozart opera. In 1967 he started
three yeats of study at the Royal Academy of Music.
He took as his first subject the harpsichord, receiving
the Raymond Russet Prize for that instrument, and
while at the Academy he also took up electric
guitar.
In 1970 Francis formed Curved Air’, which
evolved from the group “Sisyphus”. They signed a
recording deal With WEA Records and had three
albums released, the first being ‘Air Conditioning’.
With “Curved Air” he toured all over Europe and
the USA to great and enduring acclaim. Francis
started doing session work whilst still at the Royal
Academy and consequently he has wotked with
many of the top recording and performing artists in
the UK — The Shadows, David Essex, Paul
Nicholas, Kate Bush and Steve Harley amongst
them. He also continued to give highly acclaimed
classical concerts at the Royal Albert Hall, The
South Bank and the Purcell Room. He is an extremely
original and accomplished consposer and has
written and performed jingles, library albums and
gramophone singles. Francis was introduced and recommended to John Williams by
Stanley Myers and subsequently Francis played on
John’s 'Travelling’ album. It was at this time that a
relationship was estabiished which finally has
culminated in Sky.
Francis and two partners also formed their
own music production company, Crocodile, which is
primarily concerned with music for television and
radio commercials.
Francis left Sky in the summer of 1980 to pursue other interests following the success of his score for the film 'The Long Good Friday'. He released a solo album, 'Dweller on the Threshold', which regrettably pretty much sank without a trace. He remained active in classical keyboard music, especially harsichord and organ and played concerts up and down the country. In 1999, he released his latest creation, 21st Century Blues, from which you can hear extracts on his own web site. (And don't forget to buy the CD!).
Kevin Peek
Electric and Acoustic Guitars (1979-1985)
Kevin was born and brought up in Adelaide, Australia. He left for England in 1965 and
basically remained domiciled in London until 1982 when
he returned to Australia. He studied music
in from the age of seven -his first studies being in
the full range of orchestral percussion instruments plus jazz
drumming, vibraphone and general music theory. Studies on guitar
commenced when he was twelve and, for a while did this in tandem
with continuing studies in percussion. By the age of fifteen his
love of the guitar had completely taken over and Kevin Peek
ceased any further work on percussion from that time on. After
leaving school he worked in Adelaide for a few years playing
guitar in various rock and jazz bands until departing for
England.
During his entire time in England, Kevin worked as a self-employed professional musician - mainly as
a recording "session" musician - but also undertook
concert tours from time to time. In the course of such work he
performed at live concerts, on radio broadcasts, on television
broadcasts and on commercial recordings with many internationally
known orchestras, instrumentalists, groups and singers - as well
as recording, broadcasting and performing in concert in his own
right.
Artists he's recorded with include:
Cliff Richard, Olivia Newton-John, John Williams, The New
Seekers, Lulu, Cilla Black, Chris Rea, Elton John, Manfred Mann,
Peter Skellern, Shirley Bassey, Mary Hopkins, Rick Wakeman, Alan
Parsons Project, Jeff Wayne, Roger Daltry, Mel Torme, The
Shadows, Hank Marvin, Neil Diamond, Val Doonican and many, many
others - as well as orchestras such as the London Symphony
Orchestra and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.
Kevin is currently active within the field of music
composition, recording and production for film and television and
is constantly expanding the list of works completed in those
media.
John Williams
See my other site.
Herbie met music quite by chance. He applied for early call-up. In 1955 absolutely every young man of 18 had to serve two years' National Service. After square bashing (learning to be a good soldier) and several months of egg frying he pleaded with the careers officer to help, who showed him a list of alternative trades available and at the bottom was 'bandsman' with the figure NINE in brackets after it. Herbie told his first fib, saying that he'd played tuba in the school band. A week before the audtion, he drew a tuba (E flat Bombardon to be exact) from the stores; one day later, his first note. The day after that, the scale of C.
Since he added playing the trumpet to his role as SKY's drummer Tristan has had many requests from all over the world. But he still won't stop playing it! He is kept pretty busy when not working with SKY by quite a few different organisations. One is THE ACADEMY OF ST. MARTIN'S IN THE FIELDS CHAMBER ORCHESTRA, for whom Tristan principally plays Timpani. Most of this music is of the Bach, Mozart, Haydn eras: for which he finds a great similarity to playing with SKY as all the composers were and are writing the popular music of the day.
Paul Hart
