The Flight
This is Paul Maguire's latest project - a synthesizer instrumental inspired by a flight over the Churchill Barriers, originally erected in WW2 as part of the coastal defence of the UK, now used as causeways between the islands.
As with Paul's other work, it finds inspiration from Orkney and the lives lead therein.
A follow-up to his previous piece of work "Dancers & Lights", this will be uploaded to YouTube and released on Compact Disc in April 2022.
The Rock School Years
In 1994 I founded a rock school. It began during a teaching course at the City of Ely Community College where I had a placement. And in July that year we ran our first ever Rock School. A humble 25 students and instructors, Dave Cutter and a drummer who were at the same placement, Lui di Martino who was on the same course at a different placement and Owen Edwards who had contacted me after seeing the event announced in the press. It was an enormous success with a lengthy slot on the local Anglia Television evening magazine program and news and also good coverage in several newspapers.
It was so successful we decided to run another at the end of the summer break which received similar attention and It inspired me to take it further. Obviously week long rock schools would only be possible during school holidays and I knew there were many young musicians who would benefit from regular sessions to help them grow as musicians and so the Saturday Rock Workshops were born on November 5th 1994. We initially went under the name Gateway To Music and I had approached several people on the council and at suitable locations for the workshops and after a while I found the Howard Mallet Centre in Cambridge, a building in the city centre which was used by play groups during the week, youth clubs and even boxing matches. There were several rooms, a café open space and even a fairy large sports hall. We settled in well there, the team of instructors were keen to keep helping and the following year we ran another week long rock school with a concert at the end in the hall. The end of course concerts would become quite a talking point in Cambridge and as you will see, went on to some dizzy heights.
That summer we decided to run similar events in other schools, Melbourn, Ely, Soham, Huntingdon, St Neots and another at the Howard Mallet but we held the end concert a little way up the road at Cambridge’s best and famous music pub, The Boat Race. Many well known bands had played at this venue, The Darkness, The Levellers, Oasis and many more. It was so much more rock and roll and the young students absolutely loved it. We held a few other events at ‘The Mallet’ including a guitar clinic with Steve Morse from Deep Purple.
The Howard Mallet Centre closed shortly after and left us homeless for a while. By now we had become quite a success story in Cambridge. The press, TV and radio stations loved us, we were a newsworthy event and soon I was approached by a local college to move the workshops there and so in 1997 we moved to the local Tech and continued. Most of the crew stayed with me and soon we were up and running the workshops. We did a few more clinics including a really good drum show with Squeeze, Quireboys drummer Simon Hanson. We ran events there for about a year and we applied for an Arts Council Grant which we were awarded. Two of the original team had the idea they could run something better and took some of the gear we had accumulated and even the arts council grant they managed to divert to their own organisation and really that should have been the end of us but it angered me so much, I dug my heals in and looked for a new venue. We had welcomed on board a former Police Superintendent from Hong Kong who did his best to get the money back with no luck.
I then came up with an idea and approached a large council run venue in the city, The Junction to see if we could run the workshops there on Saturdays They welcomed us with open arms as we had such a good record and had all the necessary expertise to operate safely. Guy, the ex policeman was then able to provide the team with CRB checks and now with such a prestige venue to work in I decided to change the name to something a bit more rock and roll and came up with RockTech. By now the others had given up and their new organisation had disbanded while we went from strength to strength. Along with the original crew we also took on a publicity manager and the number of young musicians who wanted to join in with the workshops grew. We had access to some of the big names who were playing at the venue including blues legend, Walter Trout, Robert Plant and welcomed several great clinics including the Fender Roadshow. We took on two more drum instructors, Magpie (Gaary Bowler) who had played with Motorhead and Mournblade and was at that time working with Medicine Hat. We also took on Alex Reeves who was a local drummer with a unique touch. He worked with us for a few years and helped with the Elena project. Elena was a vocal instructor, an Italian lady with an astounding voice who had been diagnosed with cancer and it was her dream to make a CD and perform at a big venue. I quickly wrote 4 songs and after a few difficult recording sessions and the kindness of sponsors we achieved it. Alex is currently drummer for Elbow.
The summer rock schools became very popular and we had to adopt a new method. We worked out how many guitarists, bass players, drummers etc we could accommodate and accept them on a first come first served basis. RockTech went from strength to strength getting a two page spread in Making Music, a magazine that catered for musicians, a 3 minute segment on the children’s news program, Newsround, visits from JJ and Dave from the Stranglers, a surprise visitor, Pink Floyd‘s original guitarist, singer and songwriter Syd Barrett who lived just round the corner, popped in to see what was happening and my friend Dom Byrne who was a local newsreader and went on to co host the Radio 1 Breakfast slot with Chris Moyles. We remained there for several years gaining popularity I even became an advisor to Ch 4’s program Rock School with Gene Simmons. We also hosted the Marshall Road Show at the boat Race with Jim Marshall himself.
In 2006 a new manager was hired by the venue who took a dislike to RockTech and started making impossible demands and even tried to replace me and run RockTech himself with different genres of music including DJ workshops. None of my team knew much about that and so after a few heated meetings we found ourselves without a home. Again.
I was so angered it inspired me to take it to a higher level and so we continued at the Warehouse TV and arts studios in Fulbourn and for two years ran the end of rock school concert both there and at Cambridge’s top venue, The Corn Exchange and the main stage for two years at Cambridge Rock Festival adding the Thursday bonus day to the event which still continues to this day.
Following the Soham tragedy it became harder and harder to work with young musicians. I went on several courses, upped our insurance, but it became difficult. Our insurance would not cover us at festival sites and insisted on 4 SIA licenced security people and up to that point I was the only one with one. And so in 2008 the doors closed for the final time. In 2015 I handed the whole thing over to a new team in Peterborough but so far they haven’t brought it back. I hope one day it will return as it was a brilliant organisation with many happy memories and so many success stories for both the team and the students.
The Flight
This is Paul Maguire's latest project - a synthesizer instrumental inspired by a flight over the Churchill Barriers, originally erected in WW2 as part of the coastal defence of the UK, now used as causeways between the islands.
As with Paul's other work, it finds inspiration from Orkney and the lives lead therein.
A follow-up to his previous piece of work "Dancers & Lights", this will be uploaded to YouTube and released on Compact Disc in April 2022.
The Rock School Years
In 1994 I founded a rock school. It began during a teaching course at the City of Ely Community College where I had a placement. And in July that year we ran our first ever Rock School. A humble 25 students and instructors, Dave Cutter and a drummer who were at the same placement, Lui di Martino who was on the same course at a different placement and Owen Edwards who had contacted me after seeing the event announced in the press. It was an enormous success with a lengthy slot on the local Anglia Television evening magazine program and news and also good coverage in several newspapers.
It was so successful we decided to run another at the end of the summer break which received similar attention and It inspired me to take it further. Obviously week long rock schools would only be possible during school holidays and I knew there were many young musicians who would benefit from regular sessions to help them grow as musicians and so the Saturday Rock Workshops were born on November 5th 1994. We initially went under the name Gateway To Music and I had approached several people on the council and at suitable locations for the workshops and after a while I found the Howard Mallet Centre in Cambridge, a building in the city centre which was used by play groups during the week, youth clubs and even boxing matches. There were several rooms, a café open space and even a fairy large sports hall. We settled in well there, the team of instructors were keen to keep helping and the following year we ran another week long rock school with a concert at the end in the hall. The end of course concerts would become quite a talking point in Cambridge and as you will see, went on to some dizzy heights.
That summer we decided to run similar events in other schools, Melbourn, Ely, Soham, Huntingdon, St Neots and another at the Howard Mallet but we held the end concert a little way up the road at Cambridge’s best and famous music pub, The Boat Race. Many well known bands had played at this venue, The Darkness, The Levellers, Oasis and many more. It was so much more rock and roll and the young students absolutely loved it. We held a few other events at ‘The Mallet’ including a guitar clinic with Steve Morse from Deep Purple.
The Howard Mallet Centre closed shortly after and left us homeless for a while. By now we had become quite a success story in Cambridge. The press, TV and radio stations loved us, we were a newsworthy event and soon I was approached by a local college to move the workshops there and so in 1997 we moved to the local Tech and continued. Most of the crew stayed with me and soon we were up and running the workshops. We did a few more clinics including a really good drum show with Squeeze, Quireboys drummer Simon Hanson. We ran events there for about a year and we applied for an Arts Council Grant which we were awarded. Two of the original team had the idea they could run something better and took some of the gear we had accumulated and even the arts council grant they managed to divert to their own organisation and really that should have been the end of us but it angered me so much, I dug my heals in and looked for a new venue. We had welcomed on board a former Police Superintendent from Hong Kong who did his best to get the money back with no luck.
I then came up with an idea and approached a large council run venue in the city, The Junction to see if we could run the workshops there on Saturdays They welcomed us with open arms as we had such a good record and had all the necessary expertise to operate safely. Guy, the ex policeman was then able to provide the team with CRB checks and now with such a prestige venue to work in I decided to change the name to something a bit more rock and roll and came up with RockTech. By now the others had given up and their new organisation had disbanded while we went from strength to strength. Along with the original crew we also took on a publicity manager and the number of young musicians who wanted to join in with the workshops grew. We had access to some of the big names who were playing at the venue including blues legend, Walter Trout, Robert Plant and welcomed several great clinics including the Fender Roadshow. We took on two more drum instructors, Magpie (Gaary Bowler) who had played with Motorhead and Mournblade and was at that time working with Medicine Hat. We also took on Alex Reeves who was a local drummer with a unique touch. He worked with us for a few years and helped with the Elena project. Elena was a vocal instructor, an Italian lady with an astounding voice who had been diagnosed with cancer and it was her dream to make a CD and perform at a big venue. I quickly wrote 4 songs and after a few difficult recording sessions and the kindness of sponsors we achieved it. Alex is currently drummer for Elbow.
The summer rock schools became very popular and we had to adopt a new method. We worked out how many guitarists, bass players, drummers etc we could accommodate and accept them on a first come first served basis. RockTech went from strength to strength getting a two page spread in Making Music, a magazine that catered for musicians, a 3 minute segment on the children’s news program, Newsround, visits from JJ and Dave from the Stranglers, a surprise visitor, Pink Floyd‘s original guitarist, singer and songwriter Syd Barrett who lived just round the corner, popped in to see what was happening and my friend Dom Byrne who was a local newsreader and went on to co host the Radio 1 Breakfast slot with Chris Moyles. We remained there for several years gaining popularity I even became an advisor to Ch 4’s program Rock School with Gene Simmons. We also hosted the Marshall Road Show at the boat Race with Jim Marshall himself.
In 2006 a new manager was hired by the venue who took a dislike to RockTech and started making impossible demands and even tried to replace me and run RockTech himself with different genres of music including DJ workshops. None of my team knew much about that and so after a few heated meetings we found ourselves without a home. Again.
I was so angered it inspired me to take it to a higher level and so we continued at the Warehouse TV and arts studios in Fulbourn and for two years ran the end of rock school concert both there and at Cambridge’s top venue, The Corn Exchange and the main stage for two years at Cambridge Rock Festival adding the Thursday bonus day to the event which still continues to this day.
Following the Soham tragedy it became harder and harder to work with young musicians. I went on several courses, upped our insurance, but it became difficult. Our insurance would not cover us at festival sites and insisted on 4 SIA licenced security people and up to that point I was the only one with one. And so in 2008 the doors closed for the final time. In 2015 I handed the whole thing over to a new team in Peterborough but so far they haven’t brought it back. I hope one day it will return as it was a brilliant organisation with many happy memories and so many success stories for both the team and the students.