Richard Digance
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Boast Post
Things You May Not Know
Richard bought his first guitar from Steve Marriott of The Small Faces
Richard has made 42 albums and written 24 books and played over 4,000 concerts
In 1974 his How The West Was Lost was Melody Maker folk album of the year
His first ever musical collaboration was with David Cain of The BBC Radiophonic Workshop who composed The BBC adaptions of Tolkien's The Hobbit and War Of The Worlds
He joined The BBC in 1976
He had his own show on BBC Radio 2 for 7 years before joining Capital Radio, London
He has won three Independent Radio Awards for documentary soundtracks
He presented Britain's first ever folk programme on commercial radio where he interviewed Joni Mitchell and Arlo Guthrie amongst others. He also presented The BBC Radio Devon folk programme.
He qualified as a producer at Elstree Radio School
He left Capital Radio to join London Weekend Television in 1984 and had his own ITV Saturday night show for 11 years
On his show he played with Queen's Brian May, Status Quo, The Moody Blues, Suzi Quatro and Paul Brady and gained a BAFTA Nomination
Richard appeared twice on The Old Grey Whistle Test
In America he supported Steve Martin and The Allman Brothers and Tom Rush at the legendary Bottom Line in New York
He composed audiobook soundtracks and songs for author Bill Bryson
He was granted The Paul Harries Fellowship from Rotary International for a project to eradicate polio
Before becoming a headline act he toured with Steeleye Span, Supertramp, Jethro Tull, Elkie Brooks, Joan Armatrading, Tom Jones, David Essex, Richard Thompson, Chas and Dave and The Kinks
Other than Fairport Convention he has played at their Cropredy Festival more times than anyone else
He played The London Palladium with James Taylor, Roy Orbison and Robin Williams
He compered The Knebworth Festival in 1980 introducing The Beach Boys and Santana
He is a Gold Award recipient from The British Academy of Composers & Songwriters
He has completed The Great North Run twice with Carol Vorderman
He has appeared on Channel 4s Countdown nearly 200 times
He founded The New Forest Folk Festival as a birthday present for his friend Keith Curtis
He also founded Folks At Home the first internet Folk Festival during lockdown to raise funds for other musicians
He presented the first BBC broadcast of The Cambridge Folk Festival
PERSONAL
His favourite guitarist is Mark Knopfler
His favourite band is ELO
He once lived with songwriter John Martyn
His mum once booked David Bowie for £8 and made Sandy Denny a bacon sandwich
His biggest inspiration was his close friend Ralph McTell
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