GEOFF'S LATEST MUSIC IS BEING RECORDED UNDER THE NAME 'MISSIONSHIFT' - THE MUSIC CAN BE HEARD ON MYSPACE - MISSION SHIFT MYSPACE

BIOGRAPHY
Geoff's life has been in music and art. After going to art college in his native Newcastle and in Leeds he designed and printed posters for the music, art and poetry scene, including work with Lindisfarne's first 2 albums and with the poetry presentations at the Morden Tower.

He trained as a sound engineer on the road and in a studio which was at the hub of that music scene at the time, with visitors such as Sting, The Animals, Lindisfarne, Joan Armatrading and many others, a great experience in a short time.

He then spent many years as a record producer and label manager with Rubber Records and later with Black Crow Records as a top UK folk and contemporary music producer recording musicians such as Bert Jansch, Kathryn Tickell, Dick Gaughan, Rab Noakes, Rod Clements, Rory McLeod, Alan Hull and Mike Harding.

His albums gained much critical acclaim, his work was ground-breaking in that he introduced a lot of new techniques for the recording and arrangement of this music, and worked in the new field of electric folk/rock as well as with many young musicians with bright new ideas such as Catriona MacDonald, Simon Thoumire and Brian Finnegan.


Since then he has concentrated on Ribbon Road - performing, arranging and recording the songs of his wife Brenda. Over these years he has also been involved in his other great love, that of the visual arts, producing a body of work in Sculpture, Drawings and Paintings (including the sleeves of the Ribbon Road albums.)


There are many influences and guidings that Geoff has received from a wide variety of sources for which he is ever thankful, you can see a few of them in Inspirational Writings in our Resources and Influences section.

GEOFF HESLOP – ‘STANDING ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS’

from May/June issue of The Living Tradition Magazine


It's a great relief that the world of folk music is not filled with self-seeking egomaniacs, keen only to promote themselves to the detriment of the music and the boredom of all those that look on. But even in this self-effacing scene Geoff Heslop could be said to be a modest man. The name might not be familiar to you, but for the last 35 years this name has graced some of the most beautifully crafted folk albums you will hear. His achievements have been marked - well over 100 album production credits covering a wide sweep of styles from the most traditional players through electric folk and singer/songwriters to comedy and the avant-garde. He has also run successful live music venues in Northumberland and Scotland.
On visiting his studio on a tiny wind-swept island off the west coast of Scotland, you find yourself surrounded by recording equipment and instruments of all kinds while on the walls are large colourful paintings and in the fireplace a carved mahogany angel guarding a young woman. It’s all a bit of a shock but this is the environment where Geoff has spent most of his life.

He has always felt that he is a member of a very fortunate generation. 'We were all so blessed to be born when we were - exposed to the very, very best in music for the first 30 years of our lives. We were weaned on Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly songs from the likes of Lonnie Donegan, in my case coupled with Kathleen Ferrier, Danny Kaye.......I used to sit in front of the radio with it all pouring out, mouth open, soaking it all in.' At 9 he was blown away by Great Balls of Fire ('I still haven't forgiven Irene Walton for sitting on my copy and breaking it, although - was that just a tale of my mothers?'), Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran.
At school they had very good radio in the physics dept. ('what I was doing in there I can't imagine') and on this he first heard the country blues. 'I just knew that this was for me, it was like a music I already knew, but deeper. As someone who had lost his father at a very early age, I knew what it felt like somehow, and after Cliff and the Shadows it was just so real!' He pursued this interest, helped by all the imports appearing on RBF and Folkways and the Blues Package tours that appeared in Newcastle. 'I saw people like Son House, Bukka White and Fred McDowell, musicians I thought had died years before.'

When Geoff got to Art College in the mid-60's it was the place to be - blown away by a combination of the lyrics of Bob Dylan, the jazz of Kirk, Coltrane, Mingus and Monk, Ingmar Bergman films and Mark Rothko paintings – as he says, 'who needs drugs?'
Among all this embarrassment of riches he heard an album by a musician called Bert Jansch. 'He wrote and sang songs in a blues style that moved along, combined with another element which I loved but didn’t know, a strange world where people got murdered for no explained reason and fiddlers could play milk out of maiden's breasts. This bloke knew about the other bit, what Chuck Fleming calls the X factor.'
After college Geoff had a job screen-printing posters for concerts, clubs and bands, and through that met Alan Hull and Brethren (later to become Lindisfarne). 'I loved that band. We had tolerated years of superstars playing guitar solos with their noses in the air as if we didn't exist and here was this bunch of Geordies up there saying 'come on get on your feet, what are you sitting there for? We can't hear you, you'll have to sing louder than that', they were actually interested in the audience, and of course it came from the folk clubs.'
This contact took him to building a studio over a bingo hall in Wallsend (for a pound a day). 'It was a good time around then, we had Sting in Last Exit, Joan Armatrading doing demos, Alan, Billy Mitchell, Back Door, with the incredible Colin Hodgkinson on bass. I have to say there was a down side too, I think I recorded 100 versions of ‘Aquarius’, ‘The Shadow of your Smile’, and other favourites of the local social club acts.'

It was then that Mickey Sweeney arrived at the studio, he had been on the road with bands from an early age, and had the greatest pair of ears on the planet. Geoff and Mickey started a working partnership which lasted for 20 years between 1974 and 1994. “Mickey did the hard part of engineering, and I had the chance to work on the music itself, which is what I love to do.”
Geoff produced albums with artists such as Hedgehog Pie, Five Hand Reel, the great Chuck Fleming, Dave Burland, Mike Harding (Hit Single - ‘The Rochdale Cowboy’ ) Bob Fox and Stu Luckley, the late Sean McGuire and Allan Taylor (Silver Rose of Montreux for ‘The Traveller’). At this time he got to work with Bill Leader, recording Dave with Nic Jones (‘You Can’t Fool The Fat Man’), and Allan (‘Circle Round Again’), which is a treasured memory. He learned a lot working with everyone. Geoff felt that the late Tony Capstick deserved a mention, 'I think it’s a pity his singing and contribution to the folk scene have not been remembered enough. Everywhere I went to record him live, people in the clubs were thanking him for teaching songs to them'. Another thing Geoff discovered was the feeling that can be generated in an audience by a collective memory or understanding. 'I remember Mike (Harding) describing a scene at his school and mentioning that there was a coke pile in the yard. The feeling in the hall as everyone remembered and laughed at the memory was what I think of as profound.'
By the ‘80’s he was working with a lot of songwriters such as Rab Noakes, Alan Hull, Bert Jansch, Dick Gaughan and Rory McLeod , (his 1987 Tribute to Woody Guthrie ‘Woody Lives’ is a personal favourite) as well as interesting himself in the traditional music of his native Northumberland. 'I’ve always been switched on to song-writing and have had the privilege of working with some of the best in the folk scene. I don’t think they have sufficient recognition in the broad sense. We used to talk a lot about the effect that songs had on real situations, the song movements in South America, about the people who had gone before – without them we are nowhere.' One of his great favourites is Tommy Armstrong, who lived in the small area of Co. Durham that Geoff’s family are from, and wrote about the things that happened to his people, whether funny or tragic like ‘The Trimdon Grange Explosion’, ‘The Marley Hill Ducks’, ‘The South Medomsley Strike’.
Geoff documented the music of many generations of Northumbrian players, from Joe Hutton, Willy Taylor and Will Atkinson to Alistair Anderson, Tom Gilfellon and Johnny Handle, culminating with his long association with Kathryn Tickell, producing 4 of her albums and putting together the Coquetdale Music Publishing catalogue which contains most of the main compositions of the last 50 years in the county. 'It was good to work with Kathryn, she is very forward-looking and ready to try all kinds of things (Geoff has found some musicians ‘a bit conservative’). We used to record the pipes chanter separately sometimes, then build up drones so that we could change chords behind the tune on the desk. We also got into some interesting combinations of pipes with trombones, bowed cymbals – just anything. I’ve always been more of the artist than the musician, just making noises in the studio the way I want to, not minding too much how they are made.' As you can see looking around the room, his visual art work is very important to him and very much part of things. He has produced a body of work in paintings and sculpture which is seen to great effect on his web-site www.theshipbuilders.com and also can be seen on the Ribbon Road CD inlays.
His production extended to yet another generation of young players, and albums with Simon Thoumire, Ian Carr, Brian Finegan and Catriona MacDonald followed. Wherever he has been he has always helped on every level he could, and many musicians, poets, etc. both amateur and professional knocked on the door of his studio and were all treated with equal care. One of those was songwriter Brenda (now Heslop), and it is to arranging, recording and performing her songs that Geoff has devoted the last years. As well as getting married, they have produced 4 albums under the name Ribbon Road, of which ‘The Tender Coming’ is the latest.
Never one for self-promotion, he has always been a believer in the importance of functional music, music with a purpose beyond entertainment, and has backed this up in his work. It is his major concern - 'My kind of music is not entertainment. I need music to have a purpose in life - to help, to heal, to gain understanding, to dance, to sing, to make you laugh - to be real, to explain, to be fruitful for those who listen or join in in any way. I bore people to death with it, and don’t consider most things I hear as music at all, they just masquerade. Like some modern ballad-type songs - they sound right, they have the right components, but you know they’re not real at all. Pretend stuff, pretend stuff, that’s why I go for folk music. As bass player Tommy Duffy once said “Aal music swings, even bloody folk music'.
The music they have done for the last 15 years is based on that belief. 'Brenda and I have so much to say in the way we record and perform, what Brenda calls – ‘life and death and the bit in-between’. When she came to the studio her songs just knocked me down, there was so much care, so much understanding - she was facing things in life with such emotional honesty. She’s lovely as well, so I married her.' Brenda has written songs for 4 more albums and they are now working on the next, ‘The Passing Of The Rain’ and the songs for a musical titled ‘The Triple Fool’. The work on Ribbon Road has given Geoff a chance to spread his wings as a singer and player. 'Harmony is a big part of our sound, the balance of the voices of a man and a woman, the sound of everyman. I can also have a chance to try out all the daft ideas I’ve had sitting in studios all these years. I hit things and make noises on things and it seems to paint a picture.'
It’s a great sadness to him that his albums are in the hands of other companies and are now largely unavailable. 'I was never in control of the copyrights. I never had the money to finance labels myself but I’d like people to able to hear them.'
So here is a man that has made a life-time job out of listening, understanding, working - looking for the truth through music and art. “I think of it as treading on the bodies of those that went before, trying to pass the message on – we’re still here, you’re not alone”, and today (or any day) he can be found behind his mixing desk working on the next album of his long quest.

(Ribbon Road albums ‘The Music Of My Heart’, The Mortgaged Heart’, ‘The Moving Cloud’ and ‘The Tender Coming’ are available at www.theshipbuilders.com)

GEOFF HESLOP PRODUCTION CREDITS


ALAN HULL & BRETHREN (Lindisfarne) - 'Take Off Your Head And Listen' - RUB 001

PRELUDE - 'Take Off Your Head And Listen' - RUB 001

JSD BAND -'Take Off Your Head And Listen' - RUB 001

THE CALLIES - (Lindisfarne singer' Bill Mitchell) - 'On Your Side' - RUB 002

PETE SCOTT - 'Don't Panic' - RUB 003
'Jimmy The Moonlight' - RUB 020

TONY CAPSTICK with Hedgehog Pie - 'His Round' - RUB 004
'Punch And Judy Man' - RUB 008
'There Was This Bloke' - RUB 010
'TONY CAPSTICK Does A Turn' - RUB 023
'Songs of EWAN McCOLL' - RUB 027

DEREK BRIMSTONE - 'Very Good Time' - RUB 005
'There Was This Bloke' - RUB 010
'Shuffleboat River Farewell' (with Michael Chapman) - RUB 017

BILL BARCLAY - 'There Was This Bloke' - RUB 010

MIKE HARDING - 'There Was This Bloke' - RUB 010

'Mrs 'Ardin's Kid' (including Hit Single 'The Rochdale Cowboy') - RUB 011

ANDY ANDREWS RHYTHM AND BLUES ALL-STARS - 'Dracula Has Risen From The Grave' - RUB 006

THE BUSKERS (Paul Furey & Davey Arthur) - 'The Life Of A Man' - RUB 007

HEDGEHOG PIE - 'Hedgehog Pie' (produced with Rick Kemp) - RUB 009
'The Green Lady' (produced with Rick Kemp) - RUB 014
'Just Act Normal' - RUB 024

DAVE BURLAND - 'Songs And Buttered Haycocks' - RUB 012
'Songs of EWAN MacCOLL' - RUB 027
'You Can't Fool the Fat Man' (with Nic Jones) - RUB 036

JOHN LEONARD & JOHN SQUIRE - 'Broken-Down Gentlemen' - RUB 018

FIVE HAND REEL (Dick Gaughan, Bobby Eaglesham, etc.) 'Five Hand Reel' Melody Maker Folk Album of the Year 1975 - RUB 019
''For 'A That' (made for RCA)

ALBA- (Sean O'Rourke, Tony Cuffe, Alan MacDonald, Mike Ward) -' 'Alba' - RUB 021

MIKE ELLIOTT - 'Out Of The Brown' - RUB 025
'Live' - RUB 044

ALLAN TAYLOR - 'The Traveller' (Silver Rose of Montreux Winner, Best Acoustic Album 1976) - RUB 026
'Roll On The Day' - RUB 040
'Circle Round Again' - CRO 205

DICK GAUGHAN - 'Songs of EWAN MacCOLL' - RUB 027
'Five Hand Reel' - RUB 017
'For A' That'
'Woody Lives' - CRO 217

BOB FOX & STU LUCKLEY - 'Nowt So Good'll Pass' (Melody Maker Folk Album of the Year 1978) - RUB 028
'Wish We Never Had Parted' - CRO 204

SEAN McGUIRE & JOSEPHINE KEEGAN - 'On Two Levels' - RUB 029

DANDO SHAFT - (Martin Jenkins, Kevin Dempsey, Danny Thompson, John Stevens, Dave Cooper) - 'Kingdom' - RUB 034

TOM McCONVILLE & KIERAN HALPIN - 'Port Of Call' - RUB 041
'The Streets of Everywhere' - CRO 203

MAXIE & MITCH 'Double Trouble' -RUB 045

THE CHAMPION STRING BAND (Chuck Fleming, Tom Gilfellon & Martin Matthews) - 'The Champion String Band' - CRO 201


ALAN HULL - 'Another Little Adventure' - CRO 219

RAB NOAKES - 'Under The Rain' - CRO 207
'Woody Lives' - CRO 217

CHUCK FLEMING & GERRY KALEY - 'Shake Loose The Border' - CRO 209

ALISTAIR ANDERSON - (with The Steel Skies Band, Joe Hutton, Willy Taylor, Will Atkinson, Bob Fox, etc.) 'The Grand Chain' - CRO 216

RAY JACKSON & ROD CLEMENTS - 'Woody Lives!' - the songs of WOODY GUTHRIE - CRO 217

RORY McLEOD - 'Woody Lives!' - the songs of WOODY GUTHRIE - CRO 217
'Footsteps And Heartbeats' COOK 018
'Travelling Home' - COOK 048

BERT JANSCH & ROD CLEMENTS - 'Woody Lives!' - the songs of WOODY GUTHRIE - CRO 217
'Leather Laundrette' - CRO 218

KATHRYN TICKELL - 'Borderlands' - CRO 210
'Common Ground' - (with Danny Thompson and Chris Newman) - CRO 220

KATHRYN TICKELL BAND - 'The Kathryn Tickell Band' - (with Lynn Tocker & Ian Carr )- CRO 227
'Signs' - (with Karen Tweed) - CRO 230

SIMON THOUMIRE & IAN CARR - 'Hootz!' - CRO 225

SYNCOPACE - 'Syncopace' ( ALISTAIR ANDERSON, CHUCK FLEMING, MARTIN DUNN & PENNY CALLOW) - CRO 226

MIKE TICKELL - 'Warksburn' - (produced with Kathryn Tickell, including Martin Simpson)

THE RIPLEY WAYFARERS - 'The Ripley Wayfarers' - MWM 1017

JOE HUTTON - 'JOE HUTTON Of Coquetdale' - MWM 1024

JOE HUTTON, WILLY TAYLOR & WILL ATKINSON - 'Harthope Burn' - MWM 1031

KATHRYN TICKELL, ALISTAIR ANDERSON, HUTTON, TAYLOR & ATKINSON, MIKE TICKELL, ALLAN WOOD, JOHN DAGG - 'From Sewingshields To Glendale' - MWM 1033

WILLATKINSON - 'Mouthorgan' - CGR 002

JOE & HANNAH HUTTON - 'The Border Piper' - CGR 006

ADRIAN SCHOFIELD - 'Jane Of Biddlestone' - CGR 007

WILLY TAYLOR - 'Welcome To The Dene' - CGR 008

JOHNNY HANDLE - 'A Difficult Fish' - CGR 009

RAY STUBBS AMAZING ONE MAN BAND 'Frisco Bound' - DT2
RAY STUBBS Rhythm And Blues All-Stars - DT3

RIBBON ROAD - 'The Music Of My Heart' - RRD 001
'The Mortgaged Heart' - RRD 002
'The Moving Cloud' - RRD 003
'The Tender Coming' RRD 004

BRYAN FINNEGAN - 'When The Party's Over' - ARAD CD 101

CATRIONA MacDONALD & IAN LOWTHIAN - 'Opus Blue' - ARAD CD 102

SIMON THOUMIRE 3 - 'Waltzes With Playboys' - ARAD CD 103