HARRY S FULCHER

Sax, Clarinet, Keyboards, Bandleader and Composer

I was born in 1956 and educated in and around London, moving to Devon in 1981.I started learning the piano and the clarinet as a boy, not migrating to saxophone until in my late twenties. Music was always my first love and obsession but, typically a Gemini,I've dipped into other wildly diverse careers along the way.

I studied clarinet with Stuart Allen and John McCaw and later with Stephen Pierce at the London College of Music. While at Chiswick Music Centre my jazz tutors included Alan Wakeman, Stan Sulzmann, Harry Beckett, Don Rendell and other great British players. While a student I took classes with Howard Riley at the Guildhall School of Music and with Phil Wachsmann at the City Literary Institute. These latter tutors encouraged and informed my love of avant-garde and totally improvised music. I was a founding member of The London Musicians Collective and the Alternative Music Orchestra. I was as happy playing alongside Tony Oxley (my favourite drummer!) as playing Brahms.

After studying music I heeded my parents advice and took up a career in 'the city' as a broker at Lloyds of London. I had a great time for four years but I was very unhappy not being able to devote myself to music. I quit and moved to Salcombe in Devon which had always been an important place for me. I only meant to stay for three years but quickly became involved with a life and a community that I truly loved. For three years I worked for Edward Hannaford, a boat builder who had always been a hero of mine (and subject of my composition "No6 Boatstore"). I became one of the towns retained firemen for ten years and had many odd-jobs while building up a private music teaching practice and getting involved with the west country gig scene. This led to forming my own jazz groups and freelancing as an instrumentalist. Now that's all I do.

My wife Bobbi, an artist, is from Los Angeles. We married in 1992, around the time that I formed The Complete DBs with Kevin Sanders, Dhevdhas Nair and Sean Wilmott. This band was formed to play my/our original compositions. Of course we couldn't get gigs for love nor money and I retreated to more acoustic line-ups playing standards. At least that kept the friends playing together and thankfully the original concept is now being reborn as The Limbic System.

The Limbic System album features my own compositions which look beyond the usual attitudes of jazz. It is very descriptive music, played by my favourite colleagues. It was recorded as organically as possible but is not afraid to draw upon both natural and manipulated sounds. Solos are played for joy and expression, not for hot-shot points.

I keep various jazz line-ups working with 'the usual suspects' and other favourite musicians from the south west. I am a member of the latin/salsa band Mas Bajo, Sam Richards' Upsticks, Hat Trick (a free jazz trio) and a committee member of the Totnes Jazz Collective. I love my freelancing and teaching and I hope that my new venture, Limbic System Records, the company formed to release the Limbic System album and other projects, will help me to meet more of the world through my music.

I sometimes cannot believe that I am so fortunate to live with Bobbi (who I love with all my heart) in my favourite place (the view from my studio over the Salcombe estuary stunning), have such close friends, go sailing AND be able to play music to my hearts content. I'm reminded of the Talking Heads lyric : "How did I get here?"

Contact Harry: 01548 842869
e-mail: h@harryfulcher.com

Limbic System Music Ltd, PO Box 12, Salcombe, Devon, TQ8 8EW
e-mail: h@limbicsystem.net