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Davy Graham

Published Monday 12 January 2009 at 14:25 by Graham Gurrin

Davy Graham was one of the most influential guitarists of the past half-century, yet was virtually unknown outside the guitar-playing community.

Born David Michael Gordon Graham in Leicester on November 22, 1940, to a father from the Isle of Skye and a mother from Georgetown, Guyana, he was brought up in Notting Hill Gate. On leaving school he took on odd jobs, but each summer he would head off to places such as Paris, the French Riviera and Tangiers, where he would busk for a living. Largely self-taught, he would sometimes play in night clubs, where he could put down his plectrum and develop his finger-style technique, experimenting with tunings, rhythms and genres. In the winter of 1961 he got his big break, accompanying Alexis Korner and Shirley Abicair on radio, TV and at the Royal Festival Hall. Two albums released in 1964-65 are testimony to his enduring influence.

On Folk, Blues & Beyond… and Folk Roots, New Roots (with Shirley Collins) we first heard folk-baroque, world music and the DADGAD guitar tuning. At the same time, one of his guitar tunes, Anji, became ubiquitous in folk clubs up and down the country.

In an apparent bid to emulate his jazz heroes, Graham became addicted to heroin, so virtually disappeared, though he continued to travel, re-emerging in the early nineties as a guitar teacher and charity worker. I caught him at a small club in London in the mid-nineties and he was as mercurial as ever - slipping in a piece of Bach between blues and jazz standards. I also sat next to him at a Martin Simpson concert, and was in awe of this huge man, with powerful hands, yet so shy and gentle in manner. He released a new album Broken Biscuits in 2007, gigging last year, before his illness took hold. In the liner notes to his first album, The Guitar Player, he signs off with a typical lack of self-importance: “I sincerely hope you enjoy this record, either to listen to, or as a background to a good conversation.”

Graham died of lung cancer on December 15, aged 68, at his home in Camden Town, London.

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