Bernard Brogue

I've been playing and singing since I was 14. I was grown up north in the Netherlands in a village called Stadskanaal, nearby the city of Groningen, which is one of the better cities in The Netherlands with a university, many bars,music and art.
I lived in Leeuwarden, in the province of Friesland until 1987. I studied on the school for Social Work.After that I moved to Apeldoorn (just north of Arnhem), where I still live. I couldn't find a job in the mid 80's so I decided to do the inservice psychiatric nursing course. Now I work 4 days as a Social Worker in Mental Health.
My first performance was together with my friend Jan Jaap Boer, a pianist,on high school where Luka Bloom performed with Eamon Murray in 1979. In those days he still used his real name Barry Moore. He used to live in Groningen at the time. Í started writing songs around 1978. It must have been around 1984 that I made my first trip to Edinburgh,Scotland. Since then I've visited Scotland at least every year. It's a beautiful and great city for music. I've made many friends there. I 'd like to mention George Stott who was a foundermember of Burach, a Scottish folkband and John McCreadie, a singer-songwriter who lives with his girlfriend Lorna in Houston, just outside of Glasgow.
Around 3 years ago I met Tom Fairnie at the Royal Oak, a unique folkbar in Edinburgh. Tom and his wife Jane have become very close friends and we've also co-written some songs.
Tom is a great songwriter, and you can also find him here on myspace.com Currently I have finished my new CD Escape the day with my friends Tom Janssen (bass,keyboards)and Vincent Gal (drums&percusison) Ok, this is my story in a nutshell.The rest of the info I've copied from my bio.
Bernard Brogue belongs to the British ‘school’ of singer-songwriters like John Martyn, Nick Drake and Allan Taylor. Bernard has made several trips to Scotland. In 1996 his song 'Down River', later to appear on his debut album 'Birdwatching', was voted second in a very high standard singer-songwriters contest at the Edinburgh International Festival. In Spring 1997 he did a small but successful solo tour in London and performed succesfully at the legendary folkclubs Bunjies and The 12 Bar. Since the autumn of 2001 he performs with his new band featuring Vincent Gal on drums and percussion and Tom Janssen om fretless bass and keyboards.
In september 2006 his new album ‘Escape the day’ was released with this new band and other fine musicians. Kaz Lux (former member of the legendary Dutch band Brainbox) contributed the leadvocals of one of the songs.
Escape the day is a sentence from the song “Dream away” and refers to the desire to escape daily life, romance and the night as a symbol of the shadowside of life.
December 2006 saw the promotion of the single “Not before christmas”. “Don’t go at christmas”, is the subject of this melancholic song. A beautiful counterpoint to the standards. Though he still performs solo, Bernard performs frequently with Tom Janssen on fretless bass and Vincent Gal on drums and percussion.
"Singer-songwriter Bernard Brogue travels frequently between Holland and Scotland and is very much appreciated in the venues there. The album Escape the day reveals why. Especially if Bernard's sings with his warm voice about the pink moon there is a reference to Nick Drake. The absolutely beautiful melodies in which you can hear influences of pop and jazz are more lightfooted though, which makes he chooses more for the style of Luka Bloom. Although, this remains spherical music for late in the evening." (Platomania nov. 2006)
“On this CD he is accompanied by quite a few guestmusicians f.e. Kaz Lux (! , former member of the Dutch band Brainbox , where also Jan Akkerman took part of) who makes his remarkable contribution to the mysterious duet ‘Genocide’. On this CD are 13 self penned compositions, well produced and with a solid band which seamlessly enwrap Bernard Brogue his warm intimate, sometimes a bit timid, voice in a warm and comfortable bath. The music has elements of pop and jazz with a melancholic red line through all the songs always with a lot of atmosphere. The album has been mixed pretty dry and kept direct which contributes a lot to this music. Very beautiful.”(Muziekwereld – Musicworld. Dec 2006)
CD Escape the day available on: www.arisingartist.nl
.. CDBABY LINK for BERNARD BROGUE: Escape the day --
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