During his school years Paul learned to play the clarinet and the guitar. In his teens he got involved in local jazz workshops where he learned musical bushcraft skills from Stan Barker and Digby Fairweather. Around this time, Paul became the bass player with the (then still embryonic) Sefton Youth Jazz Orchestra.
In later years Paul's main instruments were the acoustic guitar and the electric bass. He also got into mandolin playing after seeing Steve Earle play one at a gig in Rotterdam. Through his interest in mandolin playing Paul started playing traditional folk tunes from both sides of the Atlantic.
In the late '90's Paul played guitar (and occasionally also mandolin or pennywhistle) with the Lelystad-based fiddle tune trio Jenny Picking Cockles. Seeing how much fun his fiddle-playing friends were having playing traditional tunes, Paul couldn't resist the temptation to try his hand at fiddle playing. So he got himself a fiddle and started learning a few tunes and techniques from Natalie MacMaster's tuition video "A Fiddle Lesson".
During a period of recuperation following a winter hill-walking accident in Belgium in 2006, Paul discovered the music of two emerging bands here at MySpace Music: Fribo and Habbadám . Hearing the music of these two bands opened up entirely new dimensions of folk music for Paul and also resulted in him "getting serious" about his fiddle playing. Paul was inspired by the fresh, exciting and high-quality folk music which is currently emerging from the British Isles, North America, and the Nordic countries.Paul currently plays with the band of musicians which accompanies the Danish traditional folk dancing group Den Danske Ring .
DR Spillemand |
DR Folk |
NRK Alltid Folkemusikk
