Guitar man returns to his Yorkshire roots (From Wharfedale Observer)

Guitar man returns to his Yorkshire roots

11:04am Thursday 12th April 2012 in Leisure

Guitarist and songwriter Michael Chapman 71, has been touring the world for 45 years – and he’s stopping off in Otley this week As part of a short tour Michael, from Hunslet in Leeds, will be at Korks piano bar on Friday night. Tickets cost £10 After leaving school in the mid-1950s, he rejected the idea of factory work, and against his family’s wishes, applied to Leeds College of Art because he wanted a proper education. He was a contemporary of David Hockney at Bradford Art College.

He needed to pay for college and started playing guitar to earn his fees in jazz and dance bands at venues all over Yorkshire, including Harrogate, Otley and Ilkley.

When he graduated Michael took a job as a photography teacher, but by the time he reached his late 20s he had decided to leave teaching and went to Cornwall for a break.

He was sitting outside a pub in his van one rainy night in 1966 with no money, so he went in and offered to play his guitar for a while in return for a beer. The owner soon offered him the chance to play every night and he earned more money in that week than in a month of photography teaching.

Michael Chapman recorded for BBC4’s Songwriters Circle in November, 2011: the recording features Martin Simpson and Steve Tilston as well as Chapman, and is scheduled for an early 2012 broadcast date.