Pete Turnpenney-Tim Smith-Vikki Clayton-Chris Conway-John Montague

As a total non-smoker and a guy who drinks very little indeed you can imagine when I suffered chest & arm pains to be told you are “quite poorly” and need treatment pretty quickly it came as a massive shock to both my family and myself.
No matter how big and strong you feel this experience brings your own mortality right into vision very quickly. I don’t mind admitting it frightened me!

But after a very quick testing from my own local Syston Health Centre and the brilliant Dr Kovac and his fabulous Team at The Leicester Glenfield Hospital Rapid Response Clinic
I knew I was in the safest hands possible.
For this I will be eternally grateful.
We are so lucky in this Country to have all these facilities virtually on our doorsteps and I’m sure from time to time we forget that and take them all for granted.

I believe Coronary and Heart Disease is now the highest killer in this Country.
I also realise only too well that some poor people don’t get a warning and sadly they don’t get through, so I feel humbled and very very lucky to have done so myself.

This experience has brought to the forefront, the work of The British Heart Foundation into my life and I would like to introduce it to you.

I don’t want to go into statistics now but their ever-progressive work, research and skills are constantly moving forward thus not only helping us now but our Children and Children’s children to come. So it is vital work!

Hence our BHF fundraising “Have A Heart Concerts” Held at The Hind Leys College Theatre, Shepshed, Leicestershire. 15th & 16th October.

I want to offer my sincere thanks to all these guys for helping me make it all possible:

Mr Pete Fines and his fantastic young student musicians and singers.
Mr Steve Dootson and his Stage Tech & Lighting Team.
Greg Tempest (Gregsmusicroom.co.uk) Fantastic sound engineering and PA.

Musicians in order of performance :

Singer Songwriter Alex Jones ( You must keep an eye out for him!!) (http://www.myspace.com/alexjonesacoustic )
Wonderful Fingerstyle guitarist Dave Kirk (www.mayfly.org.uk )
The Fabulous Vikki Clayton (www.vikkiclayton.co.uk )
“Mr Music” himself Chris Conway (www.chrisconway.org)
The guitar squad of Martin Burch, Pete Turnpenney, Tim Smith
“ The High Sierras”
( www.montysmusic.com )

And can I just say an even BIGGER THANKYOU to everyone who bought tickets or gave donations and even supported the raffle.
The Grand Total will be posted over the next few days on this website.
So Watch this space !
In the meantime if you would like to help us raise the total even more then please make a cheque made payable to
“ The British Heart Foundation “ and send it to

BHF Region Office
The Willows
Ransom Wood Business Park
Southwell Road
West Mansfield
Nottinghamshire
NG21 0HJ

Or you can even visit www.bhf.org.uk and donate online.

“HAVE A HEART”
Music Concert in aid of the British Heart Foundation.

Friday 16th. October 2009

We don’t usually go out to concerts on a Friday night, but we made an exception in this case to support such a good cause. The concert was in the theatre at Hind Leys Specialist College in Shepshed, and the evening started with three numbers from some of the students. They performed one of their own compositions and two cover versions (none of which were introduced, so I don’t know the titles), all three were very impressive, especially the young girl who sang the second song. Such a strong vocal technique. They were followed by a former pupil, now studying at university, Alex Jones who treated the audience to some fine guitar playing on an instrumental version of ‘Stairway To Heaven’, and two more songs, one self penned and a cover of a Newton Faulkner song. All three delivered with great confidence, in fact both the present students and Alex showed just what a bit of encouragement could produce. The rest of the concert was taken up by some excellent local talent. Dave Kirk, singer / songwriter / guitarist took us to the interval starting with his interpretation of the John Lennon song ‘In My Life’ followed by a selection from his 2007 concept CD ‘Mayfly’. Chris Conway joined him on stage on keyboards and whistles.

The second half of the concert featured The High Sierras with the added attraction of Vikki Clayton and Chris Conway. The High Sierras, John Montague (vocals & guitar), Martin Burch (acoustic lead and slide guitar), Peter Turnpenny (vocals & electric guitar) and Tim Smith (bass) gave us a selection of songs ranging from Country to Blues and beyond, including ‘Voodoo King’, ‘She Thinks I Still Care’, ‘Praying For Rain’ (a Bob Gilmour-Evens song), Martin’s song ‘If This Isn’t Love’ and an excellent version of ‘Slow Me Down’ with Peter on lead vocals and harmonies from John, Vikki and Chris. As they were all on stage together, they each took turns to sing, both Vikki and Chris did solo spots, backed by The Sierras. Vikki was on top form as per usual, especially on ‘White Dress’, ‘Crazy Man Michael’ and the Chris Conway song ’10 Years’. Chris’ keyboard and whistle playing added to the proceedings, and his solo ‘blues’ gave everyone the chance to show just what they were capable of, he even managed to slip in the name of the venue into the song. All in all, a superb concert, and if I could play guitar half as good as either Dave, Peter or Martin, I would be ten times better than I am!! Many thanks must go to John Montague for all the hard work that goes into putting on one of these concerts, and to all the artists who gave their time for free. I’m looking forward to the next one.

Pete James

‘Folk, Blues & Beyond’
103 The Eye (103FM)
www.103theeye.co.uk