Group formed in Nottingham, 1970 but with a Derbyshire background.
Clive Harvey – Vocals, Acoustic Guitar, Electric Guitar, Ukulele, Ukulele Banjo, Whistle
Mick Hennessy – Vocals, Electric Bass, Acoustic Bass
Derek Pearce – Vocals, Fiddle, Tenor Banjo, Mandolin, Accordion, Piano
The following bio is from their discogs page.
Clive met Derek Pearce in 1970 at Nottingham Art College, which was about to be swallowed up by Trent Polytechnic (now Nottingham Trent University). The college then had a thriving folk club, packed to the rafters every week. Clive and Derek were regular solo performers but got on well and soon teamed up as a duo, to good response. They specialised in lively instrumentals, music hall songs and anything else they fancied (Me And My Teddy Bear was a favourite!). The college also ran regular talent contests which Derek had won several times. The duo entered – and won. Money. Something like seven quid each. In those days seven pounds would feed a student for at least a fortnight. So they entered again, and won again. Good game! To cut a long story short, they won the talent contest so often they got banned by the social sec, but in the same conversation he sweetened the pill by offering them a paid gig. “What are you going to call yourselves?” he asked. Derek replied off the top of his head “Roaring Jelly” – the title of the Irish jig he was currently learning to play. “Good name,” thought Clive. So Roaring Jelly it was. For that first paid gig in 71 Derek suggested drafting in a mate of his, Mick Hennessy. He sang and played bass with Derby folk band The Druids, who had a strong following and a record contract with Argo (folk subsidiary of major label Decca!). Derek had played a bit with them and guested on one of their albums. The expansion to a trio was intended as a temporary arrangement, a one-off for that first gig. The line-up lasted for 16 years and an estimated 1500 gigs.
Here are a few songs on YouTube:
Valerie Wilkins
Poor Little Turkey
Christmas In Australia
Bed Bug
Clive Harvey has a website with another bio of Roaring Jelly by Adam Conway.
ROARING JELLY
“Pioneers of alternative comedy before the term became fashionable” – Guinness Encyclopaedia of Popular Music
“Interesting and original” – Melody Maker
Voted “best crowd-pullers” in a 1980 poll of UK folk club organisers
Jelly performed an estimated 1500 gigs, sharing concert bills with top names such as Victoria Wood, Fairport Convention, Bert Jansch and Stephane Grappelli, as well as headlining in their own right. Clive’s ukulele playing was the inspiration for the founding of The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain.
Clive met Derek Pearce in 1970 at Nottingham Art College which in those days had a thriving folk club, packed to the rafters every week. Clive and Derek were regular solo performers but got on well and teamed up as a duo. (All right – Derek and Clive Live? – yeah yeah, we’ve heard the joke many times! In fact they were known as Harvey and Pearce.) From the outset they played whatever they felt like, straying well beyond the usual “folk” repertoire, and response was good. So the college offered them a paid gig! “What are you going to call yourselves?” asked the Social Sec. Off the top of his head Derek replied, “Roaring Jelly”, the title of an Irish jig he was fond of. Clive nodded approval, so Roaring Jelly it was. For that first paid gig they drafted in bass player Mick Hennessy, of established Derby folk group The Druids. Hiring Mick was intended as a one-off for that first gig, but the combo worked so well he stayed for the second gig, and the third . . . and in fact for the next sixteen years Roaring Jelly were Derek Pearce (vocals, multi-instrumental), Clive Harvey (vocals, guitar, ukulele) and Mick Hennessy (vocals, double bass). A saying attributed variously to Louis Armstrong, Lead Belly or Big Bill Broonzy was:
“All music is folk music, I never heard no hoss sing.”
This “anything goes” philosophy was rare on the British folk scene at the time and unwelcome in some quarters, but Jelly applied it gleefully. They embraced skiffle, rock’n’roll, pop, country, reggae, music hall, even disco – in fact any style they fancied, all played on their acoustic “folk” instruments. They weren’t afraid to take the piss out of hallowed folk songs either, producing outrageous parodies such as Clive’s bizarre version of “Lord Randall”. Soon they were writing nearly all their own material, mostly comic. Nowadays it would be called alternative comedy, but the term wasn’t really known then. It didn’t go down well with the purists. Some folk clubs wouldn’t book them, but there were plenty of others that would – and audiences loved them. Jelly were playing to packed houses and in 1975 were invited to play Sidmouth Festival, the UK’s oldest, biggest and most revered traditional folk festival, in a bold move by then-director Keith Glover. They went down a storm, opening the door to a national following. In 1981 the demands of gigging finally persuaded them to give up their day jobs to go fully pro. Radio and TV exposure, including Chris Tarrant’s legendary Tiswas, helped them spread beyond the folk circuit and into touring abroad, as far afield as Hong Kong. They broke up in 1985 (“exhausted”) but reformed for a final tour in the summer of ’87. Although Roaring Jelly never became a household name the band were ahead of their time, achieved something of a cult status and are fondly remembered by many.
Adam Conway, 2010
BAND HIGHLIGHTS
71 – Formed in Nottingham, briefly a duo then a trio, local Midlands gigs
75 – Sidmouth Festival, springboard to nationwide gigging
77 – “Roaring Jelly’s Golden Grates”, first album, Free Reed label
78 – This is… Roaring Jelly, first TV appearance, BBC Midlands
79 – Roaring Jelly’s Christmas Trifle, BBC Midlands TV special
80 – Christmas Trifle repeated nationally on BBC2
80 – Topped a UK folk club poll as best crowd-pullers
81 – Turned pro, second album “In The Roar”, Topic label
83 – Took Cambridge Festival by storm, upstaging famous headliners (oops!)
83 – Appeared on Chris Tarrant’s legendary kids TV show Tiswas
85 – “Farewell” gig at Derby Assembly Rooms
87 – Reformed for final tour, last ever gig (aptly) Sidmouth Festival
2012 – “Valerie Wilkins” chosen by Mike Harding as one of his 12 favourite tracks on his BBC Radio 2 show. It remains the most requested comic song in the show’s 15-year history.
Discography:
Roaring Jelly’s Golden Grates (LP, Album) Free Reed FRR013 1976
In The Roar (LP, Album) Topic Records 12TS420 1981
Classic Roaring Jelly (Cass, Album) Not On Label none 1990
Singles & EPs
Christmas In Australia (7″, Single) Ideal Records (10) SPOT4 1980
Compilations
Roaring Jelly, Michael Hebbert – “Roaring Jelly’s Golden Grates”& “The Ramping Cat” (CD, Comp, RE, RM) Free Reed FRRR-17 2008
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NEWSPAPER CUTTINGS
1972
1973
1975
1976
1977
1978
1979
1980
1981
1982
1983
1984
1985
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There is also a biography of Clive on his website and I’ve added to it here with * a few thoughts by Clive after I queried his early days..
BORN
… in Watford, a post-war baby-boomer, but I grew up in Derbyshire from the age of 2.
EARLY MUSIC MAKING
Self-taught on ukulele from age 4. Took up classical guitar at 10 but was soon very easily distracted by rock’n’roll. Went electric at 16 and was invited to join a Derby band (in those days, a “beat group”): The Vulcans, my first band. Around the same time I was a founder member of the school jazz band with my good mate Steve Salfield (and all these years later we still occasionally gig together in The Back Seat Jivers).
*1 “Music in my family? Not really. The nearest was my mother’s brother, my Uncle Leslie, who was a semi-pro pianist and organist. My mother had a good singing voice but only sang for her own amusement. My father wasn’t musical. I believe further back I had an ancestor who was a professional violinist of some repute.
*2 Musical influences? Loved music from a very early age – all the stuff I heard on the radio plus my parents’ record collection, mostly classical but also had some jazz and swing, Ink Spots, Bing Crosby, Vera Lynn… When I first heard skiffle and rock’n’roll I was totally blown away. My parents hated it – I loved it!
*3 The Vulcans? Me on vocals and rhythm guitar, Dave Powney lead guitar, Mick Hibberd bass, Keith Hatton drums. On some gigs we also had a girl singer called Jane Richardson. Lost track of all of them. We played local Derbys/Notts pubs, clubs, miners’ welfares etc. Biggest gig – supporting Dave Berry and The Cruisers at Derby Central Hall (long demolished) in 1963. We played Shadows/Cliff/very early Beatles/rock’n’roll etc. Don’t have any photos, sorry. Bandleader Dave Powney kicked me out of the band for moonlighting in my (Ecclesbourne) school jazz band…
*4 The Derwent Jazz Seven, when we started getting gigs outside school. He disapproved! Again I was singer and guitarist. I was a founder of the band with my good mate Steve Salfield (sax, who is also in The Back Seat Jivers). Trad/mainstream jazz and blues mainly”.
POST-SCHOOL
At 18, I went off to London as a British Rail management trainee (largely, I might add, to please my parents: a “proper job”!). Stuck it for a while but it wasn’t for me. So I applied to, and was accepted at …
ART COLLEGE
Foundation course at Derby College of Art then 3 years studying furniture design at Nottingham, where I met kindred spirit Derek Pearce, to this day another of my closest friends. Roaring Jelly was born.
*5 “Nottingham Art College folk club was held at The Fox in Upper Parliament St. We packed 150-ish people into the upstairs function room every week. Sometimes we had bigger nights in the college – always packed. I remember we booked The Strawbs before their first hit”.
TEACHING
After teacher training in Yorkshire I taught art in a secondary school in north Derbyshire for several years. But all this time Roaring Jelly had been steadily building popularity on the folk scene and beyond. The band was getting more and more gig offers and eventually, the BIG DECISION: we turned pro. In 1981 I became a …
FULL-TIME MUSICIAN
… and have been, more or less, ever since: Roaring Jelly, R. Cajun & The Zydeco Brothers, Zydeco Hot Rods, The Back Seat Jivers, The Omega 3 (some of these concurrently), latterly solo ukulele. I’ve met some amazing people, travelled much of Europe and the world beyond, as far afield as Hong Kong, played on stage with Sir Paul McCartney, supported Van Morrison, Debbie Harry, Lonnie Donegan, Victoria Wood, Fairport Convention and others, played on TV and radio, composed music for TV and radio, made records. I never became famous but I’ve made a living doing what I love (and lots of musicians would envy just that!). I’m still teaching guitar and ukulele and still composing. After living and working in Surrey for over 20 years I moved to Devon in 2021.
Clive has also been involved with other bands which can be found on his website too.