About Joan & Steve

In the late 1970's Joan Aitchison and Steve Carter could be found playing in venues around the Fylde Coast with their carefully chosen repertoire of contemporary and traditional folk songs.

Originally with Peter Brown, Joan and Steve were part of 'The Wrea Folk' a local trio that played regularly in the area from around 1972.

Twenty years later, Joan and Steve have reunited to take up where they left off, now with the benefit of their own musical experiences of the intervening years. They have released three CDs to date and are preparing another which is scheduled for release in 2006.

Joan studied Education at Warwick University, taking music as one of her options. She ran the folk club and also branched out into Gilbert and Sullivan. She started singing lessons and more formal voice training. Joan taught in primary schools for the next 15 years, often leading the school music with voice and guitar. She opened her own nursery 12 years ago, where music plays a large part in the children's overall development. Joan joined different musical societies, singing anything from musical comedy to high opera. She continued with singing lessons and is currently studying with Barbara Robotham from the Royal Northern College of Music. One of her musical highlights was singing in front of 3000 people at 'The Last Night of the Proms' held on the Green at Lytham. (Yes she has the big frock with all the flags! ) After one of those 'we must meet up this year' comments in a Christmas card, Joan and Steve did meet up and enjoyed revisiting the old folk scene and moving on to different vocal and guitar styles. Joan says, "The nursery rhyme CD was a very natural progression for me, because of my job - but I never thought I'd ever see Steve playing his usual fantastic guitar for .... five little ducks went swimming one day!" 
 
Steve is an electronics engineer and has his own studio where he spends most of his spare time writing and recording songs, that's if he's not pulling old cars apart! A self-taught guitar player, Steve reckons that he has had a lifetime's battle with the instrument. "I pick up the guitar and the battle commences - the guitar generally wins" he said. "I know what I want to play but the guitar seems to have other ideas." In spite of those typical 'muso' frustrations, Steve lives in a world where music plays a very important part to him and his family. "All three of my children play much better than I do and I take the role of proud father very seriously, much to their embarassment most of the time!" Steve has a small collection of a dozen guitars and insists that "a man can't possibly ever have enough guitars!"

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