Gordon Huntley?

[Andy Volk]

Anyone know anything about British pedal steeler, Gordon Huntley? He played with Ian Matthews band "Southern Comfort" in the late 60's/early 70's.

[Allan Thompson]

Hi Andy,
Gordon sadly died of cancer I think it was round about 1985-86. He was a gem of a man who worked for a company called the Steel Mill in Maidstone Kent who imported steels into Britain. I bought my first guitar from Gordon and he was a great help to me in the beginning. He is sadly missed in the Steel Guitar circles over here.

[Andy Volk]

Thanks, Allan. Sorry to learn he's no longer with us. His playing on Matthew's album "Second Spring" was one of my earliest exposures to pedal steel. He fit in very well in their folk/rock context.

[Roger Rettig]

Gordon was a wonderful man, and a fine musician. When steel guitar became 'fashionable', due to the country-rock explosion in the early '70s, Gordon was already an accomplished player. He was a great source of encouragement to the crop of new players, me included, that proliferated in the UK at that time.

He was closely associated with Eric Snowball, who imported ZB steels into Britain thus making the instrument more easily accessible that it might otherwise have been, and was always on-hand with words of advice and set-up suggestions.

He was my 'sub' when I did "Best Little Whorehouse...." at the Drury Lane Theatre in London's West End , and he took my 'chair' for a week while I went to Majorca!

It's nice to see him remembered on the Forum - for many people, in the UK anyway, his work on the Matthews Southern Comfort record was their first exposure to steel guitar.

------------------
Roger Rettig
Emmons LGIII(S10/D10)& MCI D10

<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Roger Rettig on 12 March 2002 at 03:59 PM.]</p></FONT>

[Joe Goldmark]

Gordon also recorded a neat album called Sleepwalk. It was fully orchestrated and had that great British studio lushness to it.

[Jason Odd]

You beat me to it Joe......