Martin Barre

Martin Lancelot Barre (/bɑːr/; born 17 November 1946) is an English guitarist. He was lead guitarist of British rock band Jethro Tull, with whom he recorded and toured from 1968 until the band's initial dissolution in 2011. Barre played on all of Jethro Tull's studio albums from their 1969 album Stand Up (replacing Mick Abrahams, who played on their first album) to their 2003 album The Jethro Tull Christmas Album. He remains the longest-serving member of the band after founder and leader Ian Anderson. In the early 1990s he began a solo career, and he has recorded several albums as well as touring with his own live band.

He has also played the flute and other instruments such as the mandolin, both on stage for Jethro Tull and in his own solo work.

Martin Barre was born in Kings Heath, Birmingham, England, on 17 November 1946. His father was an engineer who had wanted to play the clarinet professionally. Barre played the flute at his grammar school. When Barre bought his first guitar, his father gave him albums by Barney Kessel, Johnny Smith and Wes Montgomery to broaden his musical perspectives.

In college, he studied architecture at Lanchester Polytechnic (now Coventry University) for three years, but did not complete his studies after failing Spanish and Atomic Science, subjects that he found to have little to do with designing buildings. After designing a road junction in Birmingham, England, he decided that a career in architecture was too boring, and switched to music.

In 1966, he moved to London with his friend, Chris Rodger, who had played the saxophone in their previous band, the Moonrakers. In London, Barre and Rodger got an audition for a band called the Noblemen, who were looking for two saxophonists. Barre bought a tenor saxophone, and after two days' practice was able to bluff his way through the audition. The band subsequently changed its name to the Motivation, and backed visiting soul artists such as the Coasters, the Drifters and Lee Dorsey. The band evolved through several musical styles, from soul to R&B to pop; in 1967, the band changed its name to the Penny Peeps. By this time, Barre was playing lead guitar. As the Penny Peeps the band released two singles in 1968, "Little Man With a Stick" backed by "Model Village", and "I See the Morning" backed with "Curly, Knight of the Road". Finally, in mid-1968, they became a blues band named Gethsemane, and played in pubs all over England, with Barre playing the guitar and flute.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.