WELCOME!! to my ramshackle selection of songs written and recorded since 1967 and also recordings of my family’s Christmas parties in the early 1960’s.

In my youth I learnt piano, banjo and guitar and I started singing and playing in folk clubs, and quickly took to enjoying songwriting, and mixing vocal and instrumental tracks at home. In the early 1980’s with my partner Pat and 2 friends we all formed ‘PATCHWORK’, an acoustic group which we all thoroughly enjoyed being part of, playing folk clubs, pubs, Essex Radio etc.

When the opportunity arose late in ‘Covid year’ 2020 to have a website created I decided to gather a few of the many songs I’ve written over the years and include them along with some ‘Patchwork’ tracks.

However, my main incentive to creating a website was in order to preserve and share for a while snippets of my family’s 1960’s Christmas parties, which I used to tape record. These are, I believe, a record of times sadly no longer with us, where people gathered together at home, playing various instruments, in a muddle of singing, drinking and continual laughter. I hope that somewhere there still are a few such happy family gatherings occasionally maintaining this great tradition!

Many thanks for dropping by.

ART GARDNER