Canticle

(c’67-’72) Frank Press (guitar/mandolin/backing vocals), Pete Lambert (violin), Howard McDermott (guitar/lead vocals) and Howard Fulbrook (guitar/backing vocals).

This Farnborough based folk group – Press, McDermott and Lambert had all attended Salesian College (where McDermott and Lambert both played fiddle in the school orchestra), while Fulbrook was at Farnborough Grammer School – appeared at folk clubs, pubs and venues across the Southeast and into London, including Basingstoke and Fleet, and as far north as Derby.

The band members’ paths would often cross at the Farnborough Folk Club, held at The Old Ford, Farnborough. Press and Lambert had been performing as the folk duo Frank & Pete for a while before they teamed up with Fulbrook and McDermott, who had also been operating as a duo, to form Canticle. One of the groups earlier appearances was supporting Ralph McTell at Brighton’s Technical College and at the Farnham Folk Festival where we shared the bill with Al Stewart and the Johnstons, among others.

On 5 September ’69, there was a gig at the Town Hall, Farnborough headlined by Canticle that also featured Bill Boazman, Diz Disley, Graham Butterfield, Fiona, Johnny Silvo, and Dave Moses. A couple of weeks later, on 27 September ’69, they appeared at the Farnborough Folk Club’s second concert held at the Memorial Hall, Hawley. They were joined by Jon Betmead, Roger Nutbeam, Fiona, Borderers & Chris Jant.

The next year, on 7 February ’70, the Technical College, Basingstoke held a concert headlined by Wiz Jones, who was supported by Gasworks, Canticle, and others. Robert Reiter approached them, following a floor spot at The Troubadour, London offering some recording time to lay down a couple of tracks. This resulted in the release of “Like a Rolling Stone” as a single on RCA across the US and Canada in 1970. Produced by Peter Eden, Donovan’s co-discoverer and manager, the B-side carried “My Mind’s Eye”, and “…Rolling Stone” which featured blues slide guitarist Mike Cooper to boost the layers.

The group disbanded in ’72, about the time a South African trio of the same name started to appear. In August 2019, Grapefruit Records released the compilation “New Moon’s in the Sky (The British Progressive Pop Sounds Of 1970)” [CRSEGBOX059] and included the folk-rock cover of the Small Faces’ “My Mind’s Eye” from the B-side of “Like a Rolling’ Stone”. The following year the compilation “Strangers in the Room: A Journey Through the British Folk Rock Scene 1967-73” on Cherry Red included “Like A Rolling Stone”.

Press, who had been head of a middle school in Norwich, passed in February 2000, of cancer. In August that year the remaining members held reunion gigs at Press’ local in Bawburgh, Norfolk and The Fox & Hounds, Fleet – A 30th reunion Press had been organizing before he passed. Eight years later, in 2008, when Lambert was visiting the UK from his home in Australia of 28 years, the three remaining members convened again, in Lambert’s words “shatter a few numbers and go through our old repertoire”

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