“East London bloke with banjo takes on all-comers and comes out alive”
– Boff Whalley (Chumbawamba)
Russ Chandler is a forceful singer and banjo player who sings songs he feels have something to say to the world we live in.
He plays traditional, political and modern songs.
He is a fine banjo player and as well as giving concerts can teach and give presentations on the history and culture of the instrument.
His first album Last Night In Babylon was described by fRoots magazine as “Masterly”
He was well known around the folk scenes of East London and Essex for many years and in 2021 relocated to Sheffield.
Hold the Line: Lessons of the Peekskill Riots
He has written a short book called “Hold the Line: Lessons of the Peekskill Riots”.
It is a new work examining the Peekskill Riots on their seventieth anniversary. It examines the political and social background to the events, the main characters involved and draws parallels with events in the present day United States such as Charlottesville as well as drawing parallels with the increase in oppression and the growth of the far right across the world. It includes a new interview with one of the last surviving eyewitnesses to the events.
You can find out more about the book here.
On The Roof Of Your House, All Alone
His latest collection On The Roof Of your House, All Alone featuring Matt Quinn, Matthew Crampton, Rachel Weston and Steve White & the Protest Family is available now.
In this new collection Russ continues his eclectic choice of material and collaborators to come up with a very distinctive take on folk music.
Songs range from a forgotten music Hall Number from the late nineteenth century brought bang up to date in hipster Shoreditch, a song by designer and radical William Morris, one of the most powerful songs of resistance to oppression ever written and some swinging hits from the nineteen thirties. And a sad love song too.
“A Pick ‘n’ mix grab-bag of Wizz Jones, William Morris, Charles “The Laughing Policeman” Penrose, music hall silliness and radical subversion, a nudge in the conscience, and a poke in the ribs. The brevity of On The Roof Of Your House All Alone’s six-track EP format is more than balanced by it’s wide-open diversity… All human life is here. And that’s shallot…”
Andrew Darlington – RnR Magazine (Four Stars)
Click here for more about On The Roof Of Your House, All Alone
I discovered the folk scene in 2003. In those days I played guitar, only taking up the banjo a couple of years later.
This page is a collection of my recordings and videos, plus a place for me to share some of the other bits and pieces I have come up with.