~Mike
Absalom~
Since 1964 Mike Absalom has performed in such varied locations as the Royal Albert Hall, London, the Grand Municipal Theatre, Punta Arenas, Chile, the Rochas Harp Festival in Paraguay, the BBC TV's Old Grey Whistle Test, every university, teacher training college and polytechnic in the British Isles and every elementary school in British Columbia, Canada. (Not to mention libraries, bookstores, festivals, hospitals, retirement homes, cruises, the bars of the Costa Brava, the bites de nuit of Athens, the streets of Paris, mountain cabins in the Rockies and even on a white water raft bouncing down the mighty Fraser River.) Mike Absalom was born in Britain of Irish and Welsh parents, raised in England and Quebec and educated at Oxford University and the University of Gothenburg in Sweden.
Mike
appeared for us on 1st August 1972 at our "Down River" Club which
was held
weekly at the William IV, Leyton, London. I seem to (just about) remember
the evening.
But do recall that Mike's "abstract" performance was most entertaining!
He spent many years as a folk singer and songwriter in England and on the Continent and returned to Canada in 1980 where he quickly established himself as a solo performer, singing and writing songs for the CBC and for school and concert programs throughout British Columbia.
In 1986 he formed the Vancouver Squid Jiggers, an East Coast/Irish fiddle band, in which he sings, plays Celtic harp, fiddle, guitar and button accordion.
In 1988 he joined Harps International as the Paraguayan harpist in a trio of Classical, Celtic and South American harpists and has since toured extensively with them in Canada, South America and the United States.
In 1989 he was awarded a Canada Council scholarship to study the Paraguayan harp in Asuncion, Paraguay. He returns regularly to South America and studies with Papi Galan, Enrique Samaniego and Abel Sanchez Gimenez. He is currently writing a teach-yourself manual for the Paraguayan harp.
In 1996 he was a featured performer at the Sixth World Harp Congress held that year in the USA. The main thrust of his work is bringing arrangements of Irish jigs, reels and slow airs to the Celtic Harp. He also gives concerts of his own compositions and traditional Irish music for the harp, love songs, humorous poems and ditties and other works he has put together over the past 35 years as an entertainer.
In 1999 he published a book and a CD of his children's songs and verse "Professor Absalom 's Pomes For Gnomes" and engaged in a library concert series in British Columbia. He was invited to perform at the Festival of Fools in Cambridge on April 1st, 2000.
When not giving concerts, Mike makes wooden puppets for his children's show: "Professor Absalom and his Amazing Acrobatic Street Dolls". He gives his shows in English, French or Spanish and also speaks fluent Swedish and German.
He lives in the country in British Columbia, Canada on a small acreage with bears, deer, coyotes and raccoons.