Dan Wheeler: singer-songwriter & guitarist

Discography
Ten Things to To Do (Authentic 2004)
Long Road Round (Authentic 2004)
Seven Kinds of Grace (Authentic 2006)

Session credits include: Simon Brading / Brenton Brown / Cathy Burton / Chris Eaton / Allan Ellingsgaard / Luke Finch / Andy Flanagan / Paul Field / Simon Goodall / Garth Hewitt / Tim Hughes / Graham Kendrick / Steve Parsons / Nicki Rogers / Najam Sheraz / Adrian Snell

Other clients include: Authentic Music / BBC / Cabin Fever / CN Productions / G2 Studios / ICC Records / Nonsuch / Survivor Records / Vineyard Music UK

There was talk of me learning the trumpet when I was eleven...
However, other events transpired and I ended up in the summer of 1986 in Cornwall listening to Phil Keaggy’s ‘What a Day’ album and working my way through Russ Shipton’s ‘Complete Guitar Player’ volumes one to three. I took to it pretty quickly, so my mum bought me an acoustic guitar and I spent the next few years wearing out the stop, rewind, and play buttons on the tape recorder trying to get to grips with the aforementioned Mr Keaggy’s licks, along with the slide playing of Bryn Haworth, session maestros Dann Huff and Larry Carlton, and the otherworldliness of Eric Johnson. Still, it could have been worse: I could have been learning the trumpet.

I abandoned my guitar hero pretensions at university, having decided that my fingers were never going to move that fast, and, besides no-one cared for that anymore as Britpop was ruling the airwaves. But the discovery of albums like Shawn Colvin’s ‘Fat City’, Crowded House ‘Together Alone’, and Counting Crows ‘August and Everything After’ fuelled my musical passion and turned my attention to songwriting.

I think it’s this focus on the song that suited me to session playing. Producers that I got to work with always seemed to appreciate the way I made a musical contribution that fitted the lyric and feeling behind the song. Eventually, there were enough of them interested for me to abandon the day job and take things more seriously. Since then I’ve been fortunate to play for some great artists, producers and, more importantly, some good friends.

The session career has also been a means to developing my songwriting. Playing other peoples songs all day everyday can either kill-off your personal creativity or give it a kick up the backside! I’ve always found it to be the latter. So when I met with the A&R guy of an artist I was recording for in 2004, I already had a bunch of songs tucked up my sleeve that were getting good responses from audiences and critics alike.

I made my debut EP ‘Ten Things To Do’ in 2004 as a forerunner to the album ‘Long Road Round’. Both seemed to be well received, and the challenge of a live audience was a great balance to the precision and control of the recording environment that occupied the other half of my time. I knew the music was having an impact at a grassroots level from the comments and e-mails I received, so I went on to release ‘Seven Kinds of Grace’ last October, and the journey continues.