Such an amazing sound. Reminds me of a tiny hamlet out in the sticks where people sit on porches and make their own fun. Sounds like heaven to me, as long as there's a beer delivery. 👍
He partnered in a band with Gerry Rafferty, it's all relative. He's a genius in comedy and a real musical talent. Gerry was a genius in music so I'm sure that kept a lid on him getting too confident with instruments. I'm sure Gerry never felt he could tell a story like Billy.
It's a very Scottish trait to hide your talent under a bushel and say you don't have the talent. But as you've seen for yourself, Billy could play and he could sing and write songs. Listen to his song, "I Wish I Was In Glasgow" and try telling me that Billy Connolly couldn't write songs! That song comes right from the heart and will make even the hardest Glasgow man weep buckets of tears! But most of all he could make folk roll around with laughter without even trying. His folk-singing days very much preceded his appearance on the Parkinson Show with Michael Parkinson. He founded his band The Humblebums with a fellow called Tam Harvey and they toured initially as a duo, eventually expanding to a trio when they managed to persuade a painfully shy Gerry Rafferty to join them around 1969 or thereabouts. The end of the Humblebums began about a year later when Tam Harvey left, and Billy and Gerry continued together until 1971. Billy had become disenchanted with the folk scene and went more or less full-time into stand-up comedy and Gerry went off and joined Stealers Wheel, and the rest as they say, is history. Billy's appearance on the Parkinson Show was very much a watershed moment because it introduced him to an English audience for the first time. Most English people think that it was Parkinson who "discovered" Billy, but we in Scotland had known about him for a good decade before that. It still amazes me how Billy managed to get the joke he told on the show that night past the BBC censors! I suppose the fact that Billy's comedy routines are all completely unscripted might have had something to do with it because Billy even says himself, he doesn't go onstage knowing what he's going to speak about most of the time. And that is why no two of his gigs are ever exactly the same as the one before it. Each one is a masterpiece in its own right. It is heart-breaking to see him in the state he is in now and I know what pain his wife Pamela and his kids are going through right now because my late mother had the same strain of Parkinson's Disease Billy is suffering from. It's no picnic, I can assure you, and if truth be told, it will be a great release for them when Billy does finally pass away. He will leave an unfillable hole in their lives, but they will know that he's at peace and no longer suffering. Vascular dementia is a cruel, cruel condition.
Remember the classic moment on one of his gigs (I think it was on his Billy Bites Yer Bum tour) and he was playing this instrument. He'd just started to sing and one of the strings on the autoharp snapped with the heat under the stage lighting, and all he could say was, "Well, that's f***ed that one!" and move swiftly onto the next item.
UK autoharp club- @ every month or so they have an on line Sat work shop with American Autoharper , Karen Mueller. You can also take private online lessons from her and learn how to play this way.
Billy is as good of a musician as he is a comedian. In case someone out there didn't know, he was in a band/duo with Gerry Rafferty of Steeler's Wheel (Stuck In The Middle With You) and Solo career (most people remember the song Baker Street). He's quite the talent.
Connolly recorded 3 LPs with Gerry Rafferty as "The Humblebums", possibly available on iTunes, I haven't looked, but they did indeed make some great music together before going their separate musical ways.
@@douglashadden2172 There should be a RU-vid channel called "Collected Connolly" where ALL of Billy's TV, radio etc appearances are gathered in one place.
