He is a drummer and sculptor born in Peckham, London.
He began his professional career playing in the band Ferris Wheel when he was sixteen, then Brett Marvin and the Thunderbolts, and from there he moved onto the rock band IF and stayed with them for five of their albums. He left them around 1972 and for a short while he played for The Roy Young Band . With them he appeared as the drummer for Chuck Berry’s live sessions, which produced his hit song “My Ding-a-Ling“, and it has been said that Chuck Berry always seemed to pick on him.
After that group disbanded he performed on an Ian Hunter album and after he had been requested to do another with him and Mick Ronson in America, he moved to New York.
At the same time he teamed up with Mick Jones and five others, with three being British, and become a founder member of the rock group Foreigner. They were acclaimed for the next two decades and say several No. 1 hit singles on the Billboard charts such as “I Wanna Know What Love Is”, “Cold as Ice” and “Waiting for a Girl Like You”.
He left the group in the early 1990s and turned himself to his other love of wood sculpture. He has since had several successful exhibitions, owns his own gallery and his works are a feature in many museum collections.
Chuck Berry recordings
Johnny B. Goode (Chuck Berry )
My Ding-a-Ling (Dave Bartholomew )
Here he is performing “Blue Morning Blue Day” with PUSH…
Sources:
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dennis_Elliott
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreigner_(band)
- http://beatles.ncf.ca/roy.html
- http://www.4eigner.net/theband/denniselliott.html
- http://www.functionart.com/AM/Artists/ElliottD/ElliottD.html
- http://www.denniselliott.com/guide/featured.artistbio.ihtml?c=12
- https://www.discogs.com/artist/520631-Dennis-Elliott