Nelson, Keith

Banjo player and craftsman who was part of several groups before becoming a sought-after session musician.

One of his earliest recordings is with the Brunning Hall Sunflower Blues Band on the 1968 release Bullen St. Blues. Other groups he was affiliated with include Matthews’ Southern Comfort, Meal Ticket, and The Southern Ramblers.

He appeared on a couple of relatively high-profile albums in 1974 and 1975, Leo Sayer’s Just A Boy and Olivia Newton John’s Clearly Love, respectively. In 1977, he played banjo on Scouse the Mouse, a children’s album which employed the vocal talents of Adam Faith and Ringo Starr in a story written and narrated by Donald Pleasence. Four years later, he joined forces with Monty Python alum Neil Innes on Innes Book Of Records.

There is a great story about Keith Nelson the craftsman: Pete Townshend generously gave Albert Lee a Gibson SG guitar. The only problem was, it was in about four pieces. Nelson managed to put it back together, with new inlays around the neck. You can see the finished product on Jerry Lee Lewis’s album, The Session.

Since the turn of the century, Keith Nelson has performed as half of the duo West & Nelson, with country and western guitarist/vocalist Alan West.

A bit of trivia about Keith: He has a Bacon number of one in the popular game “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon”. He played banjo on the Des’ree album Why?, which was produced and mixed by Kevin Bacon, who also played bass.

Leo Sayer recordings
Long Tall Glasses (I Can Dance) (David Courtney/Leo Sayer)

Matthews’ Southern Comfort recordings
Woodstock (Joni Mitchell )
Old Gold OG 9795-A (UK 7″)

Here he is on banjo performing with Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown and Vassar Clements…

Sources:

Nelson, Keith

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