Born in Chelmsford, Essex in 1955.
Educated locally at Chelmsford Technical High School.
Worked on building sites, then as lab technician in pathology laboratories for local hospital group before resuming full time education at Shoreditch Teacher Training College. Gained Cert.Ed in 1978 and returned to complete B.Ed in Music in 1979.
Four years teaching in London primary schools followed before promotion to Advisory Teacher for IT. An exciting four years followed exploring the use of (early) computers in education - forging a link with Apple Computers, producing many forward thinking initiatives for IT in schools at the time.
So much so that I was offered a position in my local Apple dealership to head an 'education' department for sales of Apple equipment to schools. A targeted approach worked and sales grew from £200k in the first year to £5m by the fifth year.
Apple changed its approach to selling to Education in the mid nineties preferring a direct approach and I took the opportunity of setting up my own company with my business partner, Steve Bonnick!
Toucan Computing was born to provide complete ICT solutions to schools; a company staffed by ex teachers and educators which became, and remains, a very credible and profitable business.
For twenty years my music had taken a back seat to information technology. This all changed when I moved to Lilley, a small village in Hertfordshire. Here lived Craig Sunderland, a gigging musician but more importantly, a talented engineer of production, mixing and mastering! A friendship and partnership flourished which resulted in my returning to music composition - my subject for degree.
Craig's production skills together with my IT knowledge and the growth of 'desktop' music software enabled a particular creative partnership period, the results you can sample in the 'composition' area.
I have since renewed acquaintance to Lorna, my college girlfriend and after twenty five years apart, we wed in July 2004!
I have now left Toucan Computing and live with my wife Lorna in Omagh, Northern Ireland, together with her son, Alex and dog and cat (Nevan & Kitty)!
Music and IT have now become the focus of my life. I play tenor and soprano saxophone and my wife plays flute in the local brass and reed band, St Eugene's Band.
I have created the bands website launched in July 2006 and recorded, mixed and produced (with the help of Craig) the bands first CD launched in September 2006.
We recently moved to the Hospital Road area of town where we have extended our house to include a seperate recording studio which allows me to work on my music compositions and website design in peace!!
Richard
Jan 2007
biography