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Eddie Curtis, Trombonist, Music Arranger and Electronics Designer was born Ernest
Henry Curtis in Bristol.
Eddie founded the original band in 1972, first known as The Eddie Curtis Orchestra. One
musician in that band was a youthfull Trumpet Player, Bob Cutting, he was on the very first gig the band ever played
and is the only remaining original member in the line up of The Debbie Curtis Radio Big Band.
Current member of
the saxophone section, Mark Allaway who joined Eddie in the late 1980's is the only other remaining player.
Eddie
changed the band name following BBC broadcasting contracts to The Eddie Curtis Radio Orchestra and finally in the 1980's
to The Eddie Curtis Radio Big Band.
Eddie was taught to play trombone by his local branch of the Salvation
Army.
During the war, Eddie was in the Royal Marines, where he continued to play trombone in army bands entertaining
the troops.
After the war he played for Ambrose and Teddy Foster as well as most of the well known bands of the
40's and 50's.
His talents as a trombone player earned him 'Best Trombone Player' in the Melody
Maker for two years running!
Eddie was also a professional music arranger, he arranged for the BBC as well as other
major London Publishing companies.
He was also for a time a member of the BBC Light Orchestra.
His band
worked with many great entertainers over time including Tommy Cooper, Bruce Forsyth, The Dankworths, Don Lusher, Kenny
Baker and Vince Hill to name but a few!
Eddie's other talent was electronics, he designed and built an
electronic organ for music company Selmer, they paid him in excess of £5000.00 in 1952 for his design, plus a royalty
per unit manufactured. You could buy a row of houses for that in those days!
He later went on to design the famous
'Blow Typewriter' for the disabled, an idea that came about as a Trombone player shaping notes with his mouth!
Eddie moved around a lot in his time but later settled in the Oxfordshire and Bucks area, firstly at Brill and then
at Princes Risborough where he lived until his death.
Daughter Debbie Curtis took over the band after he died,
sadly, most of the original music library went missing after another regular musician broke a promise to Eddie's widow
that the library would be kept together and used only for a charitable youth band.
The library was broken up, Debbie
located some of it, but the rest remains missing, which broke her heart frankly, but she has built a new library
over time to 9000 arrangements and is pleased to have at least a handful of Eddie's originals!
If anyone knows
the whereabouts of the bulk of the library, which was passed on to Amateur Saxophonist Roger Ayres of Tring, then please let
us know! Debbie would be most grateful!
Eddie's interests other than music was for boats, he had several over
the years on the River Thames, he also enjoyed piloting Gliders. In latter years he was an amateur radio ham and like Debbie,
had a love of animals.
Eddie's signature tune was 'I'll Be Seeing You' and remains the signature
of the current band!
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