1. Jon Boden was born on 17 March 1977 and is a singer, composer and musician, best known as lead singer and main arranger of Bellowhead.
31 Facts About Jon Boden
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Jon Boden was awarded honorary doctorates by Durham University and the Open University in 2019.
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Jon Boden holds a master's degree in Composition for Theatre and has worked on theatrical productions, including two plays with the Royal Shakespeare Company.
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Jon Boden grew up in Winchester, England, where he attended Henry Beaufort School and Peter Symonds College.
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Jon Boden has a BA in Medieval Studies from Durham University and a master's degree in Composition for Theatre from the London College of Music.
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Jon Boden has received honorary doctorates from the Open University and Durham University.
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Jon Boden first started writing for the stage along with friend Chris T-T when still at school and he wrote his first musical whilst at sixth-form college.
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When Jon Boden first met John Spiers in the Elm Tree pub in Oxford, Jon Boden had little experience of folk clubs.
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Jon Boden was the first person to use a "stomp box" with English traditional music - an idea he and Spiers borrowed from singer-songwriter Rory McLeod.
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Jon Boden continued in that role, arranging around two-thirds of all the songs Bellowhead recorded.
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Since 2009 Jon Boden has toured regularly with The Remnant Kings.
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Jon Boden plays guitar, electric guitar, fiddle, melodeon and concertina and sings lead on all songs.
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Jon Boden discussed the importance of these events in this key-note speech for the English Folk Expo in 2014.
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In 2016, following the end of Bellowhead, Jon Boden re-released his first album Painted Lady with three newly recorded tracks, and toured entirely solo for the first time.
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In 2017 Jon Boden released Afterglow, a narrative concept album following on from Songs From The Floodplain and the second in a prospective trilogy of post-climate change concept albums.
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In 2019 Jon Boden released Rose In June, a selection of traditional and composed tracks performed by the 10 piece Remnant Kings.
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In 2021 Jon Boden released Last Mile Home, the third and final album in his Floodplain Trilogy.
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Many of the songs were recorded with no accompaniment, but Jon Boden used fiddle, concertina and guitar in some cases.
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In October 2014 Jon Boden used the theme as the main inspiration for his keynote address at The Folk Expo in Bury.
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Jon Boden explored both the role of the folk singer as professional, but suggested that there needs to be a balance between performance and participation.
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At the start of 2013, Boden was commissioned by Jonathan Reekie, the musical director of Aldeburgh Music to create the show based on Benjamin Britten's The Ballad Of Little Musgrave And Lady Barnard.
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In 2013 Jon Boden joined the Sacconi Quartet to perform Elvis Costello and the Brodski Quartet's Juliet Letters at The Bristol Proms.
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In film and television, Jon Boden has written the soundtrack for the BBC TV version of the radio comedy Count Arthur Strong.
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Jon Boden contributed a version of Mike Scott's How Long Will I Love You to the soundtrack of the Richard Curtis' feature film About Time, appearing as a busker in an extended montage sequence.
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The theme song for the 2023 BBC show "Beyond Paradise" is arranged by Jon Boden and performed by Bellowhead, as is Sunday Omnibus version of The Archers' theme on BBC Radio 4.
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Jon Boden composed All Hallows for Music to Move to, a part of the annual Dance Umbrella, London's international dance festival, celebrating 21st century choreography across the capital and running since 1978.
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Jon Boden was commissioned to compose a short choral piece for The Bristol Proms 2015, which was performed at Bristol Old Vic Theatre by Erebus Ensemble, a 40-voice choir.
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In 2019 Jon Boden provided a song for the computer game Nocked.
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In 2019 Jon Boden provided music and lyrics for a touring production of the children book The Pirate Cruncher.
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In 2021 Jon Boden launched Colourchord system, an experimental system for promoting social singing using simple four-part harmony, funded by Awards For All.
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In 2022 Jon Boden arranged and performed orchestral versions of six songs from the Floodplain trilogy of albums, with the Hallam Sinfonia.