'The man and his guitar' FRoots ' leaves you with a greater appreciation of the land and environment we live in" R.Klein. Richard Grainger is a phenomonen in his native Teesside. After three decades he remains a powerhouse in the vanguard of songwriting and folk music . He is an expert unaccompanied ballad singer, a fine guitarist and shows a depth of experience seldom found, except in the likes of Dylan , Keats or Heaney. True to his working class roots he writes about all aspects of life in the towns and countryside of his beloved North Yorkshire and industrial Teesside. The composer of a large collection of contemporary folk songs , Grainger was born in Teesside, the industrial heart of North east England, and raised to the sounds of early skiffle and blues until discovering traditional music. ‘It was the industrial and sea ballads that really turned me on’ He states ‘The sound of real people singing in a language that was my own, that I could easily relate to, in my landscape of steelworks,dock cranes, ships, trucks and cargoes. Apart from his song writing skills he is one of the foremost interpreters of traditional music. When not singing his own songs he’ll turn to ballads learned from the likes of Louis Killen or Cyril Tawney , George Spicer, Bert Lloyd or Ewan McColl . His songs inhabit the present day, the recent and distant past. On board an 18th century sailing ship, working the iron mines, baling hay, fishing the north sea or in a drama of a lifeboat rescue, he sings with passion of the every day lives of the working man. Richard is more than purely entertaining, he leaves you with a greater appreciation of the land and environment we live in.