The Happy Accidents

THE HAPPY ACCIDENTS are five musicians from Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire.

THE HAPPY ACCIDENTS specialise in playing well known modern and classic pop songs in styles completely at odds with the originals. “The Foo Fighters” are played on ukulele! “Keane” on mandolin and “Don’t Stop Me Now” by “Queen” is treated to acoustic guitar, fiddle and tambourine!

“Green Day”, “The Stranglers” and “Jerry Lee Lewis” are also given THE HAPPY ACCIDENTS treatment as tongue remains firmly in cheek throughout.

Between them they can boast two music degree and countless decades of performing experience.

JON BENNS has been a professional entertainer since the 1970s, touring as support act to numerous top names such as “Ultravox”, “Barclay James Harvest” and “Steeleye Span”. As a broadcaster he has presented folk and rock music programs for both BBC and Independent radio stations. Jon now runs “The Music Trade”, the musical instrument shop in Tewkesbury. He plays guitar, mandolin and ukulele.

CAROLINE McQUILLAN-BENNS has a music degree. She has been teaching piano for 25 years. She also arranges and plays music for local Am Dram groups. Very much the “clever clogs” of the group, it can take the other members three weeks to learn a new song while Caroline can play it straight away with one hand while pouring herself a glass of wine with the other!

JESSE BENNS plays percussion. Being the baby of the group his main job is to reduce the average age of all the other members! Jesse has a diploma in drums and percussion from 'The Academy of Contemporary Music.'

DEBBIE LANNEN is a young bundle of energetic fun. She has a huge voice and a personality to match. To be frank, the older members of the band find her exhausting company as she always wants to sing "just one more" while the rest of the band are sliding down the wall to join the empties on the floor!

VICKI WAGSTAFF is Debbie’s big sister. She joined the band for a one off gig at a private party and we’ve refused to let her go ever since! Vicki has sung and played music for as long as she can remember, both at school and in various local am-dram productions. She plays guitar, keyboards and various whistles and recorders.
Vicki and Debbie’s harmonies have become a major part of The Happy Accident’s sound and are guaranteed to make the hair stand up on the back of your neck!

"The Happy Accidents wouldn't be complete without their sixth member and sound engineer ROB BARNET who is as patient and charming as he is skilful!"

An evening spent in the company of THE HAPPY ACCIDENTS is an evening of pure musicianship, quirky humour and equal measures of novelty and nostalgia.

(ROB GOLDING) - Many of the photographs on this site were taken by Rob Golding who, as well as being an excellent photographer with a passion for music, is also a great bloke and a good friend. - (ROB GOLDING)

Contact

Jon Benns. The Music Trade, 76 Church St., Tewkesbury GL20 5RX.

Tel. 01684 850220 or Mob. 07967 597 388

Email jon@themusictrade.co.uk

Listen to us on MySpace at http://www.myspace.com/happyaccidentsband

BBC Review - The Happy Accidents

THE HAPPY ACCIDENTS at Twyning Village Hall.

Chris Eldon Lee - BBC Radio 4 Arts Unit Producer

This was a highly auspicious debut for a multi-generational band, which very quickly wooed an even more multi-generational audience.

“The Happy Accidents” specialise in playing familiar contemporary music in quirky unfamiliar styles. This does wonders for both the tune and the lovingly revealed lyrics of popular material by the likes of Oasis, Keane, Queen, Green Day, The Foo Fighters and even The Velvet Underground.

It’s not only a refreshing revelation; it’s also a clever piece of social engineering.

You give the kids the songs they love in a way that doesn’t send shock waves down their wrinkly parents’ spines. At last you can have a bus pass and like The Stranglers.

The band’s highly eclectic and Quixotic set was leavened by some dazzling moments of virtuoso violin from Maurice Hipkiss and the youthful, liquid voice of Oonagh Hughes, who deserves to be up there with Maddy Prior and Annie Lennox.

Jon Benns’ ukulele song about the Tewkesbury floods had the air of one of George Formby’s cheeky-chappie Blackpool ditties - sung at a dangerously high spring tide.

Caroline McQuillan-Benns held it all neatly together with some proper posh piano playing - and Jon’s son Jesse underlined the whole evening with a range of very subtle rhythms.

It was an archetypal, cross section village hall audience and ‘The Happy Accidents’ proved beyond doubt that - actually - you can please all the people all the time.

Happy? I was delirious. An Accident? I don’t think so.