biographies
Singers
Katarina Holmberg is a singer and composer (signed to Universal) and has sung at hundreds of weddings and functions throughout her career. She is a lively entertainer and soulful singer who also records as a session vocalist for producers in Germany, Finland and the UK (including BBC and ITV) when not performing live or running workshops with children and adults throughout the UK. She graduated with First Class Honours in Music from Southampton University.
MaryAnne has been working extensively in Music, Television, Theatre, and Radio, as a writer, composer and teacher. She has performed in a number of bands throughout the years from Big band Jazz with the Australian Show band to function bands. In the theatre Mary Anne played some of the best female roles ever written such as Gypsy in “Gypsy”, Rosemarie- “How to succeed….” (Green Room Award Nomination), Georgie –“The Full-Monty”(Helpmann Award Nomination), and most recently Joanne in “Company”. Her work has taken her all over the world from her native country of Australia to New York, London, Europe and Asia.
Steve Down is a Guitarist with extensive live and studio experience. He is a First Class Honours Music graduate from Southampton University and has performed and recorded with many top UK musicians including Matthew Scott (Channel 4, Chichester Royal Festival Theatre, National Theatre).
He has performed many function gigs across Europe and the UK. He also performs and writes original material with Katarina Holmberg and leads his own Jazz project 'Swiss' Trio.
Rob Biss studied at the Academy of Contemporary Music (ACM) in Guildford, and achieved a Higher Diploma in drums at the Brighton Institute of Modern Music in 2005. Rob maintains a very busy gigging and recording schedule, and has toured and recorded worldwide in the past with artists such as Shana Morrison (Van Morrison’s daughter), Saiichi Sugiyama, Pete Brown (Cream lyricist), Martin Luklinski, Matt Love, Luke Clark, The Jamestown Union, Tim Woodcock, Stuart James Band, along with many more.
Chris Britt has worked with Van Morrison's daughter Shana Morrison, playing bass for her 2006 UK Tour. He has also been lucky enough to play with The Ordinary Boys, Chad Smith (RHCP) and worked on sessions with Rob Green (Toploader) and Clive Carroll. He is currently playing with Brighton artist Kit Ashton, who is signed to Orange Room Music, and is working for new tuition website ShowMeHowToPlay.com.
The keyboard player Toby McClaren completes the rhythm section. This Peter Whittingham Jazz award winner is a graduate of The Middlesex School of Music.
He is an extremely experienced performing musician having been part of the popular London rock band The Pinch and the very successful new signed Jazz group Led Bib who play all across Europe and at high profile UK venues including The Royal Festival Hall and Carling Academy.
