Tray73
இڿڰۣ-ڰۣ—
I couldn’t find a thread for Kate Bush and thought she deserved one being one of the most popular and successful female artists to come out of England. I’ve admired her work for many years, and still remember the first time I heard her sing – I’d never heard such an unusual, haunting and captivating voice. She’s certainly unique and love her or hate her she has carved out an impressive and prolific career and has been an inspiration for many.
I’ll be doing the thread in parts, starting with her childhood and the years up until she burst into public view. To refresh my own knowledge of her life and work, and add anything I didn’t know, I will be referring to online sources and a wonderful book I have, ‘Kate Bush: A Visual Documentary’ by Kevin Cann and Sean Mayes, which I treasure as it is signed by Kate
Kate Bush
Kate Bush Official Website
Studio Albums
1978 The Kick Inside
1978 Lionheart
1980 Never for Ever
1982 The Dreaming
1985 Hounds of Love
1989 The Sensual World
1993 The Red Shoes
2005 Aerial
2011 Director's Cut
2011 50 Words for Snow
Born Catherine Bush on July 30, 1958 in Bexleyheath Maternity Hospital, London, Kate is the youngest of the three children born to Dr Robert Bush and Hannah Bush (now both sadly deceased). She has two brothers, the writer, poet and photographer John Carder Bush – known as ‘Jay’ – and the accomplished musician Paddy Bush. Apart from a brief time when Kate was around five or six when she and her family emigrated to Australia only to return less than a year later, home was a rambling 17th century farmhouse in East Wickham, Kent, which you can imagine was the perfect surroundings for a young and creative mind to flourish.
Kate was born into a musical family, her father played classical piano and her brother, Paddy, various stringed instruments, so from a very young age music was a big part of Kate’s life, “Music was an obsession”, she once said talking about her household.
Young Cathy, photographed by her eldest brother, John Carder Bush
In September 1968, Kate started senior school – St Joseph’s Grammar School in Bexley - and was obliged to learn an instrument as it was compulsory. She chose the violin and, despite not enjoying it, played quite well, reaching Grade 2 in her exams after the first year. Having little interest in the violin, as soon as she could (or as soon as her mother allowed her!) Kate dropped the violin and took up the piano, which she had been introduced to by her father. He taught her a few keys and it didn’t take long for her to start creating chords and simple melodies.
From left to right: Hannah, Paddy, Kate and John (Jay)
Kate was often to be found joining in with her brothers’ musical sessions. Jay had a folk band and during rehearsals she would sing along to the chorus and dance around enjoying the music. And she often accompanied Paddy on whatever instrument he had chosen to pick up and play (he would later play all manner of instruments on Kate’s albums from mandolin, sitar, violin and harmonica to more unusual instruments like the balalaika (a Russian stringed instrument, similar to a guitar, with a triangular body) and koto (a Japanese stringed instrument like a zither), and not forgetting the didgeridoo and a musical saw!
Kate and Paddy (playing an autoharp) singing together. Photo by John Carder Bush.
At around the age of 11 Kate started writing, she excelled in English and often contributed to her school’s end of year magazine. She enjoyed poetry and started setting her poems to her chord formulations on the piano. Kate revealed, “I used to write poetry like everyone else did in English classes and everyone was free to read them, we always used to read each other’s work. But people at school didn’t know that I was writing songs.” Even towards her older school years when she started to think that maybe she would like to pursue a career in music, her class mates knew little of it. But in the privacy of home Kate was coming on leaps and bounds with her musical compositions and with her brothers’ encouragement she had started recording demos of her own work by her early teens. The whole family realised that she had a real talent for music, and in a rare interview her father once said, “Her songs seem to write themselves, whole stanzas at a time, in her head, whilst I’m struggling to put one word after the next.” Indeed, she wrote the outline to ‘The Man With The Child In His Eyes (for which she later won an Ivor Novello Award in 1979 for Outstanding British Lyric) at just thirteen years old.
When Kate was 14, a family friend, Ricky Hopper, who had connections in the music business, helped her send the demo tapes she had been recording to record companies, but they didn’t seem interested, some even described her music as “morbid”, “boring” and “uncommercial”. But Ricky had another plan. He had a friend who’d he’d been at Cambridge University with, who he thought would be able to help Kate get the break she deserved. That friend was Pink Floyd’s Dave Gilmour. He played Dave some of Kate’s demos and then invited him to come along and see her perform. Dave was impressed and invited her to his house to record some new and improved versions of some of her work in his home studio. But these were still turned down. At this point Kate was losing heart and starting to think that a career in music was maybe beyond her reach - perhaps she should forget her dreams and choose a more conventional profession. She toyed with the idea of social work or a career in psychiatry, and, doing extremely well in her ‘O’ Level exams – she gained 10 – she decided to stay on at school into the sixth form and study for ‘A’ Levels. But her love of music, and her dreams, would not go away, and after a year of sixth form she decided to leave school. It was summer of 1975 and Kate had just turned 17.
Kate with Dave Gilmour
I’ll be doing the thread in parts, starting with her childhood and the years up until she burst into public view. To refresh my own knowledge of her life and work, and add anything I didn’t know, I will be referring to online sources and a wonderful book I have, ‘Kate Bush: A Visual Documentary’ by Kevin Cann and Sean Mayes, which I treasure as it is signed by Kate
Kate Bush
Kate Bush Official Website
Studio Albums
1978 The Kick Inside
1978 Lionheart
1980 Never for Ever
1982 The Dreaming
1985 Hounds of Love
1989 The Sensual World
1993 The Red Shoes
2005 Aerial
2011 Director's Cut
2011 50 Words for Snow
Born Catherine Bush on July 30, 1958 in Bexleyheath Maternity Hospital, London, Kate is the youngest of the three children born to Dr Robert Bush and Hannah Bush (now both sadly deceased). She has two brothers, the writer, poet and photographer John Carder Bush – known as ‘Jay’ – and the accomplished musician Paddy Bush. Apart from a brief time when Kate was around five or six when she and her family emigrated to Australia only to return less than a year later, home was a rambling 17th century farmhouse in East Wickham, Kent, which you can imagine was the perfect surroundings for a young and creative mind to flourish.
Kate was born into a musical family, her father played classical piano and her brother, Paddy, various stringed instruments, so from a very young age music was a big part of Kate’s life, “Music was an obsession”, she once said talking about her household.
Young Cathy, photographed by her eldest brother, John Carder Bush
In September 1968, Kate started senior school – St Joseph’s Grammar School in Bexley - and was obliged to learn an instrument as it was compulsory. She chose the violin and, despite not enjoying it, played quite well, reaching Grade 2 in her exams after the first year. Having little interest in the violin, as soon as she could (or as soon as her mother allowed her!) Kate dropped the violin and took up the piano, which she had been introduced to by her father. He taught her a few keys and it didn’t take long for her to start creating chords and simple melodies.
From left to right: Hannah, Paddy, Kate and John (Jay)
Kate was often to be found joining in with her brothers’ musical sessions. Jay had a folk band and during rehearsals she would sing along to the chorus and dance around enjoying the music. And she often accompanied Paddy on whatever instrument he had chosen to pick up and play (he would later play all manner of instruments on Kate’s albums from mandolin, sitar, violin and harmonica to more unusual instruments like the balalaika (a Russian stringed instrument, similar to a guitar, with a triangular body) and koto (a Japanese stringed instrument like a zither), and not forgetting the didgeridoo and a musical saw!
Kate and Paddy (playing an autoharp) singing together. Photo by John Carder Bush.
At around the age of 11 Kate started writing, she excelled in English and often contributed to her school’s end of year magazine. She enjoyed poetry and started setting her poems to her chord formulations on the piano. Kate revealed, “I used to write poetry like everyone else did in English classes and everyone was free to read them, we always used to read each other’s work. But people at school didn’t know that I was writing songs.” Even towards her older school years when she started to think that maybe she would like to pursue a career in music, her class mates knew little of it. But in the privacy of home Kate was coming on leaps and bounds with her musical compositions and with her brothers’ encouragement she had started recording demos of her own work by her early teens. The whole family realised that she had a real talent for music, and in a rare interview her father once said, “Her songs seem to write themselves, whole stanzas at a time, in her head, whilst I’m struggling to put one word after the next.” Indeed, she wrote the outline to ‘The Man With The Child In His Eyes (for which she later won an Ivor Novello Award in 1979 for Outstanding British Lyric) at just thirteen years old.
When Kate was 14, a family friend, Ricky Hopper, who had connections in the music business, helped her send the demo tapes she had been recording to record companies, but they didn’t seem interested, some even described her music as “morbid”, “boring” and “uncommercial”. But Ricky had another plan. He had a friend who’d he’d been at Cambridge University with, who he thought would be able to help Kate get the break she deserved. That friend was Pink Floyd’s Dave Gilmour. He played Dave some of Kate’s demos and then invited him to come along and see her perform. Dave was impressed and invited her to his house to record some new and improved versions of some of her work in his home studio. But these were still turned down. At this point Kate was losing heart and starting to think that a career in music was maybe beyond her reach - perhaps she should forget her dreams and choose a more conventional profession. She toyed with the idea of social work or a career in psychiatry, and, doing extremely well in her ‘O’ Level exams – she gained 10 – she decided to stay on at school into the sixth form and study for ‘A’ Levels. But her love of music, and her dreams, would not go away, and after a year of sixth form she decided to leave school. It was summer of 1975 and Kate had just turned 17.
Kate with Dave Gilmour
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For some reason I thought you may have some of her stuff - maybe you mentioned it to me before, not sure. 
Whoo hoo! You've started it and it is looking epic! 
