Fanfare Band

Music

by John Miles

Grade 3 | 6 Mins

Born in Jarrow, northeast England, in 1949, John Miles was something of a child prodigy, learning the piano from the age of five. In the early ’60s he persuaded his father to buy him a guitar and by the end of the decade he had joined a semi-professional band, The Influence. The group soon disbanded and by 1969, Miles was recording with his own group, The John Miles Band, releasing a dozen singles in the early ’70s. In 1975, Miles decided to move to London and secured a deal with Decca Records. By October that year, a newly formed band, John Miles and Co, had released their debut single, Highfly, but their greatest hit, which stormed the British charts in March 1976, was Music.

Often criticised for being pompous and overblown in an era that was gearing itself up for punk, Music nevertheless was quintessential British techno-pop and, along with numbers such as Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody, a defining record of the period.