My friend Barry Dransfield, who has died aged 79, was, with his elder brother Robin, a pioneer of the late-1960s English folk music revival movement. An accomplished fiddle player, he was also a multi-instrumentalist on guitar, cello and dulcimer.
The brothers began working as a duo in 1969, quickly establishing formidable reputations on the folk-club scene. By this time, Barry had taught himself folk fiddle – he had an unerringly sharp ear, while never having learned to read music – and, unusually, played off the chest, as opposed to on the shoulder, easier for singing while playing.
Bill Leader, the then-owner of Trailer Records, issued their first LP of traditional songs in 1970, winning Melody Maker’s folk album of the year, and the follow-up in 1971. International fame loomed, with a US Warner Brothers’ contract and best-of LP prepared for release.
Barry turned down the offer, and the duo split. Both resumed solo careers, Barry recording a now much-sought-after solo LP for Polydor Records in 1972. He featured on two historic records of the era – the Shirley Collins and the Albion Country Band album No Roses (1971), on which he played lead fiddle on The Murder of Maria Marten, and Morris On (1972), a folk-rock compilation of morris dance tunes, playing fiddle and guitar and singing a lasciviously leering version of The Cuckoo’s Nest.
Born in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, to Mary (nee Maltby) and Arthur Dransfield, an office clerk, Barry went to Woodlands community primary school, then Harrogate grammar school.
He began performing in his teens on mandolin in a bluegrass group with Robin, until he began work as a luthier in London, during which time his performing career took off.
The brothers reunited towards the end of the 70s for two more LPs and occasional gigs, until both settled into string instrument repair and dealerships, Barry in Hastings and Robin in Cornwall. In 1979 Barry met his partner, Christine Goldschmidt, at the Queens pub in Crouch End, north London, at one of his gigs.
Barry was cast as The Blind Fiddler in the 1984 film The Bounty with Mel Gibson and Anthony Hopkins. He also contributed to various TV, theatre and film scores.
He later released three more solo records, featuring his own compositions, folk songs, and music-hall standards. It is possible that he is the only luminary of the folk revival to record both a Procol Harum cover and a Handel aria – singing and playing guitar against two cello and four violin overdubs.
After Hastings, he and Christine moved to Brittany in 2007, before returning to the UK and settling in Barnstaple, North Devon, in 2016.
I was a longtime fan of Barry’s work, and we began corresponding in the early 2000s, which developed into a friendship. We shared a love of baroque music, in particular Biber and Handel, and bonded over the Handel aria Where’er You Walk, recorded on his last CD, Unruly: “Cool gales shall fan the glade; blessed flowers shall rise; all things flourish.”
He is survived by Christine and Robin.
