Cassell Webb
Cassell Webb | |
|---|---|
 Cassell Webb 2011 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | San Antonio, Texas, U.S. |
| Genres | Folk, pop |
| Occupation(s) | Singer, songwriter, producer |
| Years active | 1965–present |
| Labels | Virgin, Ode, International Artists, China, Atlas |
Cassell Webb is a British–American musician.
Biography
Texas-born Cassell Webb has enjoyed a career that carried her from late-1960s psychedelia to country music and latter-day folk rock to progressive rock/pop, and moved her across an ocean in the process. Her voice, which can sound ethereal or mournful and crosses genres as easily as Webb's career has over more than 30 years. Born in Llano, Texas, United States, in the late 1940s, Webb began playing guitar at 14 and later gravitated to the psychedelic scene in San Antonio. She became a member of the Children, a psychedelic outfit that was part of Lelan Rogers' stable of artists, appearing on their 1968 Rebirth album and several singles. She later joined Saddlesore, a Texas combo whose core members, Mayo Thompson and Rick Barthelme, were survivors from the Red Krayola (another Rogers-managed act). They stayed together long enough to record one single ("Old Tom Clark") on the Texas Revolution label before disappearing in the early 1970s. Webb spent time in California and New York working as a session singer and acquiring some knowledge of production as well and then returned to Texas, where she spent the next few years working with such country artists as Jerry Jeff Walker, Guy Clark, and B. W. Stevenson. It was around the time she began writing songs that she also began her long association with songwriter/producer Craig Leon. Webb went to Europe in the early 1980s, first to Holland and then to England, where she remained permanently and began her solo recording career. Initially signed to the tiny independent label Statick Records, for which she recorded her debut album, Llano, she later joined the roster of Venture Records, an off-shoot of Richard Branson's Virgin Records label, through which she recorded Thief of Sadness in 1987. Webb's most representative and popular album was her third, Songs of a Stranger, which was derived from her concert repertory of other writers' music, including Jimmy Webb ("P.F. Sloan"), Nick Drake ("Time Has Told Me"), Townes Van Zandt ("If I Needed You"), and Phil Ochs ("Jim Dean of Indiana"). Webb remains based in England, where her work on such radio programs as Saturday Sequence, coupled with periodic album releases and projects, such as the dance score "Klub Anima" (co-written with Leon), and singing and production work with artists such as Marillion's Steve Hogarth have sustained her career in music. Her poetry has also been published by Pen & Ink of Ann Arbor, MI. Webb's hauntingly lyrical version of the Rolling Stones classic "Tell Me," from her 1990 album Conversations at Dawn (which also included her covers of Bruce Springsteen's "Reason to Believe" and – in a nod to her own Texas psychedelic roots – the 13th Floor Elevators' "Splash One"), has been included on the Connoisseur Collection's Jagger/Richard Songbook CD, alongside recordings by the Flamin' Groovies, the Who, Mary Coughlan, Naked Prey, Melanie, Marianne Faithfull, and Ike & Tina Turner. Her subsequent two albums Conversations at Dawn and House of Dreams continued her development as a songwriter. The former was again recorded for Virgin Venture and the latter released on China Records.[1]
She has worked consistently on the productions of Craig Leon, which since 1998 have been primarily in the classical field. Webb has also been a production assistant to Leon on television projects such as the 2009 documentary Orbit: Journey to the Moon, which aired on the U.S. Discovery Channel, and Bell'aria which aired in 2010 on U.S. PBS. Webb is also a producer on the 2012 PBS broadcast Quest Beyond the Stars as well as the creator of the story concept.
More recent work has been appearances on the new re-recording of Nommos, Visiting and The Canon along with live appearances of those pieces in New York; Moogfest (Asheville, North Carolina); Saint Petersburg, Russia; Berlin, Germany; and Kraków, Poland from 2014 to date.
She has also co produced the album George Martin: The Film Scores and Original Compositions, released in 2018 on Atlas Realisations/PIAS.
Albums
- Cassell Webb- Llano-Virgin Venture
- Cassell Webb- Thief of Sadness- Virgin Venture
- Cassell Webb- Songs of a Stranger- Virgin Venture
- Cassell Webb-Conversation At Dawn- Virgin Venture
- Cassell Webb- House of Dreams- China
- The Children- Rebirth-Cinema/Atco
Production credits
With Craig Leon:
- Craig Leon- The Canon: The Anthology of Interplanetary Folk Music vol.2 – RVNG Intl.
- Craig Leon- Nommos/Visiting: The Anthology of Interplanetary Folk Music vol. 1- RVNG Intl.
- Craig Leon- Nommos- Takoma
- Craig Leon- Visiting- Arbitor/Enigma
- Craig Leon- Klub Anima Sound Track-Psi
- Cassell Webb- Llano-Virgin Venture
- Cassell Webb- Thief of Sadness- Virgin Venture
- Cassell Webb- Songs of a Stranger- Virgin Venture
- Cassell Webb-Conversation At Dawn- Virgin Venture
- Cassell Webb- House of Dreams- China
- Mark Owen- Green Man –BMG
- Mark Owen- "Child" – single –BMG
- Mark Owen- "Clementine" – single- BMG
- Angel Corpus Christi-White Courtesy Phone- Almo
- Martin Phillipps and the Chills- Sunburnt—Flying Nun
- Cobalt 60 (Front 242)- Elemental CD-Edel
- The Fall- Code Selfish -Phonogram
- The Fall -Shiftwork -Phonogram
- The Fall -Extricate -Phonogram
- Doctor and the Medics- Laughing at The Pieces -IRS
- Doctor and the Medics – Spirit in the Sky -IRS
- Blondie- No Exit –BMG
- Blondie- "Maria" – BMG
- The Cesarians – Cesarians 1 – Imprint
- Steve Hogarth – Ice Cream Genius (1997) – Poison Apple
- Bell'aria-"Little Italy"- EMI
- The London Chamber Orchestra – Midwinter's Eve- Sony Classical
- Quest Beyond the Stars – Original Soundtrack- Atlas Realisations/Warner Music
Bibliography
- Routledge (2007). International Who's Who in Popular Music, p. 299. Routledge Books, London. 2007 ISBN 1-85743-417-X
