Biography
Born on 5th August 1953 in Ormskirk, England, Fiona’s childhood was spent moving between various places in Scotland, England, and Africa. It was a musically unremarkable childhood, without any formal music education. In spite of desperately wanting to take violin, and subsequently piano lessons, music was considered a hobby, rather than career. But music was a constant element of her early life. She absorbed much of the classical music that her parents listened to on the radio, and had a remarkable musical memory for melodies and arrangements.
Playing my old Hofner in the Matopo Hills
Her first opportunity to play an instrument came when she was fourteen, and reasonably settled in (then) Rhodesia. By working for extra pocket money, she bought her first guitar (a Bellini which cost 15 dollars!) She and her friends taught themselves to play, and to sing, and to harmonise. In the late sixties and seventies, the acoustic guitar was the preferred instrument of the folk movement, so there were plenty of songs to play, and she was naturally drawn to the folk-based melodies they were using, because they were part of her roots. She was influenced by all the current popular music of the time, especially by the less mainstream sounds. The biggest influences in the early days were the lyric poetry and unusual guitar work of Joni Mitchell, and the harmonies of groups like Crosby, Stills & Nash.
Cape Town students put on concert in Bulawayo 1972 Mick Allard, Gordon Render, Fiona, Liz Wallace, Geoff Sedgwick, Andy McGibbon
Jamming in a friend's flat in London
By the time she left school, she had played solo and in a few “girl groups” at school talent shows, charity concerts and had done a couple of shows on Rhodesian television. She started composing original music, using a variety of folk finger styles and alternative guitar tunings. In the early part of the seventies, studying at Cape Town university greatly broadened Fiona's musical horizons.
She made her debut with a new folk/rock band, covering artists as diverse as Frank Zappa and Pentangle, as well as playing originals penned by her and other members of the band. Succumbing to the lure of a regular income, she returned to Bulawayo, taking a job as a computer programmer, while continuing to work the clubs and pubs both as a solo act and with various groups, and composing new songs.
After getting married in 1975, she set off to see the world with husband and guitar, and worked in London for a year, listening more than playing, soaking up the rich concert scene there, and playing the odd folk club gig.
The rest of the decade was spent in several Arabian countries, and she became a much loved feature of the folk club circuit in places like Doha, Muscat, Dubai and Sharjah, where she was able to work with musicians from all over the world. She set up her first home studio in Muscat, and wrote and recorded a jingle for the local Radio Oman. She was featured in several radio shows in Qatar, playing both original songs and popular covers.
Moving back to Africa in 1980, Fiona settled first in Pietermaritzburg, and spent a couple of years raising two young children, limiting her performing to the local folk club. In 1983 she moved to Durban where she has lived since.
The folk club in Durban had died out in the late seventies, and Fiona found there was little opportunity for a solo folk artist. Undeterred she co-founded the new Durban Folk Club in 1986, and has been an anchor member until it closed just after the turn of the century. Through the folk club connections, Fiona met many of the local musicians, including Will Wallace and Dave Atkinson.
Together they formed the group, Odyssey (later renamed Bona Fide), earning fame for their tight three part harmonies. They featured at many local venues, playing the folk clubs and the national festival circuit. Fiona continued to play as a solo act during this time, and to write songs both for solo and band performance, becoming a veteran of the annual Splashy Fen festival in the mountains.
The late eighties also saw the creation of Odyssey Productions, a partnership with band members created to explore their keen interest in the arrangement and recording of their original material. Odyssey was later to form the core of bigger bands, like the Fiona Tozer Band and Alien.
Recording at the home studio
C&G Studios
Much time was spent in the recording studio set up in the basement of Fiona's smallholding home in 91 and 92, culminating in the completion of an album titled Odyssey by the band, and featuring eight of Fiona's original songs on the 12-track album. Released on cassette and not distributed commercially, the album sold well at gigs and festivals, and a couple of the tracks received airplay on East Coast Radio. Fiona continued to write new songs, and with a busy schedule of gigs and national festivals thrived on the feedback so important to a creative artist. Returning to the studio in 94 with an album of new material, and the help of many talented friends, she completed Neverland early in 96. This time released on CD, it was co-produced by Will Wallace and Fiona, and digitally mastered in England. Tracks from the album were placed on the playlist of East Coast Radio in Natal and Radio Algoa in Eastern Cape, and were also featured on CBFM in Eastern Cape, KFM in Cape Town and Radio Cani in the Transvaal. Fiona has promoted the album with features at the Maynardville festival in Cape Town, the Mannville festival in Port Elizabeth, and at the 96 Splashy Fen (which coincided with the release date). A combined concert tour with guitar virtuoso Steve Newman in Durban and coastal resorts was also included in the post release promotions.
May 1998 saw her back in the studio to record a new album. All of the songs on Light and Sound are new and many were inspired by events between the two albums, and are a reflection of her growth as a songwriter, and performer. This album was recorded at C&G Studios, produced by Will Wallace and Don Clarke, and features some of Durban’s most prominent musicians. Live performance remained an important part of Fiona’s musical ethos, and for several years she ran an enthusiastically supported monthly club bringing live music to her local community. During this time, she also started teaching guitar at several Highway area schools, and continued working part time as a computer programmer.
Although change is continual, there are periods that seem to mark a sudden new direction, and the new millennium was one of these. Fiona’s compositional style had not essentially changed up to this point, apart from the addition of bigger band arrangements. She was becoming increasingly aware of the limitations of her knowledge, and becoming frustrated with relying on lyrics to give meaning to the music. In 2001, she started studying music at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, having a brief flirtation with jazz guitar performance before settling on classical composition as her major. In the course of her studies, she composed for orchestra and for a variety of small ensembles. She completed her BA (Music) degree, graduating with distinction both in 2003, and Honours in 2004. During this time, performing took something of a back seat as she experimented with new musical concepts.
Fiona completed her masters degree in composition in 2008, composing and recording the pieces for the Photophonics portfolio. Since then has received several commissions to compose works for various ensembles, including the KwaZulu-Natal Youth Orchestra, SAMRO, and local and international performers.
Splashy Fen festival
Celtis at Luna Lounge
Fiona assisted in curating new contemporary music events around the country for NewMusicSA, the South African arm of International Society for Contemporary Music, and served as treasurer on its board from 2007 to 2010. The organisation holds a national festival each year, alternating between acoustic music (Indaba Festival) and electronic music (Unyazi Festival). At the same time she continued to do folk gigs, solo and with bands, and also took part in the folk show Those were the Days, which had several successful runs at various venues in Durban, in 2001 and 2002. In 2006 she was the featured acoustic artist at Splashy Fen, where she put together a showcase of her work featuring talented local instrumentalists and vocalists. Around this time she also occasionally played guitar for local band Celtis, which connected her with her celtic roots and led to playing ceilidh gigs with violinist Ant Cawthorn-Blazeby.
After graduation, Fiona took a job as the concert coordinator for the University of KwaZulu-Natal, followed by a year as administrator for the KZN Youth Orchestra. However she found the work was conflicting with her need to be musically creative, so resigned from the music admin world after the 2015 festival.
