Trevor Watts

Trevor Watts was born in York but moved to Halifax when very young. He is mainly self taught on saxophones. He first began playing with John Stevens and Paul Rutherford while stationed in Germany in the Royal Air Force (1959-1963). On leaving the RAF he became a founding member of the New Jazz Orchestra and during 1963 and 1964 played with various blues and rock musicians including Rod Stewart and Sonny Boy Williamson. In 1965 he re-met Stevens who became the drummer in the quintet co-led by Watts and Rutherford; with the opening of the Little Theatre Club in London in 1966, this group became the Spontaneous Music Ensemble (SME), went through various personnel changes and group sizes during the next year, finally working as the reduced core of Evan Parker and John Stevens. During this time, Trevor Watts left the SME to form the first version of Amalgam with Barry Guy. and others. In the spring of 1968 Trevor Watts re-joined the SME and he and John Stevens became the mainstay of the group until 1976 playing, as before, with a wide membership varying from the ad hoc to the more permanent. Watts was also a member of the early versions of Steven's more rock- based projects like 'Away'.