Royal Southern Events

After a record-breaking number of entries in May, don’t forget to enter the 2nd of our flagship Summer Series events. There will be three groups:

Black Group: IRC Classes, HP30s and J/111s
White Group: J/70s, SB20s and J/24s
Green group: VPRS, IRC Cruisers and XODs (NEW)

Shoreside, members of legendary British Rock Bands Dire Straits and Procol Harum come together with top musician friends to play a unique “one off” evening of their hits and more. Plus a Charles Heidsieck Champagne-tasting bar, street food, and more.

Whether you are racing or not, come to your Club and enjoy this unmissable event.

Members of legendary British Rock Bands Dire Straits and Procol Harum come together with top musician friends to play a unique “one off ” evening of their hits and more …

ENTER THE REGATTA

THE YACHT ROCKETS

Josh Phillips
Hammond organ and Keys

Is a rock keyboardist and composer. He first played Hammond organ with Procol Harum in 1993 and was the band’s organist from 2004 until they took a break in 2022.

He began his career at sixteen playing organ on the soundtrack to Quadrophenia, and he later appeared in the film with his band Cross Section. From 1983 to 1984 he was the keyboardist for Diamond Head. He has written for and/or performed with a wide range of musicians, including Big Country, Leo Sayer, Pete Townshend, The Crazy World of Arthur Brown, Kenney Jones, Starlite Campbell Band, Ronan Keating, Alisha’s Attic, Heatwave, Midge Ure, Eric Clapton and Paul McCartney

He co- composed title themes and incidental music for many TV shows including Strictly Come Dancing and Take Me Out.^[5] For the US version of “Strictly Come Dancing”, “Dancing with the Stars“, they have received numerous ASCAP Awards.^[ He also has songwriting credits on Procol Harum’s 2017 album Novum.^]

Josh was the MD for the Prostate Cancer UK shows at Kenney Jones Polo Club, responsible for the entire music of the series of concerts, Josh’s choice as joint keys player was Sam Tanner. Together they accompanied the late great , Jeff Beck, Mike Rutherford (Genesis), John Lodge (Moody Blues) Josh and Sam were the keyboard players for the official reuinion of Rod Stewart and the Faces.

John Illsley
Bass Guitar

Is an English musician who rose to fame as the bass guitarist of the critically acclaimed band Dire Straits. With Dire Straits, John has been the recipient of multiple BRIT and Grammy Awards and a Heritage Award. As one of the founding band members, with Mark Knopfler, his brother David and drummer Pick Withers, John played a major role in the development of the Dire Straits’ sound.Throughout it all, John and Mark were the only founding members to remain in the line up of Dire Straits right through from 1977 until they decided to call it a day in 1995. They still remain close friends and recently produced a programme “Guitar Stories” for Sky Arts.During their time together as Dire Straits they sold over 120 million albums and toured extensively across the world. When Dire Straits took a couple of well earned breaks John released two albums; Never Told a Soul (1984) and Glass(1988). Both featured Mark Knopfler as a guest musician.

Sam Tanner
Lead Vocals, Piano & Keys

Sam is often described as Rock’s finest piano player and has worked with many of its greatest names, including Rod Stewart, Pete Townsend & Roger Daltrey (The Who), The Faces, Jeff Beck, Mike Rutherford (Genesis), John Lodge (Moody Blues), Mick Hucknall (Simply Red) and Paul Carrack.

Sam is also an accomplished singer/songwriter and is the front man of popular uk-based funk-soul band “Brother Strut”, who receives 10/10 reviews from Blues & Soul Magazine, with a debut album that has topped the iTunes chart.

Richard Studholme
Guitar & Vocals

Has been a working musician both pro and semi-pro from the age of 13, when he joined his first band while at school. Like all of his age who grew up into music Richard was initially profoundly interested in The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan, although not too attracted by the more overt “pop” material from those days. After becoming interested in who the writers were on the Stones first album, Richard set out to find out who E. McDaniel, J. Moore, McKinley Morganfield, Willie Dixon and Jimmy Reed were, and discovered the rich world of American Blues. British favourites from the 60’s blues boom included John Mayall, and Fleetwood Mac, particularly the guitar of Peter Green. Moving to New York in 1977, working as a mechanic, Richard began to discover the blues on a more local level besides the more famous and well-known…

Towards the end of the 90’s Richard recorded, played on and produced award nominated and critically acclaimed work with Eric Bibb, Arthur Brown, David Maxwell, Hubert Sumlin, The Kenney Jones Band, Donovan, Deborah Bonham,and many other wonderful artists, both local and international.

Richards musical favourites and influences are still 50’s and 60’s R & B, blues, soul, cajun and zydeco, and American roots music generally.

Craig Alexander
Drums & BVs

One of the UK’s honest and hardest-working artists, Craig has been a music maker for more than two decades. Writing and performing non-stop, he’s a multi-talented musician known for his drumming, singing and playing acoustic guitar to a wide variety of audiences.

As a published songwriter with the late Mickie Most and RAK Publishing, Craig has worked along side many household names: The Pretenders, Robert Plant, Steve Harley, Coldplay and Robbie Williams to name just a few.