| In 1987 James co-founded the Silkworm Guitar Network with guitarist and composer Terence Croucher, who wrote a series of articles in Guitar International magazine to publicize it. James co-ordinated the Network, together with Ellen Lee, as a forum for discussion and exchange of ideas between classical guitarists in the UK, and to provide a link between the many local guitar societies around the country. The Network helped publicize concerts organized by participating societies and some concerts and masterclasses in Cambridge and Leicester were promoted as SGN events, involving artists such as Julian Byzantine, the Dunlea-Garcia Duo and the Shibata-Martinez Duo. With a bimonthly newsletter, SignPost, the Network performed these functions for its members and affiliated clubs until 1991, when the growing membership of EGTA(UK) began in large part to take over this rôle, at least for those members who were teachers. As an offshoot, SGN also gave rise to the Silkworm Early Music Series in Cambridge, with concerts (and some masterclasses) by The Tallis Scholars, The York Waits, Ruth Holton (soprano) and Lorna Fulford (fortepiano), Marianne Cotterill (soprano) and Gregory Hamilton (lute), and Barry Mason (lute and baroque guitar). These concerts showed a groundswell of interest in early music in Cambridge, and helped pave the way for the now very popular Cambridge Early Music Summer Schools and the Cambridge Summer Recitals. |