One of the unsung and industrious heroes of folk music, who has collected and published a tremendous amount of material over something like the past five decades.

From Manchester originally, he lived for many years in London and now resides somewhere up on the Anglo Scots border.

He is noted particularly for his work with travellers, Walter Pardon, and singers and musicans from the Southern Appalchians. As well as his own label, Kyloe, a considerable amount of his material is available on Topic and Musical Traditions. I'd particularly recommend Far in The Mountains, a four CD set of his collecting work in the Southern Appalachians which is available on Musical Traditions. Also, the Walter Pardon CDs, Put a Bit of Powder on it Father (Musical Traditions) and A World Without Horses (Topic). If memory serves me right, Mike produced the latter, although it does feature the work of other collectors.