Darren is a gifted singer/songwriter born in Merthyr Tydfil,
South Wales. He has in the past been signed to
Blue Haven Publishing, but now has selected Publishing
(for certain songs) through the Panama Music Group.
He has written over 150 songs in many varying genres
but mainly in the styles of rock/pop/R&B.
He is currently performing solo, or with a small acoustic band
but has been part of numerous local outfits,
including "Real World" who reached the latter stages of
the Studiomaster Battle Of The Bands competition in 1997,
performing original material. He has had reviews for
reaching the latter stages also of the Benson & Hedges
Soundsearch competition for singing one of his self-penned
songs, "Emotional Games", as a solo performer.


Darren has received interest from Bonnie Tyler’s manager,
David Aspden expressing his and Bonnie’s interest in some
of his songs; including the powerful ballad, "More Than Love".
Interest has also come from Kinsley Ward, the owner of
Rockfield studios in Monmouthshire (where Oasis,
Dire Straits etc. have recorded) who has described him as
a “very promising singer/songwriter”.
He is currently performing at showcase venues
wherever possible and has in the past showcased at the
highly acclaimed Taylor’s music bar in Soho Street,
London run by Bullsheet Music Publishing.
Darren won (May 16th 2000) the Welsh final of
the Megabowl singing competition, singing rock
and pop songs, and came in the top three in the
British Grand final which took place in Feltham,
London the following week. Darren has had his
songs recorded by other artists, including
Andrew Mark Jones' version of "Hit You In The Heart"
(Blue Haven Publishing).


Darren is an accomplished tenor in the
"Black Mountain Male Chorus of Wales"
(of which Noel of Hear’ Say/ Popstars was a member and of
which Bryn Terfel is patron, www.choralworld.net).
Black Mountain were the official chorus group of the
1999 Rugby World Cup and featured on the
No.1 Classical Rugby World Cup album.
Darren and the group undertook a prestigious concert
tour of the West coast / Middle America in
Sept. 2000; completing 45 sell-out concerts in
10 weeks, covering 16 states and around 17,000 miles!
It is the only professional chorus of its kind in Wales.
They have now notched up nearly 200 concert performances
in the US alone. They have performed at the
Rugby World Cup in 1999 at the Millennium Stadium in
Cardiff with Shirley Bassey and Tom Jones and on
the Des O’Connor Show with Bryn Terfel and Shirley.
They are featured on Bryn Terfel’s album,
"We’ll Keep A Welcome", the 1999 Rugby World Cup CD,
"Land Of My Fathers" and the brand new 2007 Official Rugby
World Cup album. Darren was also part of
Black Mountain singing for a TV production entitled,
"Music Under The Stars" (in addition to Annie Skates,
vocal coach, also of Popstars fame) for Michael Ball and
Bryn Terfel. This production was filmed at Bryn Terfel's
Faenol Festival, North Wales, in August 2000
(shown on the BBC on the 22nd December 2000).
Darren has been fortunate to represent Wales by singing
at the Lorient Inter-Celtic Festival in Brittany,
France (August 2000), performing for audiences of
up to 16,000 in large football stadiums and arenas.


Further performances and invites include; invited to
New York to sing in Michael Douglas’ and
Catherine Zeta Jones’ wedding (with Black Mountain),
as well as a private performance for the Thornton’s
chocolate family, for a society wedding in Gloucestershire
(December 2000 ). In addition, he has sung for a special
ITV production at Cardiff Castle, which was screened
on Christmas Eve 2000. He was also selected
(with Black Mountain) to sing with Max Boyce at the
England v Wales rugby match in Feb. 2001, singing in
front of 70,000 fans at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff.
In addition, Darren has undertaken a concert tour
of Hong Kong in March 2001, with Black Mountain,
performing a prestigious concert in the Hong
Kong City Hall to a capacity crowd. He has featured
in ITV’s "PopIdol" series and auditioned for
BBC’s "Fame Academy". Darren was also selected
to sing on the pitch for the Wales V France rugby
match on 16/02/02 at Cardiff in front of about
70,000 fans again. This was shown on BBC1 and on S4C.
He has had a prestigious page spread profile in the
Songwriting and Composing magazine,
an International magazine from the Guild of
International Songwriters And Composers
(December 2001). In addition, Darren has recently
had a ‘Honourable Mention’ in the USA
Billboard Songwriting Competition for one of his songs,
"Better Than You" and has had a gospel/Christmas carol
song played on BBC Radio Wales (Dec.2003) entitled,
"The Saviour Who Was Born" which was written for the
Llangollen Christmas Festival Songwriting competition.


Darren’s song "Reality" has most recently won
(Aug. 2004) best song in the ‘Pop Category’ of the
2004 UK Songwriting Contest; a worldwide competition
open to amateur and professional songwriters, judged by
among others, members of the ‘BRIT AWARD’ panel;
of ‘BRIT AWARD’ fame and was featured on
BBC Radio Wales’ "Good Morning Wales" radio show.
Darren reached the latter stages of BBC’s
“Just Up Your Street” TV show singing renditions of,
“When A Man Loves A Women” and “Lean On Me”
which was shown on BBC TV recently. He was
also seen on HTV’s News' 6.00pm programme
profiling Black Mountains tour of the Mid West
of the USA (2005 USA tour). Darren was interviewed
live on BBC 1’s “Test The Nation” by Phillip Schofield
(Dec 05) about Black Mountain’s achievements so
far and sang a rendition of “White Christmas" with the
‘Singers’ section on the show. Darren recently (Aug 06)
reached the semi-finals of the 2006 UK
Songwriting Contest with his song “Stay” and again
in 2007 with his song, "Lost" (a remarkable
run of; winner 2004, semi-finalist 2005, 2006
and 2007). Darren was recently (31.5.07) seen on
BBC 2's TV show "Let Me Entertain You" with
Black Mountain (hosted by Brian Conley) where
Darren and a selection of the guys sang a rendition
of the "Flying Pickets" song, "Only You".
Darren also sings backing vocals for Europe’s
best and largest (17 piece) Elvis Tribute band,
"The Graceland Band"(www.elvisingraceland.com);
featured in BBC show “The World’s Greatest Elvis”
hosted by Vernon Kay . Darren and the band
have appeared on HTV's news bulletin interview,
especially about the band (Sept, 06) showing
their spectacular performance at the prestigious
Porthcawl Pavilion. They have sold out venues
all over the UK, played with some of Elvis' original
band members and have been personally endorsed by
Elvis' original tour producer, Charles Stone who has
described them as, "Elvis with attitude".
A spectacular show takes place with the
"Graceland Band" in Dec 2008 at the world
famous Wales Millennium Centre.


Darren was featured (Aug 07) in a new BBC 2 TV
show hosted by Donny Osmond called, "Identity"
where his 'identity' was a singer on the show.
Projects for 2008 include; recording a new album
of original songs, working with other songwriters
(e.g. old friend Laurence Williams who has
written for/had songs recorded by Charlotte Church)
and recording a new project with
"The Black Mountain Male Chorus"
(with Chris DeBurgh's musical arranger, Nigel Hopkins)
for general release sometime in 2008.


Darren has just returned (Feb 08) from a 1 month,
mammoth coast to coast USA tour with The Black
Mountain Male Chorus, starting in Chicago, making its way
down the eastern shoreline (near New York) and finishing up
in Los Angeles, California (map attached).
He undertook 20 concerts throughout the month tour,
covering over 18 States and around 6500 miles…by bus!
They have now completed over 200 concerts in the
USA in 10 years, a feat which will hopefully be
featured in the Guinness Book Of Records this year.
Darren has completed over 100 concerts
(65 plus in the US) and visited around 40 of the
50 American States with them since 2000! They performed
in large arenas for audiences of up to 1700 in a
show featuring choral singing, pop, Celtic, Musical Theatre,
traditional Welsh songs and which featured special guest,
Mr Peter Karrie, star of the The West End/Broadway
(especially, “Phantom Of The Opera”),who completed the
month tour with them. Highlights of the tour included:

• completing the 200th concert at High Point, North Carolina
to a packed 1200 audience,

• visiting The White House,

• visiting the Oscars

• meeting up for lunch with Welsh film star/actor Mathew
Rhys in LA (star of smash US hit TV show, "Brothers & Sisters"
and forthcoming Dylan Thomas film with
Keira Knightly/Sienna Miller, "The Edge Of Love")

• and having a guided tour of LA with old friend Ilt Jones,
(originally from Treforest!) who is a Hollywood location director
(worked on "Hellboy", “Transformers” movie and forthcoming,
"Hancock" and “Transformers 2”)

Darren recently (Oct. 08) met US singer/songwriter Michael
Bolton (who has sold 53 million records worldwide) at the Cardiff
Arena. Darren spoke to Michael in his dressing room
about songwriting, their mutual respect for singer Tom Jones,
Michael's old back catalogue of heavy rock songs and their
love of playing golf at Newport's Celtic Manor Resort.

Darren was a finalist (Aug 08) in the 2008 UK Songwriting
Contest with his song "Slippin' Away"; beating over 6000
entries from around the world. Darren has a new release on
iTUNES soon entitled..."Matters Of The Heart"