Frank Underwood is a folk and blues

Blues

Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...

 musician, also known for work in the early music

Early music

Early music is generally understood as comprising all music from the earliest times up to the Renaissance. However, today this term has come to include "any music for which a historically appropriate style of performance must be reconstructed on the basis of surviving scores, treatises,...

 field, who presently lives and works in Oxfordshire

Oxfordshire

Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....

.

He was the leader of the 1970s band Windsong

Windsong (band)

Windsong were a British folk-rock band of the 1970s, best known as one of the groups in which Annie Lennox was involved before becoming famous with The Tourists and the Eurythmics....

, which featured Annie Lennox

Annie Lennox

Annie Lennox, OBE , born Ann Lennox, is a Scottish singer-songwriter, political activist and philanthropist. After achieving minor success in the late 1970s with The Tourists, with fellow musician David A...

 prior to her involvement with The Tourists

The Tourists

The Tourists were a British rock and pop band, but are better known for two of their members who went on to achieve great success as Eurythmics...

 and fame with the Eurythmics

Eurythmics

Eurythmics were a British pop rock duo, formed in 1980, currently disbanded, but known to reunite from time to time. Consisting of members Annie Lennox and David A...

. Subsequently he played in a duo with fiddler David Favis-Mortlock

David Favis-Mortlock

Dr David T. Favis-Mortlock is an English geomorphologist and musician.Born David Mortlock on 27 August 1953, he grew up in Barking, Essex, later moving to Basildon New Town. He studied environmental sciences at Lancaster University, graduating in 1975...

 as 'Mortlock and Underwood'.

He plays and teaches guitar

Guitar

The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

, harmonica

Harmonica

The harmonica, also called harp, French harp, blues harp, and mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used primarily in blues and American folk music, jazz, country, and rock and roll. It is played by blowing air into it or drawing air out by placing lips over individual holes or multiple holes...

, and lute

Lute

Lute can refer generally to any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back, or more specifically to an instrument from the family of European lutes....

. A strong interest in the cultural life of England at the time of Jane Austen

Jane Austen

Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...

 has led him to establish an Austen group in Oxford, and to team up with Gillian Tunley in a performing duo called 'Austentation'.

Underwood was commissioned to write and perform music to honour the 1980s UK visit of Bishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

, and has become known as a performer at festivals and cultural events in Oxfordshire.

External links

http://www.follybridge.com - re. his recent recordings and appearances.

http://www.janeaustenproject.org

http://www.austentation.org