Pete Thomas

Born in Reading and a graduate of the Newcastle College of Performing Arts, the first instrument that Pete learned to play was the guitar. In his early teens he discovered the bass guitar and subsequently the double bass, and these became his favoured instruments for live performance and recording. Nevertheless he is no mean player of the tenor banjo, mandolin and bouzouki and enjoys playing them whenever the opportunity arises as a change from being the “bassman”.

At the Derby Folk Festival - image by permission © Mark Steele 

His career started when he was still at school and he has performed for more than a decade professionally with many bands covering many genres: R&B and rock, English and Irish folk music, bluegrass, and gypsy jazz.

Pete is now officially a member of the Bluejays line up and is the established bassist for the Rave On performance.  Rave On is the quintessential rendition of that charismatic 50’s and 60’s era and performances are showing throughout most of 2026; the venues can be discovered on his gig list. Pete has always been inspired by the Rock and Roll music of the 50’s and 60’s and performed a great many of those numbers when he played professionally in a cover band as a teenager. It was as a pre-teen that he came across the Shadows music and enjoyed playing the famous Hank Marvin lead guitar riffs for fun but it was the subtle bass lines of Jet Harris that persuaded him to become a bassist.

The Bluejays had been invited to headline Rock and Roll performances on several cruise ship voyages in 2026 but there’s just two remaining, to Rotterdam and Tenerife respectively, in November and December. The band is always immensely popular on board and more cruise dates will be announced in the New Year.

It is worth mentioning two stand-out items by the Bluejays during the year, namely their performance at Bodelwyddan Castle in North Wales, which was livestreamed in August (see the Rock & Roll page) and their opening of the Movies and Musicals open air concert in Battersea Park, London also in August.

The Victoria Bass Trio has gelled together very successfully and can be seen four more times toward the end of the year, finishing once more at the Toulouse Lautrec Jazz Club just before Christmas; their performance there last year finished with a standing ovation. All details and venues can be found on the gig list page.

Paul Armer and the Dawn Chorus have had a very satisfying year, proving very popular at both the Yellow Moon and Didmarton Bluegrass festivals. Also their performance at Ebenezer’s Bar in Crewe in March was recorded with studio quality livestream and can be seen in total by searching on the Folk page. The band were featured in British Bluegrass News in July complete with an in-depth discussion with Paul and Chris Lord the banjo player and with a full-page picture of the band on the front cover; well worth a read.

Pete has also played with the London Bluegrass Band during 2026 but their Soho Union Club performance in London in September will be the last time Pete plays bluegrass for this year.

In April PM Warson officially launched a new single, with Pete on bass, by the magnificent blues singer Carmy Love, entitled You Gotta Understand/Thinking of Leaving. It was released as a 7” vinyl, the first pressing of which sold out almost immediately; it can also be streamed. Details can be found on the Discography page.

Gypsy Jazz takes less of Pete's time now but he is always delighted to play bass for the virtuoso continental guitarists when they visit the UK.

See the Discography page on this website for details and links for all the music mentioned above.

Click for pics/clips of Jazz, Folk and Rock & Roll/Blues

See also Pete Thomas's Instagram page and YouTube account.