Happy Birthday Steve! - Many remember Steve Ferrone as the drummer who came into prominence with The Average White Band playing on such classic albums as Cut The Cake, Soul Searching, Person to Person, Benny & Us, Warmer Communication, Fell No Fret, Shine, Volume 8, and Cupid's In Fashion but he had already been a very successful drummer in Europe for many years. He was born in Brighton in Sussex County, England and was partly inspired to play music by the records being produced by Motown. It wasn't long before Steve was very active in the music scene in Italy and France in addition to his studies at one of Europe's most prestigious music schools, The Nice Conservatory. It wasn't until 1974 that Steve joined AWB due to the untimely death of Robbie McIntosh and recorded Cut The Cake which was released in 1975. Until then, Steve was playing in such bands as Bloodstone and Brian Augers Oblivion Express. After many successful releases AWB, Steve left the group to pursue more recording work and has since proved himself to be a first call studio musician.
The 80's proved to be a great decade for Steve as he appeared on many great recordings such as Paul Simon's Hearts And Bones, Chaka Khan's What Cha' Gonna Do For Me, Duran Duran's Notorious, and releases by George Benson and Jaco Pastorius. Soon after, he begun touring with Eric Clapton and would hold the drum chair until 1992.
The very successful release of Eric Clapton's Unplugged and 24 Nights would be only a few of the major releases Steve would find himself on in the 90's. Steve found time to record with Jeff Goulb (Out of the Blue) and Bernie Worrell (Funk of Ages) before joining Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers for the Wildflowers recording and subsequent tours and albums after.
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