March 23, 2005. Copyright 2005, Graphic News. All rights reserved

Eric Clapton: ÒSlowhandÓ turns 60
By Joanna Griffin

LONDON, March 23, Graphic News:  No one sings the blues quite like Eric Clapton. But the British musician, who will mark his 60th birthday on March 30, has enjoyed extraordinary success as well as personal struggles in a career that has eclipsed those of many contemporaries.

Born Eric Patrick Clapton in 1945 in Surrey, England, the illegitimate Clapton was raised by his grandparents after his soldier father returned home to Canada. For years, Clapton belived his mother, only 16 when he was born, was his sister.

As a teenager Eric went to art college but by the 1960s he had discovered his true calling as a musician and guitarist, firstly with the Yardbirds, then John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers and the first ÒsupergroupÓ, Cream.

Nicknamed Slowhand because of his languorous guitar style and his habit of replacing broken guitar strings on stage to the accompaniment of slow handclapping from the audience, Clapton experimented with many music forms, including reggae, pop and rock. In the 1970s he enjoyed a hit with a cover version of Bob MarleyÕs I Shot the Sheriff, developing such a following that graffiti appeared in London and New York proclaiming, ÒClapton is GodÓ.

But his true forte remained the blues, the focus of his most recent albums including the highly praised 1992 offering Unplugged, which brought him a legion of new fans. The album includes the live version of his monster hit Tears in Heaven, written to express his grief following the tragic death of his four-year-old son Conor in a fall from a window in New York in 1991.

Having successfully battled addictions to both heroin and alcohol in the 70s and 80s, Clapton set up the Crossroads Centre in 1998, a rehabilitation facility for drug and alcohol abuse in Antigua to provide subsidized care for the poorest people of the Caribbean who could not otherwise afford such treatment. An auction of 100 of his guitars, including ÒBrownieÓ, on which he recorded Layla, raised almost $5 million for the Centre.

Meanwhile, Clapton himself appears to have achieved a level of personal happiness denied him in earlier years. He has a 20-year-old daughter, Ruth, and he and his second wife, Melia McEnery, have three young children, Julie Rose, born in June 2001, Ella Mae, born January 2003, and Sophie, born on February 1 this year.
/ENDS