After graduating from Birmingham University with an honours degree in music, I started to work for the BBC as a studio manager. At the same time, I continued to play in bands as I did throughout my years at school. One of the bands was called "Tracks" which comprised of Roger Odell, Keith Winter and Trevor Horn who went on to international success as a record producer.

In 1980, along with Keith and Roger and producer Nigel Wright, I formed Shakatak. We toured the UK extensively during the early eighties and signed with Polydor records. In 1982 we had our first top 20 hit with "Easier said than done", one of the hits that I wrote for the band. Others include "Night Birds","Invitations", "Dark is the Night", "Down on the Street" and "Mr Manic and Sister Cool". In 1983, international success began for the band in Europe, America and particularly in Japan where "Night Birds" became one of the biggest selling international albums of all time.

As the band's success continued through the 80's, I released my first solo album "Famous People" in 1985. One song on the album featured Gary Numan called "Change your Mind" .It became a top 20 hit and also heralded the start of a successful collaboration with Gary under the name of "Sharpe and Numan".

Apart from working with Gary , I also found time to write with and for other artists all over the world. From Yusuko Agawe in Japan to Annabella from "Bow Wow Wow" in the UK.

As the 90's began , Shakatak and I found ourselves touring less and recording more due to the demand for recordings particularly in Japan. Our music was becoming very popular in America in the contemporary jazz market where we had two consecutive number 1 albums.

At this time, since the band's schedule was less hectic, I found time to start writing music for television which has remained an interest to this day. In 1996, through my consultancy work for Technics keyboards, I met the great jazz musician Don Grusin and after spending time helping with the design and specs for some new Technics products in Japan, we became good friends. In 1997, I had the time and opportunity to record my second solo album and asked Don Grusin to co-produce the record with me in Los Angeles. This enabled me to work with some of my favourite American musicians including Alex Acuna, Paulinho da Costa, Abe Laboriel as well as the great soul singer Jeffrey Osborne. The album was titled 'State of the Heart" and has received critical acclaim worldwide.

Don and I stayed in touch after recording this album and several years later we decided to record a joint album form our respective studios in London and Los Angeles. Don also flew over to the UK to spend some time mixing and finishing this project. We called it "Geography" as it was conceived and recorded in many different countries with musicians from all over the world.

In 2006 i released a solo piano album of my workings of the best known Shakatak songs.It was called "Close to my Heart". The idea was to show the songs in the format of conception as most of them were written on my piano at home and the recordings were done on that very piano in my home studio

2012 saw the release of my second joint project on Universal Records with Don Grusin. The album was titled “Transatlantica”.

In 2013 I collaborated with the bass player Jah Wobble (best know for working with PIL), and we released a jazz album called “Kingdom of Fitzrovia”.

The following year I produced and co-wrote a blues album with “Fast” Eddie Clarke best known as a member of Motorhead.

In 2016 I recorded a show at the Pizza Express in Soho, London, which was the 30th anniversary of my first solo album “Famous People”.The gig featured some of the artists who appeared on the original recording and some other stellar UK musicians. It was released March 23rd 2018 on Secret Records and also iTunes worldwide.

Since then and through lockdown i continued to work on several projects including an album with Leee John(Imagination) and also an album with the band i was part of pre Shakatak called Red Express.

Those album will be released in 2023 so check out my news page for details

I’m still touring with Shakatak and that seems to be going from strength to strength so as the saying goes; “The Future Looks Bright”.