As with others with enforced time on their hands, Harry Waters (son of Roger, of course) who most of you will know from things like touring in Roger's band for some fifteen years, has been keeping himself busy.

For those who aren't aware of his own work, Harry has been much in demand both for performing with other musicians (including David Gilmour, Eddie Vedder, Nick Cave and Marianne Faithfull) but for his TV, film and advertisement music. He also has a band with Larry John McNally who a number of you will have seen touring with Nick Mason's Saucerful Of Secrets - indeed, the video below (their latest song, Pompadour) includes some shots of them playing during that tour, with the Saucers staging behind them!

We know that a number of you are keen to explore the work of musicians who have been involved with the members of Pink Floyd (as shown with the feedback for Jon Carin's and Chester Kamen's music when these are released), and with the variety of music that you can find at HarryWaters.com, we're sure you'll have fun exploring it!

The Cambridge based Cheffins auction house, who sold the contents of Syd Barrett's home in St Margaret's Square, Cambridge, where he had lived since 1981, after his death in 2006, is auctioning a very rare artwork by him at the end of this month.

The painting, titled Orange Dahlias In A Vase, 1961 and signed R.Barrett, is currently in the possession of childhood friend Phil Harden, and will be sold off on May 27th. The artwork was created by Barrett when he was just 15 years of age, and was a mix of watercolours and pastels.

There were nine later artworks sold in the previous Cheffins auction, raising £121,000 to fund local art training. The estimated selling price for this newly revealed artwork is between £3,000 - £5,000 plus buyer's fees. We suspect though that this is a VERY conservative figure and expect the final hammer price to be a lot higher.

The auction house explains the provenance: "In 1957, Barrett began his secondary education at Cambridgeshire High School for Boys, which aimed to emulate the public-school model. As a student, Barrett was emphatically average and, to most of his teachers, remarkable only in his inability to follow the rules. To Gerald Arthur Clement Harden, the school’s art teacher between 1938 and 1971, however, Barrett was a conspicuous and prodigious talent and one of the very few pupils permitted to use Harden's oil paints.

"Painted when Barrett was just 15 years old, the present lot was gifted to Harden by the artist shortly before he left the school and began studying art at Cambridgeshire College of Arts and Technology. Although generally perceived as an unmotivated student by most of his tutors, Harden’s support encouraged Barrett to pursue further study in painting and ignited in him a passion for art that would continue to burn until his death in 2006."

To see the painting in more detail, and for more details of the auction, including how to bid, visit Cheffins.co.uk.

Coming next month (on June 11th - rescheduled from May 28th) is Still Wish You Were Here - A Tribute To Pink Floyd. Whilst there are a lot of tribute or cover versions of Pink Floyd material, this cover version of the entire album features a diverse set of well-known and well-respected musicians, taking in members of Yes, The Damned, Public Image Limited, King Crimson, Deep Purple and Genesis, amongst others!

If you cast your eye at the track listing below, we've listed the musicians involved with each song, and we're sure that some of the names will surprise you. Some of these have performed with Pink Floyd and Roger Waters at various points too. There's a rich amount of pedigree amongst the assembled players, and therefore, we weren't surprised when we listened to the album this week that the quality of performance came through clearly, right from the first track (Shine On Parts 1-5).

It was a particular pleasure to hear Rick Wakeman tackle Welcome To The Machine, with this keyboard-heavy song suiting Rick perfectly. Have A Cigar is fun too. Wish You Were Here works well with the assembled musicians, with Parts 6-9 of Shine On benefitting particularly from the combos of Bootsy Collins and Steve Hillage, and towards the end of the piece, Rod Argent and Ian Paice.

Here's the track list, with the names of the musicians playing on each of them:

1. Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts 1-5) - Geoff Tate, Steve Hackett, Billy Sheehan, Mel Collins, Geoff Downes, Ian Paice
2. Welcome To The Machine - Todd Rundgren, Rick Wakeman, Tony Levin
3. Have A Cigar - James LaBrie, Steve Stevens, Patrick Moraz, Rat Scabies, Jah Wobble
4. Wish You Were Here - Rik Emmett, Joe Satriani, Edgar Froese, David Ellefson, Carmine Appice
5. Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts 6-9) - Rod Argent, Steve Hillage, Ian Paice, Bootsy Collins

If this has intrigued you, orders are now being taken through the following links, which help us out with the ongoing running costs of Brain Damage without costing you a thing - and we really appreciate the help! The album will be available on CD in a 6-panel deluxe digipak, and a gatefold vinyl LP in a variety of colours (which we presume means is randomly allocated).

Today we have some more new music from respected guitarist Chester Kamen. We know that a good number of you have been enjoying these songs. Amongst many other artists, Chester has toured with Roger Waters, joining his band in 2002 and playing on subsequent tours, and with David Gilmour on his 2016 Rattle That Lock tour. He first played with David back in 1985 during the Live Aid show - David and Chester were both part of Bryan Ferry's band for that show (as was Jon Carin).

Chester has, like many musicians, kept himself busy whilst lockdowns and restrictions due to Covid-19 have called a halt to many things - in particular, live performance. In October, he shared his new piece of music called Take This, that runs for over 23 minutes. Chester told us that Take This is the first side of an album he is currently working on - following, or inspired by, the old Floyd blueprint of one long piece and several songs on the flip side. Since then we've seen the first few songs on the second side of the album: Brand New Day, Swimming, I'd Love To Turn You, Lover's Lane, and Come The Revolution.

The new song from Chester - Child Of The Damned - has just arrived, with what reminds us of an early 1970s Floyd vibe to it. Chester noted that there's "not such a band feel this time. Just me in isolation in Scarborough with a 16 track tape machine and some bananas for food..."

We'll update you as he progresses with the rest of the album, as we know from feedback we've had that the songs are proving popular.