Fred Mandel

Fred Mandel was Born in Canada and became involved in music from an early age. Fred started playing the piano and age 4 and picked up the guitar aged 8.

At the age of 11 his family moved to Toronto where he became immersed in the local music scene being lucky enough to see many major sixties acts such as Jimi Hendrix, The Who and The Rolling Stones play.

Mandel made his first appearance on record courtesy of Domenic Troiano (whos band he was in at the time). Troiano was invited to record Alice Cooper's first solo record and got Fred to play keyboards on the record. This lead to Alice Cooper inviting Mandel to join his band the Nightmare Band. Mandel did this for four years progressing from keyboards to lead guitar and finally ending up working as the musical director.

Following his stint with Alice Cooper Mandel was invited to play keyboards on the Pink Floyd album The Wall and this was followed up by some recordings with Cheap Trick.

In the 1980s Mandel was asked to perform with Queen on their 1982 tour supporting their album Hot Space (the Hot Space Tour). This lead to Mandel striking a partnership with the band and saw him become involved with Brian May on his 1983 mini album Star Fleet Project, Queen on their 1984 album The Works and on the Freddie Mercury album Mr. Bad Guy released in 1985.

Following this relationship Mandel went on tour with Supertramp who where performing their last gigs with their original line up on a tour named the Final Cut.

Later on Mandel had a was offered the chance play with his teen idol Elton John, whom Mandel states as being "...to this day, one of the most bad-ass rock and roll piano players around!

Mandel has remained involved in music and has again worked with Supertramp and other in the studio as a session musician as well as continuing to play live and is currently working towards recording his own solo album.

External Links

http://www.myspace.com/fredmandel