Tony Cummings spoke at length to one of the British Church's more unheralded musicians, RAY BUTCHER

After his King Pleasure sojourn, it was back to another spell with P&O Ferries for two and a half months. But it was all getting just too much. He admitted, "I thought, 'I've got to get a proper job. I can't cope with blowing these notes anymore'. It was just too high. I didn't enjoy the idea of just depending on playing for a living. It felt like I was weightlifting, and if you had a weak day that was your income gone. So I thought this isn't very stable, and that's when I decided to go into teaching for a bit, music teaching in schools."

Ray took a year out to do a one-year Postgraduate Certificate in Education. He explained, "I worked in a really tough inner-city school in Birmingham, which is where I was living. I lasted about a year there, it was a really challenging place." That was followed by a spell at another school, and three or four years passed. He had a deep desire to return to music. He explained, "All the while, I was praying about it but I still wasn't really finding, I felt like I had some kind of mission to fulfil, but I didn't know what it was. I was keen on the idea of going into ministry, but I couldn't really afford to because I had debts to pay off. And I think with debts, you want to clear them off first before taking on any spiritual job. That was what they kept telling me when I wrote to missionary societies and so on. So teaching kind of helped me get out of debt, but it's not an easy job, teaching!"

Quitting teaching in 2005, he recorded his album 'War On The Saints'. "I was learning to play jazz, trying to get my head around the language of jazz. And playing some gigs which were high, but not so many. Then starting to do a bit of supply teaching, as well, because that's quite good for money, it brings in a few quid. Eventually I got that album out there.

"There was a track called 'War On The Saints', another one called 'Agent Of Peace', another called 'For Those Whom Life Has Touched', you know, as in those who get really sad and depressed. That was a piano mute thing. And then 'Lamentations', which was about 15 minutes long, in three different parts. Quite morose, it was! The album wasn't particularly successful, but I thought I'd like to do another one. So I planned these songs and eventually I started to write them all down."

In 2011, Ray met a Christian lady, Barbara, who had two children from a previous marriage. They eventually married in 2015 and settled in Newcastle-under-Lyme. Ray was candid about their relationship. "I think she's frustrated it's not bringing in more money, but she's probably more the breadwinner than I am, to be honest. It's a bit embarrassing but it's one of those things. She can get a bit frustrated with that, but if I was in her position, I probably would be."

Also in 2011, Ray was contacted by a singer/songwriter who told him that he was in need of a musician to play "some Latino trumpet". Admitted Ray, "I didn't know who he was at the time. He said, 'I'm Martin Smith from Furious Music', and I thought, 'oh, right'. I looked him up; until then I didn't realise it was the same guy from Delirious?. So he's called me down to do this mariachi style trumpet for 'Back To The Start (God's Great Dance Floor)'. I went all the way down the next day to wherever he lived at the time, he lives in Brighton now but this was somewhere not far away, and went into the studio with a guy called Trevor who was engineering. So we did all this trumpet, and three hours later I think my lip was in as much pain as it's ever been in. They took about 12 bars or something for 'Back To The Start'. Then it led to recording with a few other names, his friends in that scene, such as Chris Tomlin. He just sent a file, from Trevor who sends it over to the States. It was in the same key so he didn't need to mess about with it. So that got used on Chris Tomlin's version of 'God's Great Dance Floor'. I've never met Chris or played in America with him. I think it's been played, but I've never been to play over there."

Today, Ray is able to get some kind of living doing a bit of supply teaching, teaching a couple of private music students and gigging as much as he can. "I'm trying to scale it down to the jazz quartet/quintet thing. Actually, I'm playing a concert in Hanley next month as a duet with a friend of mine called Edgar Macias. He's a really good pianist from Venezuela. I do a bit of solo work, I'm doing a thing at Totally Delicious at the end of the month. But I'd rather play with a full band and up to that level. I'm also doing some pop tunes with De-Tronic, from Manchester. They're really good, actually."

And future recording? "I've got loads of ideas but it's a question of finding the right format. But I am looking to do one quite quickly, maybe just the live jazz thing, and something a lot more instant with that. I might do some standards or I might do a couple of other arrangements, but it's definitely not going to take as long as getting 'Lions Den' out but of course I've got to make some money to pay for the recording! I do want to do some stuff with vocalists, and maybe more overtly Christian lyrics. I think there's something in that, but I want to explore the writing a bit more, as well as the playing. I like to keep things running in parallel."

Ray's albums are available from iTunes - https://music.apple.com/gb/album/lions-den/1477543733