Biography

Don Clarke is a South African Singer-songwriter, born in Johannesburg in 1955. He grew up in Westville (near Durban) and was educated at Hilton College then Westville Boys' High. He set up a recording studio and supplemented his income writing advertising jingles and recording local bands. One of his songs, Sanbonani, became a local hit record for P J Powers in 1986 after winning the SABC Song for South Africa competition.

Don's first wife was a dance choreographer known for the floor-show cabarets and supper club theatre shows at venues like Ruby Tuesday, Millionaires and the Wild Coast Sun. Don produced original, sometimes humorous and raunchy music for these productions.

The band, Adult Art, was formed with Ronnie McNamara, Shaun Herbert, Wayne Rathbone and Dave Atkinson mainly as a studio band to record Don's songs. One album, Acoustic Flush, was recorded in New York and included his first hit song, Sanbonani. The band performed on the soundtrack of the 1991 Schuster film, Sweet 'n Short (1991). It disbanded in 1997, re-formed with as The Crutchmullets then worked on the 2010 film, Schuks Tshabalala's Survival Guide to South Africa (2010). Their first album ,Soccer Safari, was released in the same year.

In 2013, a Don Clarke/Kalla Bremer song, The Long Walk is Over, won Grand Prize in the Great American Song Contest and is now part of the memorial collection held at the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory Repository. In 2018, Clarke took First Prize in the Special Category of the same contest with 'Till You're Free Again. This song was used in the movie, Frank & Fearless (2018) The anti-poaching message in the film and the song reflect Don's passion for protecting wildlife.

An outspoken anti-hunting campaigner, Don has written and produced songs for South Africa's best known environmentalist, John Varty, The Matriach, and Voortrekker Weep are recent examples. Don is a prolific songwriter. He has written music for many films, examples are:Oh Schucks ..... It's Schuster! (1989), Kwagga Strikes Back (1990),Oh Schuks ... I'm Gatvol! (2004), Schuks! Your Country Needs You (2013), Schuks! Pay Back the Money! (2015), and for numerous artists over the years (in both English and Afrikaans.)

Don Clarke works from his home studio in Howick in the KZN Midlands, and continues to write, produce and record. He remarried in 2010. His wife is a founding member of the Drakondale Girls' Choir school and they have featured in some of his recent songs. His first book, Once Upon a Crutchmullet, is a mostly autobiographical collection of short stories released in 2020.
- IMDb mini biography by: Blogger