Peter Lewis Biography

Peter Lewis was from Pontypridd, ( pronounced Pontyprith), Wales. As a teenager, he played music with friends but not professionally. He went to Bermuda as a health inspector in 1974 taking his guitar with him. He formed a folk band with a mish-mash of "Amateur" players, all of whom could have been professional. The Band was called "Magpi" consisting of Peter White, Peter Lewis, Keith Myerson, Pete Sumner, Mac Eddy and Avril Davis and they released one album.
When Rod MacKenzie came back to Bermuda the second time, he met them at the Bermuda Folk Club in Hamilton only knowing Peter White. As his residency progressed, Peter Lewis came in to play with Rod at the Robin Hood Pub and they immediately hit it off as friends and fellow musicians. Incidentally, he played Spanish guitar and had a weird way of dislocating his thumb to play. He could pick strings like no-one else could, or would want to! Then Peter White came in with his banjo and guitar and the "MacKenzie, Lewis, White" band was formed. They were playing in the summer of 1976, the year of the Tall Ships race. I believe there was a "Bicentennial" celebration going on somewhere! Jim Myers, who had just purchased the Up Country that summer with Gene Pelzar saw them play at the Robin Hood and off they went to North Conway NH, the following January. They played the Up Country for 3 months when their work permit expired and they went back to the UK eventually arriving back in Bermuda the following Dec. The band broke up after several months in Bermuda and went their separate ways but all based around the MWV. Peter Lewis eventually went back to Bermuda as a health inspector, meeting up and playing with Kevin Dolan at the Longtail Bar as well as Rod and Mike Bessette at the Rum Runners and later the White Heron.
Peter died unexpectedly in 1987 and the Peter Lewis Memorial Scholarship was born, the idea of Nancy Bartlett in Glen.