Duffy Power was born in Fulham, London, in 1941. When Larry Parnes, Britain's first rock impresario visited a Saturday morning teenage show in a cinema in west London to hear a band early in 1959, he also saw the young Duffy win a jive competition. He was so impressed when he heard him sing that he signed him up. He was 17 and had been working in a laundry.

Wearing leopard skin jackets and gold lame waistcoats it was said of him that he not only lived life in the fast lane, but with the throttle pressed to the floor.

Parnes had many talents as a manager, but picking songs for his boys to record was not one of them. Almost everything Parnes made them record was a dud or a cover of a version by a top American singer and so doomed from the start.

Consequently Duffy made no headway as a recording artist although his stage performances were stunning. It was while with Parnes that he met Dickie Pride and Billy Fury and the three became firm friends and even shared flats together.

Convinced he was never going to make it under Parnes' management Duffy parted company with him in late 1961, but things did not go well.

In his own words Duffy said:" My gigs as a rock'n'roll singer in 1961 were getting weaker. I was going out in blue and gold lame suits, but the girls' screams were dying out. I started doing a few Ray Charles numbers, but the money wasn't coming in - I thought I would end up back in the laundry."

One night he tried to commit suicide by gassing himself, but was rescued by a chance call from a friend, who took him to a blues club to recover and there, for the first time, he discovered the music he really wanted to play.

Teaming up with the newly formed Graham Bond quartet featuring Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce - two of the most exciting musicians the country ever produced - and John McLaughlin. Their version of the Beatles 'I Saw Her Standing There' recorded in 1963 remains a milestone of British blues. The Beatles thought the tune was changed too much, but Duffy Power remained their favourite British blues singer.

After working with another legend, this time Alexis Korner, by 1968 Duffy was out of work and broke again. Only this time his troubles were aggravated by drug taking and he succumbed to mental illness.

For a time he became a recluse, writing songs alone in his flat, but in the early 70s he had recovered enough to record some of those songs which later became classics of their type. At the same time he also worked as a session musician and played on the sound track of the classic car chase film The Italian Job.

In the late 80s Duffy began to emerge again, now veteran musician who had something to teach the world and now the world was beginning to listen.

When his records began to be re-issued on CD - Blues Power on See For Miles label - it is no exaggeration to say they were received with awe by a new generation, who had no idea that an Englishman could play and sing the blues, along with some R&B and rock, as well as this - and had been doing so for more than 30 years.

The only survivor of the three singers featured in Pride With Prejudice, Duffy has been a major source of information for playwright Charles Langley and a considerable inspiration as well.

Neither the playwright, or the actors, will ever forget an autumn afternoon in the United Reformed Church hall in Muswell Hill, north London, when Duffy held them spellbound for more than an hour as he recounted what life was really like on the road with Larry Parnes.

It was as if he had somehow switched on a couple of extra generators and the years rolled back, as he recalled those early days in a tour-de-force that left the young actors gasping at the power of his personality, his wit and his ability to tell a good story so well.

*Blues Power, See For Miles Records, is obtainable through Virgin.

*Pride With Prejudice is a Mighty Man production.