Stuart Elliott (drummer)

Stuart Elliott (born Stuart Alexander Elliott, 22 May 1953, London, England) is an English drummer, composer and producer. He was the original drummer for Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel and during his time with this band he became a session drummer playing for top artists such as Kate Bush, Al Stewart, The Alan Parsons Project, Roger Daltrey, Paul McCartney, Claudio Baglioni among others.

Elliott started to be interested in playing drums at the age of three by watching his father who was a jazz drummer. "Until I was fifteen, I was educated at St. Michael's School, Belgravia. Since then I have done a bit of session work, including a tour with Adam Faith and drifted through a number of rock bands until someone who heard me do a gig with a band called Monksilver mentioned me to Steve Harley. We soon discovered we could communicate on the same level, and having joined the band, I quickly realised that I had found my niche in rock music."

With Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel, Elliott enjoyed three top 10 albums including the number 1 single "Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)" and other 4 top 10 singles. In January 1976, Elliott went to Abbey Road Studios to play drums for Al Stewart's album Year of the Cat. After Steve Harley disbanded Cockney Rebel in 1977, Elliott was called by Andrew Powell to play drums on Kate Bush's first album, The Kick Inside. This would be first of the five albums with Elliott on drums as he became one of Bush's preferred drummers. "He's so easy to work with because he knows what I'm like. Occasionally I'll even ask him to use cymbals on a track now! He's been through that whole stage where I just couldn't handle cymbals or hi-hats." Elliott later on played drums on hits such as "Babooshka", "Running Up That Hill", "Hounds of Love" and "Cloudbusting". Between September 1977 and January 1978, Elliott went on to play drums on The Alan Parsons Project third album, Pyramid, which would be the first of 10 albums where he became part of the rhythm section, and he continued playing and contributed in the songwriting for the next three solo albums of Parsons.

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