From David Bowie to Amy Winehouse: PR trailblazer to talk about 40 years of working with music's biggest stars

Jérôme Soligny, David Bowie, and Alan Edwards (Alan Edwards / Instagram)
Jérôme Soligny, David Bowie, and Alan Edwards (Alan Edwards / Instagram)

Alan Edwards, the godfather of music PR, is to lift the lid on working with some of the greatest rock and pop stars of all time from David Bowie to Blondie, from the Rolling Stones to the Spice Girls and Prince to Amy Winehouse.

In the intimate setting of The Arches in London – as well as at the Old Market in Brighton – Edwards will reveal some eye-opening tales of rock star antics but also give a unique insight into what made these legends tick and what it was like working with them.

In June, Edwards released I Was There: Dispatches from a Life in Rock n’ Roll, a memoir that covered his career which started in London during the punk scene of the Seventies – inspired him to set up his own PR company.

He worked with Bowie and the Rolling Stones for four decades, and it was while on tour with Mick Jagger et al in 1982 that he started making notes “as I figured they might come in useful”.

It was when touring Australia with Bowie that he “started writing in earnest” he wrote in an article in the Standard ahead of publication of the book.

He wrote, “It started to dawn on me that I was witnessing cultural history and that in the future people would want to know about it.”

I Was There: In Conversation with Alan Edwards is at The Arches, London Bridge on February 6. For tickets visit