Mark Knopfler
Mark Freuder Knopfler OBE (born 12 August 1949) is a British guitarist, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He was the lead guitarist, singer and songwriter of the rock band Dire Straits from 1977 to 1988, and from 1990 to 1995. He pursued a solo career after the band dissolved, and is now an independent artist.
"Knopfler" redirects here. For his brother, see David Knopfler.
Mark Knopfler
OBE
OBE
Mark Freuder Knopfler
12 August 1949
Glasgow, Scotland
Blyth, Northumberland, England
- Musician
- singer
- songwriter
- record producer
- Guitar
- vocals
1965–present
Knopfler was born in Glasgow, Scotland, and raised in Blyth, near Newcastle. After graduating from the University of Leeds and working for three years as a college lecturer, Knopfler co-founded Dire Straits with his younger brother, David Knopfler. The band recorded six albums, including Brothers in Arms (1985), one of the best-selling albums in history. After they disbanded in 1995, Knopfler began a solo career, and has produced nine solo albums.[1] He has composed and produced film scores for nine films, including Local Hero (1983), Cal (1984), The Princess Bride (1987), Wag the Dog (1997) and Altamira (2016).[2] He has produced albums for Tina Turner, Bob Dylan, and Randy Newman.
Described by Classic Rock as a virtuoso,[3] Knopfler is a fingerstyle guitarist and was ranked 27th on Rolling Stone's list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".[4] With Dire Straits, Knopfler sold between 100 million and 120 million records.[5][6] A four-time Grammy Award winner, Knopfler is the recipient of the Edison Award, the Steiger Award and the Ivor Novello Award, as well as holding three honorary doctorate degrees in music from universities in the United Kingdom.[7][8] Knopfler was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Dire Straits in 2018.[9]
Biography[edit]
1949–1976: Early life[edit]
Mark Freuder Knopfler was born on 12 August 1949 in Glasgow, Scotland, to an English mother, Louisa Mary (née Laidler), and a Hungarian Jewish father, Erwin Knopfler.[10][11][12][13][14] His mother was a teacher and his father was an architect and a chess player who left his native Hungary in 1939 to flee the Nazis.[15] Knopfler later described his father as a Marxist agnostic.[16]
The Knopflers originally lived in the Glasgow area where Mark's younger brother David was born on 27 December 1952. Mark's older sister Ruth was born in Newcastle, where Mark's parents were married, in 1947.[17] The family moved to Knopfler's mother's hometown of Blyth, near Newcastle, in North East England when he was seven years old. Mark had attended Bearsden Primary School in Scotland for two years; both brothers attended Gosforth Grammar School in Newcastle.
Originally inspired by his uncle Kingsley's harmonica and boogie-woogie piano playing, Mark soon became familiar with many different styles of music. Although he hounded his father for an expensive Fiesta Red Fender Stratocaster electric guitar just like Hank Marvin's, he eventually bought a twin-pick-up Höfner Super Solid for £50 (equivalent to £1,225 in 2021).[18]
In 1963, when he was 13, he took a Saturday job at the Newcastle Evening Chronicle newspaper earning six shillings and sixpence. Here he met the ageing poet Basil Bunting, who was a copy editor.[19] The two had little to say to each other but, in 2015, Knopfler wrote a track in tribute to him.
At this time, Knopfler got around the country largely by hitchhiking, and also hitched through Europe a number of times.[20]
During the 1960s, he formed and joined several bands and listened to singers like Elvis Presley and guitarists Chet Atkins, Scotty Moore, B.B King, Django Reinhardt, Hank Marvin, and James Burton. At the age of 16, he made a local television appearance as part of a harmony duo, with his classmate Sue Hercombe.[18]
In 1968, after studying journalism for a year at Harlow College,[18][21] Knopfler was hired as a junior reporter in Leeds for the Yorkshire Evening Post.[22] During this time, he made the acquaintance of local furniture restorer, country blues enthusiast and part-time performer Steve Phillips, one year his senior, from whose record collection and guitar style Knopfler acquired a good knowledge of early blues artists and their styles. The two formed a duo called "The Duolian String Pickers", which performed in local folk and acoustic blues venues.[23] Two years later, Knopfler decided to further his education, and later graduated with a degree in English at the University of Leeds.[24]
In April 1970, while living in Leeds, he recorded a demo disc of an original song he had written, "Summer's Coming My Way". The recording included Knopfler (guitar and vocals), Steve Phillips (second guitar), Dave Johnson (bass), and Paul Granger (percussion). Johnson, Granger, and vocalist Mick Dewhirst played with Knopfler in a band called Silverheels; Phillips was later to rejoin Knopfler in the short lived side exercise from Dire Straits, The Notting Hillbillies.
Upon graduation in 1973, Knopfler moved to London and joined a band based in High Wycombe called Brewers Droop. This group had issued studio-recorded material before Knopfler joined, and went into the studio while Knopfler was a member -- but Brewer's Droop material with Knopfler remained unissued until appearing on their 1989 archival album The Booze Brothers.[25]
One night, while spending time with friends, the only guitar available was an old acoustic with a badly warped neck that had been strung with extra-light strings to make it usable. Even so, he found it impossible to play unless he finger-picked it, leading to the development of his signature playing style. He said in a later interview, "That was where I found my 'voice' on guitar." After a brief stint with Brewers Droop, Knopfler took a job as a lecturer at Loughton College in Essex – a position he held for three years. Throughout this time, he continued performing with local pub bands, including the Café Racers.
By the mid-1970s, Knopfler devoted much of his musical energies to his group, the Café Racers. His brother David moved to London, where he shared a flat with John Illsley, a guitarist who changed over to playing bass guitar. In April 1977, Mark moved out of his flat in Buckhurst Hill and moved in with David and John. The three began playing music together, and soon Mark invited John to join the Café Racers.[26]
Musical style[edit]
Knopfler is left-handed, but plays the guitar right-handed.[77] In its review of Dire Straits' Brothers in Arms in 1985, Spin commented, "Mark Knopfler may be the most lyrical of all rock guitarists."[78] In the same year, Rolling Stone commended his "evocative" guitar style.[79] According to Classic Rock in 2018, "The bare-boned economy of Knopfler's songs and his dizzying guitar fills were a breath of clean air amid the lumbering rock dinosaurs and one-dimensional punk thrashers of the late 70s. He was peerless as craftsman and virtuoso, able to plug into rock's classic lineage and bend it to sometimes wild forms. He wrote terrific songs, too: taut mini-dramas of dark depths and dazzling melodic and lyrical flourishes."[3] Knopfler is also well known for playing fingerstyle exclusively, something he attributed to Chet Atkins.
Personal life[edit]
Knopfler has been married three times, first to Kathy White, his long-time girlfriend from school days. They separated before Knopfler moved to London to join Brewers Droop in 1973.[18] Knopfler's second marriage in November 1983 to Lourdes Salomone produced twin sons, who were born in 1987.[44] Their marriage ended in 1993. On Valentine's Day 1997 in Barbados, Knopfler married British actress and writer Kitty Aldridge, whom he had known for three years.[80] Knopfler and Aldridge have two daughters.[81][82][18][83][84]
Knopfler is a fan of Newcastle United F.C.[85] "Going Home (Theme of the Local Hero)" is used by Newcastle United as an anthem at home games. Knopfler also has a collection of classic cars which he races and exhibits at shows, including a Maserati 300S and an Austin-Healey 100S.[86][87]
Knopfler was estimated to have a fortune of £75 million in the Sunday Times Rich List of 2018, making him one of the 40 wealthiest people in the British music industry.[88]
In January 2024, more than 120 of Knopfler's guitars and amps were sold at auction in London for a total of more than £8 million, 25 per cent of which will be donated to charities. Included in the auction was the 1983 Les Paul used for hits like "Money For Nothing" and "Brothers In Arms." Knopfler expressed his desire for the instruments to find loving homes and hopes they will be played rather than stored away.[89]
