Rick Wakeman Pays Tribute to Strawbs Bandmate Dave Cousins

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Rick Wakeman paid tribute to Dave Cousins, “a man who had a very great influence on my life.”

Rick Wakeman has paid tribute to Dave Cousins, who recruited the session keyboardist to join Strawbs in 1970, prior to Wakeman’s tenure with YES. The longtime leader of the folk rock / progressive rock group died on July 13, 2025, in hospice care in Canterbury, U.K., at age 85. Wakeman shared his thoughts on “a man who had a very great influence on my life.”

Wakeman’s July 14 post in its entirety: I first met Dave in 1969 when I was booked as a session piano player to join the Strawbs on the recording of their Dragonfly record through Tony Visconti. We all got on tremendously and I loved working with Dave and Tony and figuring out how to work in the best way possible to some of their weird and wonderful guitar tunings! Dave asked me to join them on some BBC Folk on Friday sessions which were great fun and shortly after, in April 1970, Dave asked me to join and the line-up changed soon after with Richard Hudson and John Ford joining, making Strawbs one of the founder members of “electric folk” or “folk rock.” Dave was determined to take the music to a new level and his songwriting and lyrics were just a joy to work with. Dave also introduced a Danelectro sitar guitar and used it to create the riff for the re-recording of the track “Where Is This Dream Of Your Youth,” which first appeared on their first album entitled Strawbs.

Dave had a wonderful gift of writing great melodic melodies which fitted his lyrics perfectly and were a joy to play on. I can remember listening to “A Glimpse of Heaven” for the first time on acoustic guitar as we sat in his cottage in Devon and he related how he had written the song on the cliffs at Sidmouth. It is such a beautiful song and in the 1970s I often drove to Sidmouth and sat on the cliffs with my Walkman listening to the track with a broad smile enveloping my face.

After I left the Strawbs, Dave and I stayed in touch and we shared many musicians including Chas Cronk (bass) and Tony Fernandez (drums) and of course two of my sons, Oliver and Adam, who both had spells with the Strawbs. I last saw Dave in Folkstone when he came along to the Yuletide show and I believe his last ever performance on stage was when he joined me at Trading Boundaries [in East Sussex] earlier that year and we did “A Glimpse of Heaven” together, totally unrehearsed I hasten to add, but it was a very moving and poignant moment for me and I’m pleased that it was recorded and filmed and here for all to listen to and reflect on a man who had a very great influence on my life. Dave now truly has a real “Glimpse of Heaven.”

Strawbs recordings are available in the U.K. here, in the U.S. here and in Canada here.

Cousins was born David Hinson on January 7, 1940, in Middlesex, U.K. Strawbs began as a bluegrass band with their frontman playing guitar, banjo, dulcimer, and other instruments. Cousins’ varied background includes a degree in statistics and pure mathematics from the University of Leicester. He also had a career in radio and ran an independent music publishing company.

Related: Musician deaths of 2025