I am a highly experienced professional musician. Performing mostly on trumpet and flugel horn, I work in a wide variety of genres, most notably jazz and commercial music.

As a freelance session player, I have performed internationally with artists as diverse as Jarvis Cocker and Amy Winehouse, as well as commercial session work for TV and radio.

I also perform regularly (including backing vocals) with several London-based soul/pop function bands and also trad jazz and brass bands. I perform regularly all over the world with the Bollywood Brass Band.

You can also occasionally catch me in the pit of West End and touring theatre shows.

I co-run the Hackney Colliery Band (www.hackneycollieryband.co.uk), a nine-piece brass and beats band whose debut album came out in July 2011 on Wah Wah 45s. Check out the band's website or join our Facebook fan page - just search for 'Hackney Colliery Band' on Facebook.

I also run my own band, the Pretty Small Band, performing jazz, swing, latin, soul and funk tunes at countless private events across the UK and beyond. Recent venues include Claridge's Hotel, a residency at Soho’s famous Madame JoJo’s cabaret bar and at the Eurpoean premiere of Chet Baker documentary Let's Get Lost where the band was warmly recieved by personal friends of Chet Baker, including director Bruce Weber.

I have also spent a great deal of time performing as an actor-musician and MD/arranger for theatre.

In Spring 2009 I appeared as an actor-musician in The Hot Mikado at the Queen's Theatre, Hornchurch. Playing the part of All the Gentlemen of Japan, I also sang and played on-stage trumpet, flugel horn, percussion and piano throughout. The show got great reviews and I got a couple of nice mentions too:

'Steve Pretty was brilliantly corrupt in his sleazy All Gentlemen of Japan role' - UK Theatre Network.

'Steve Pretty made quite an impact...with the most remarkable trumpet playing not often heard outside Ronnie Scots’ place – a great addition to the team and so well-suited for Hot Mikado.' - Barking and Dagenham Post

In October 2008 I appeared as an actor-musician (and musical arranger/MD) for The Beautiful People by William Saroyan at the Finborough Theatre, London. This was a rare revival of this unusual depression-era play, and was met with much acclaim and sell-out audiences. It was also a rare chance to catch me performing on cornet and sporting some rather fetching woolen trousers.

From November 2007 – January 2008 I appeared as an actor-musician in Tale of the Beauty and the Beast at the Castle Theatre in Wellingborough. As well as singing and playing a disgruntled musician, I co-arranged all of the music alongside MD Stephen Brown. With more or less open access to the Royal Shakespeare Company's musical instrument store, I ended up playing an amazing range of weird and wonderful instruments during the show, including cornetto (medieval trumpet), cornet, french horn, glockenspiel, percussion, tabla, euphonium and - perhaps best of all - sousaphone!

In 2007 I wrote and performed in The Big Filling: This Time it’s Pie-sonal at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival (Underbelly), for which I also wrote the music (see Production/Writing). This show attracted outstanding reviews, with The Scotsman describing my film-noir style score as ‘toe-tapping'.

In 2006 I toured for 11 months with the Bill Kenwright musical This Is Elvis playing number 1 venues across the UK and Ireland to crowds of up to 3000 per night. As well as playing on-stage trumpet and solo flugel horn throughout, I also acted in the show, understudied one of the lead actors and sang backing vocals for many of the songs.

I also sing (strong high baritone) and play a number of other instruments, notably tabla, which I studied under Pandit Subhash Nirwan in New Delhi. I also have good basic piano and percussion 'comping' skills, and (at the moment very) basic guitar skills.