1964 Deirdre Cartwright's Fender Stratocaster Olympic White

Deirdre Cartwright - TV used 1964 Fender Stratocaster electric guitar, made in USA, ser. no. L21909; Body: Olympic white refinish, previously finished in red, blemishes and dings throughout, lacquer checking; Neck: maple, refinished, lacquer checking, original tuner hole screws dowelled, March 64 date stamp, some loss to original decal; Fretboard: rosewood; Frets: good, refret; Electrics: working, original pickups, original switch, 1964 tone potentiometers, volume potentiometer replaced; Hardware: generally good, replacement Schaller tuners, damage to one corner of back cavity plate, non-original string trees; Case: original hard case; Weight: 3.81kg; Overall condition: good for age

**Purchased by Deirdre Cartwright from Chandler's, Kew, London in 1980 and was the main guitar that she used on the first BBC TV Rockschool series broadcast in 1983. The guitar features on the cover and inside the Rockschool book 

Deirdre Cartwright is an accomplished British guitarist and composer. She was a member of 'Painted Lady', which later became known as 'Girlschool', which she left to form her next band 'Tour De Force'. 

Deirdre became well known presenting the BBC TV’s ground-breaking series 'Rockschool'. At this time she was also playing with Afro Latin Jazz group The Guest Stars, who recorded three albums and toured in 17 countries.

In 1991 she formed the Deirdre Cartwright Group and played international festivals from Mexico to Warsaw and recorded five albums. She has also written and recorded albums with the groups Emily Remembered and LUND.

 She has played with legendary jazz guitarist Tal Farlow, studied in America with Mick Goodrick, founded Blow the Fuse with Alison Rayner in 1989 and presented on Radio 3.

She has also written seven books on guitar playing and was head of the guitar syllabus for the Rockschool exam series.

More recently she has toured and recorded three albums with ARQ who won Best UK jazz group in the Parliamentary Jazz Awards and British Jazz Awards in 2018.

She currently leads the group PICNIC with Annie Whitehead, and plays with ARQ, Sea Change, Carol Grimes, Electric Landladies and regularly at Ronnie Scott's in Soho.