Blondie drummer honoured by the University of Chichester

The drummer from New Jersey received an Honorary Doctorate of Music from the university on Thursday, October 20.

The award was in honour of a drumming project founded in 2008 by Clem Burke, University of Chichester professor Marcus Smith and Hatbury professor Steve Draper.

The project aims to find the physiological demands of playing ‘live’ during one-off shows (i.e. Glastonbury) and multiple gigs (i.e. World Tour) while also exploring the physical, mental and health benefits of drumming.

As one of the founding members of Blondie, Clem was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006, having sold more than 42 million records. Number one hit singles and albums helped cement Clem’s place in the Rolling Stone list of 100 Greatest Drummers of All Time.

As a member of the Eurythmics, Clem won a Grammy for his contribution to the song Missionary Man and has collaborated with various esteemed bands and artists, including: The Ramones, Iggy Pop, Bob Dylan, Pete Townsend and Nancy Sinatra.

He has won further critical acclaim with the Sky Arts access all areas music documentary My View: Clem Burke and is currently riding high in the charts with Blondie’s Against The Odds retrospective archive box set.

Clem has just finished recording Blondie’s latest album and has produced and co-written the rock opera Songs From The Big Smoke with talk of a West End musical. At the present time Clem is putting the finishing touches to his upcoming memoir The Other Side of the Dream (my life in and out of Blondie).