Tim Rice-Oxley
Background information
Birth name	Timothy James Rice-Oxley
Born	June 2, 1976 (1976-06-02) (age 31) Battle, East Sussex, England
Genre(s)	Piano rock
Occupation(s)	Musician
Instrument(s)	Piano Bass Keyboards Backing vocals Distortion piano
Years active	1995–present
Associated acts	Keane

Timothy "Tim" James Rice-Oxley is the co-founder, pianist and composer of English piano rock and alternative rock band Keane. He plays piano, keyboards, bass, and provides backing vocals for the band.

Life and career

He was born in June 2, 1976 to Margaret and Charles Patrick Rice-Oxley. He went to Tonbridge school, Kent with his best friends at the time, Richard Hughes and Tom Chaplin. He had been close friends with Chaplin due to Chaplin having been born on the same day as Rice-Oxley's brother (also named Tom) – their mothers met in hospital as a result. He had piano lessons when he was a teenager but admitted to hating them and never practicing pieces because they were all classical music which he found boring. After his parents stopped his lessons, he developed a liking for piano and so taught himself how to play, mainly because of The Beatles.. Later, Rice-Oxley would give Chaplin after-school piano lessons. In 1994, he began studying for a degree in Classics at University College London, where Hughes studied Geography. Friend and guitarist Dominic Scott suggested to Rice-Oxley that they form a band and he agreed. The two asked Hughes to join on drums. While there, he met Chris Martin, who was creating demos at the time with Coldplay. Rice-Oxley was invited by Martin to join after listening to his piano playing during a weekend at Virginia Falls in Surrey, but refused in order to concentrate on Keane with his friends. In an interview in 2004 he admitted to being jealous of Martin's success with Coldplay.

In 1997, Rice-Oxley convinced Scott and Hughes to let Chaplin join the band. It was in this year that the band took the name "Keane."

During their stint in London (since c.1998), Rice-Oxley shared a flat with Tom in Stoke Newington and they tried to get money for rehearsal time.

When Scott played lead guitar, Rice-Oxley took on the role of bass guitarist and did fill-ups as bass was not really important in the songs they played. He composed the songs for the band along with Scott. On Strangers Keane comment Scott's style was "bluesy" and they didn't like that at all. Soon they started playing Rice-Oxley's compositions instead of Scott's composition.

When Scott left the band in July of 2001, Rice-Oxley started playing the piano, and ditched his "filling-up" image to become the driving force of all Keane songs. He continues to play bass; however now the parts are pre-recorded and are sampled in live gigs through an Apple Powerbook.

In 2004, he won an Ivor Novello Award for Best Composer of the year.

Tim was married in February 2005 in a low-key ceremony in which bandmate Tom Chaplin was best man.

In 2006, he contributed on the song, "Early Winter," on Gwen Stefani's second solo album, The Sweet Escape.

Currently, he provides live and studio backing vocals for Keane, except for the studio songs "Sunshine" and "This Is the Last Time" (Demo version) where he sings the lead vocals, as well as some Under the Iron Sea DVD demos.

Equipment List

Tim Rice-Oxley playing his Yamaha CP-70 alongside drummer Richard Hughes during the January 2005 Tsunami Relief Cardiff concert

More information here: Live and studio instrumentation

• Yamaha CP70 (Main Piano)
• Nord Lead 3 Synth (Synthesizer)
• Fender Precision (Bass Guitar)
• Apple Computer PowerBook G4 Titanium (For bass tracking)
• Apple PowerMac G5

Trivia

• His father, mother and brother are all medical doctors.
• His car is a silver Volkswagen Golf Mark IV..
• His favorite Keane song is "Fly To Me".

References

1. Keaneshaped - FAQ - About songs: The Way You Want It. Retrieved on August 1, 2006.
2. Q Magazine: Keane (July 2006)