Meet the Live Sessions Team

Mike Davies

Auckland, New Zealand
Host

Mike is part of the Record Power International Team, working from the New Zealand office.

At the age of 16, Mike embarked on a 5 year apprenticeship in Woodcarving, continued his studies in furniture making, and became qualified as a teacher of Adult education. As a result, Mike has worked on commissions for Royalty, National trusts, public artworks, and private collectors alike. Mike is the author of Woodcarving by Numbers, and contributor for various woodworking magazines around the world.

These days, Mike is proud to be working with Record Power, and especially to have helped in the creation of their Internationally best-selling carving tool and educational package.

Mikes main focus at Record Power is to help support the International network of retail partners, with sales, marketing and demonstrations at shows. As international travel and shows have not been available lately, Live Sessions has been conceived to share the talents, knowledge, and passion of some of the worlds finest demonstrators with you..

Theo Haralampou

Brisbane, Australia
Demonstrator

I initially took up wood turning 23 years ago so I could turn my own drumsticks and make gifts for my family and friends.

These days demonstrating and teaching woodturning is my greatest passion and full-time endeavour. Apart from demonstrating throughout Australia and New Zealand at symposiums, club events and wood shows. I have also demonstrated in the USA AAW Symposium, on the Woodturning Cruise through the fjords of Norway and for World Wood Day celebrations and tours in China, Cambodia and Laos.

Theo enjoys demonstrating the safest and easiest way to sharpen tools, develop good tool control, and take advantage of the characteristics of the wood turn and embellish interesting, diverse and artful projects. Theo feels extremely privileged to be able to share his knowledge and experience with others.

Theo’s philosophy is that life is too short, so we should enjoy the journey, share with others and leave something to show we were here.

Click HERE to learn more about Theo’s Demonstrations

Andrew Hall

County Durham, England
Demonstrator

Born in 1961, Andrew has had a passion for working with wood all of his life. Andrews woodworking career started when he served a five year apprenticeship as a Carpenter and Joiner with Blue Circle Industries at Weardale.

At the age of 22 Andrew had the opportunity to teach apprentices at three colleges in the North East of England. After teaching apprentices Carpentry and Joinery for 20 years Andrew decided to rekindle his love of woodturning and has been teaching and demonstrating since 2002.

Specialising in making wood hats, Corinthian helmets and lately musical instruments turned on the lathe called Bluesbowls. Andrew also turns conventional bowls, natural edged vessels, platters boxes, and coloured sculptural work. When time allows Andrew loves to turn one-off pieces of artistic woodturning and plays his Bluesbowls.

Andrew supplies a small number of galleries with his work and manufactures bespoke woodturning made to the customer’s requirements. Andrew demonstrate at shows in the UK, Ireland and Europe, and also writes articles for woodworking and woodturning related magazines. Due to the challenges resulting from Covid 19, he has recently moved into the virtual world and deliver mixed medium Interactive Remote Demonstrations.

Click HERE to learn more about Andrew’s Demonstrations

Chad Schimmel

Phoenix, USA
Demonstrator

Chad Schimmel is a professional pen maker and owner of Turners Warehouse in Gilbert, Arizona. 
 
Chad began turning in high school and was quite taken with it.  After a short pause through college, he jumped right back into it when space allowed for a lathe. In the beginning turning fishing lures was his focus, but one day for reasons unknown he made a pen and entered the rabbit hole that would follow. Pen Turning, making new blanks, and creating new techniques was the goal. 
 
In 2013 he left his job in the corporate world and began selling his creations full time at art shows and online. In 2016 he decided to open Turners Warehouse, a woodturning and pen making store and supply website. This was a perfect fit and at Turners Warehouse Chad is able to help turners both new and experienced as well as give demos and teach classes. Chad gives 10 – 20 Club and event demos a year and teaches many classes at his store in Gilbert. Chad specializes in pens but also loves turning bowls,  ornaments and just about anything else he can fit on the lathe. He is an expert in resin casting, specifically for turning projects. You can find him on YouTube as well as a very active Turners Warehouse Facebook page.

Click HERE to learn more about Chads Demonstrations

Ian Symes

Brisbane, Australia
Support Crew

Ian Symes is an IT Project Management consultant by day, and chorister and woodturner by night!

Ian has been turning for just over ten years now, and enjoys challenging new works and varying materials. 

He is an active member of the Woodturning Society of Queensland, where he is currently going through a “Coffee Phase” creating Insulated Mugs and Tampers.  He loves the maths behind the designs, and creates many excel sheets for calculating dimensions.

Russ Brookes

Melbourne, Australia
Support Crew

Russ has always had a fascination of woodturning … seeing those chips flying about, then culminating in an object of beauty, but that interest kicked off in earnest about 3 years ago when he discovered a few American YouTube channels. One turner in particular, Al Furtado, left a lasting impression, as he revealed the hidden artwork within innocuous lumps of wood. That channel is still current, and goes by the name of “The Rebel Turner”.

Around that time Russ wondered if there were any Aussies present on YouTube, and that is when he discovered Theo Haralampou. Theo had just started his YouTube journey and was dabbling in live streaming. Theo and Russ struck a natural rapport and Theo invited Russ to become a moderator during those live streams. Russ has  been moderating for Theo ever since, both on YouTube and a short period on Twitch, and has absorbed well over 300 hours of  theory from the experience and has had plenty of laughs along the way.

Alas, Russ says that his practical experience has been curtailed by lack of space in which to run a lathe. However, that is finally about to change, as a project to re-organise his little workshop in his inner-city dwelling is coming to a conclusion. He  should soon be making his own chips fly!

Russ’ professional background was in IT, predominantly large mainframe operations, though he did start out after leaving school to pursue a career in electronics. That interest in electronics still prevails, and in fact most of current day technology holds a fascination for him.

His other interests include small woodworking and metal working projects, and tinkering with cars. Russ is an avid follower of Formula 1 and also his national sport, Australian Football League. When time permits he  likes to enjoy his extensive music collection or relax in his home theatre and watch a movie or two. Photography gets a look in now and then, as does astronomy, although the latter is rather challenging living inner-city with its incumbent light pollution.

He has many more interest’s beside those listed above, but from those you should conclude he enjoys science and technology. Russ thinks some might classify himself as nerdy … lol. One thing he has concluded though, is that in retirement, you never have enough time to do the things you love!