Toni Baker joined the Dakotas on keyboards and vocals in the early 80s, alongside two original members, Mike Maxfield and Tony Mansfield and they toured with Billy J Kramer in '96. Toni has a long history of working in hit bands: He played on Billy Ocean's early recordings & in the 70s was a member of "Shabby Tiger", a hugely successful group in Europe, with many hit singles, such as the No.1, "Slow Down". Toni, a session man for years, is also a songwriter and had a Number 2 hit in Japan with the hi-energy classic "Eat You Up". More recently he was also wrote and produced all the music for "Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights" and "Max & Paddy's Road to Nowhere". Toni continues his production work for major TV programmes including "Waterloo Road" and "League of Gentlemen".
A CD with much of his TV work - The Best of Peter Kay So Far - was released in 2005.
Pete Hilton joined the Dakotas in 1998 replacing original member Tony Bookbinder on drums. He is a well respected session player, and has been touring since 1963. In the late sixties Pete worked the Liverpool Cavern Club along with the guitarist Robin Hill. Pete and Robin went on to form jazz rock band "Spring". There were memorable live performances with Mike Oldfield, Joe Cocker, Canned Heat, Deep Purple, & Traffic. In the late 70s Pete worked UK theatres with many greats such as Frankie Howerd, Bob Monkhouse, Rolf Harris & Tommy Cooper! He also worked alongside The Supremes and David Essex, who inspired Pete to perform in "Godspell" while he was living in Canada.
Pete also starred alongside Toni in "Phoenix Nights" as a member of folk band "Half A Shilling".
As well as playing with the Dakotas, he teaches drumming and regularly appears at tradeshows demonstrating Roland V drums alongside colleague Pete Shaw. Here's an example ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErL6qTr1Nco
Robin Hill is an internationally renowned classical guitarist born, in Huddersfield, England. He studied at Bolton School of Music and later participated in master classes with Venezuelan guitarist Alirio Diaz. He is best known for his collaboration with legendary artists such as Luciano Pavarotti and has performed with numerous orchestrasincluding the BBC Philharmonic and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic.He has also played with Jethro Tull, Deep Purple, and now The Dakotas!
Eddie Mooney moved from Ireland to Manchester in 1975. During the 80s,Eddie was lead vocalist and bassist with Parq Avenue.
From 1989 to 2007, Eddie was the frontman of The Dakotas and toured the USA, Germany, Ireland and Sweden as well as the UK nostalgia and theatre circuit. In December 2007, whilst still with The Dakotas, Eddie was asked to stand in as lead vocalist and bassist with 60s and 70s British chart band The Fortunes due to the illness of original frontman Rod Allen. In early 2008 Eddie became a permanent member following the death of Allen and has been with the band ever since.
Eddie still re-joins his Dakotas pals for the occasional show !
