Barrett

Roger Keith Barrett as a subject in his own right, handled from the documented record only. There is no publicly available diagnosis, and every one in circulation traces back to a bandmate or a biographer rather than to a medical record, so this archive presents the competing accounts and attributes them: Waters has said schizophrenia, Wright blamed acid, Gilmour has said it would have happened anyway, and his sister Rosemary Breen has said he neither suffered from mental illness nor received treatment in the decades she knew him. He went home to Cambridge, painted, gardened, used his given name Roger, and died on 7 July 2006.

Part of Pink Floyd

48 moments in this segment.

  1. - Cambridgeshire High School for Boys, Hills Road. The Hills Road school, photographed around 1900, where Barrett, Roger Waters and David Gilmour were all pupils. All three grew up in Cambridge and knew each other well before London, which is why Gilmour's arrival in 1967 was not the recruitment of a stranger.
  2. - Syd Barrett - Interviewed By Meatball Fulton - London August 1967. Syd Barrett interviewed in London in August 1967, weeks after The Piper at the Gates of Dawn was released. Recorded interviews with Barrett are very scarce.
  3. - Syd Barrett rare interview in the early years of Pink Floyd. Syd Barrett speaking during his time in Pink Floyd. Very little interview material with him survives.
  4. - Pink Floyd with Syd Barrett, 1967. The four-piece with Syd Barrett, photographed in 1967 and printed in Hit Parader the following July. Barrett wrote almost all of the first album and the two hit singles. Gilmour joined as a fifth member around December 1967; on 26 January 1968 the band simply did not collect Barrett for a Southampton gig, and the announcement came on 6 April.
  5. - Syd Barrett, 1967. Syd Barrett in 1967, from a band photograph printed in Hit Parader the following July. He wrote almost all of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn along with "Arnold Layne" and "See Emily Play", and took the band's name from a sleeve note listing the Piedmont players Pink Anderson and Floyd Council. The two never met and never recorded together.
  6. - Syd Barrett's Cambridge House - 1981 to 2006. The house in Cambridge where Syd Barrett lived from 1981 until his death on 7 July 2006, painting and gardening.
  7. - SYD BARRETT'S BROTHER IN LAW INTERVIEW 27/10/1988. A family account of Syd Barrett's life in Cambridge. His sister Rosemary Breen has said he neither suffered from mental illness nor received treatment in the decades she knew him, an account that sits against those given by his former bandmates.
  8. - The mirrored Esquire before the Interstellar exhibition. Barrett's mirrored Fender Esquire photographed ahead of its inclusion in the Pink Floyd Interstellar exhibition at the Cite de la Musique in Paris. Barrett died on 7 July 2006 in Cambridge.
  9. - News Report of Syd Barrett's Death (2006). Syd Barrett died on 7 July 2006 at his house in Cambridge, where he had lived for decades.
  10. - Syd Barrett (Pink Floyd) BBC Newsnight Obituary 2006. BBC Newsnight Obituary concerning the death of Syd Barrett. (2006-07-11) The Mudman do not own the rights to this video track nor it's audio track, it is uploaded for educational reasons only. See my channel for more Pink Floyd and thanks for watching.
  11. - David Gilmour - Arnold Layne (Featuring Richard Wright). Gilmour and Richard Wright playing Syd Barrett's first single. Barrett died on 7 July 2006.
  12. - Syd Barrett - death news - BBC TV - 2006-07-11. Syd Barrett died on 7 July 2006 at his house in Cambridge, where he had lived for decades.
  13. - Syd Barrett - death news - Sky TV - 2006-07-11. Syd Barrett died on 7 July 2006 at his house in Cambridge, where he had lived for decades.
  14. - Pink Floyd - Arnold Layne (Rehearsal For The Barbican 2007). From Madcap's Last Laugh, the Syd Barrett tribute concert at the Barbican in London on 10 May 2007. Waters, Gilmour, Mason and Wright all appeared, though not all four on the same numbers.
  15. - Pink Floyd - Arnold Layne (Live at The Barbican 2007). From Madcap's Last Laugh, the Syd Barrett tribute concert at the Barbican in London on 10 May 2007. Waters, Gilmour, Mason and Wright all appeared, though not all four on the same numbers.
  16. - Syd Barrett's first guitar. Barrett's Harmony guitar, shown with other early Pink Floyd material. He was born in Cambridge on 6 January 1946 and grew up there alongside Roger Waters and David Gilmour, which is why Gilmour's arrival in 1967 was not the recruitment of a stranger.
  17. - Syd Barrett 2008-10-31The City Wakes festival, Cambridge guided tour by David Gale. The City Wakes, a Cambridge festival held in 2008 in Syd Barrett's memory, two years after his death.
  18. - Syd Barrett. On 26 January 1968 the band simply did not collect Barrett for a gig in Southampton, and the announcement that he had gone came on 6 April. He was not sacked and he did not leave; the passivity of it is the point.
  19. - The Cambridge Corn Exchange from the street. Cambridge staged a season of events for Barrett's eightieth birthday year in October 2026, including a tribute concert at the Corn Exchange and a major exhibition of his paintings and drawings.
  20. - The Corn Exchange box office. Barrett trained as a painter at Camberwell College of Arts in London and went back to painting after leaving music. He died on 7 July 2006.
  21. - St Margaret's Square, Cambridge. St Margaret's Square in Cambridge, where Syd Barrett lived at number 6 until his death in 2006. He was not sacked from Pink Floyd and did not resign: on 26 January 1968 the band simply did not collect him for a gig in Southampton, and the announcement came on 6 April.
  22. - Blur's Graham Coxon on Syd Barrett. 's songwriting and its influence on later British guitar music.
  23. - The Regal, St Andrews Street, Cambridge. The Regal on St Andrews Street, one of the Cambridge halls of Barrett's adolescence. His sister Rosemary Breen has said he neither suffered from mental illness nor received treatment in the decades she knew him.
  24. - Syd Barrett's sister (Rosemary Breen) interviewed at her brothers art exhibition (London, 2011). Speaking at an exhibition of the late musician's canvases and letters in London on March 17, 2011, Rosmary Breen said her brother, Syd Barrett, could never understand why people put his brief success with Pink Floyd ahead of his lifelong passion for art.
  25. - Grantchester Meadows. The meadows are the Cambridge childhood landscape shared by Barrett, Waters and Gilmour. Barrett and Gilmour busked together in France before either had a record contract.
  26. - The River Cam at Grantchester Meadows. Grantchester Meadows, just outside Cambridge, gave its name to the Waters song on Ummagumma in 1969, a rural acoustic piece with recorded birdsong that sits oddly among the album's experiments.
  27. - Cambridge Corn Exchange. The Corn Exchange on Wheeler Street, built between 1873 and 1875 to a design by Richard Reynolds Rowe. Cambridge staged a season of events for Barrett's eightieth birthday year in October 2026, including a tribute concert here.
  28. - The Hills Road site today. The school became a sixth form college in 1974. Barrett was born in Cambridge on 6 January 1946 and returned to live there for the last thirty-five years of his life.
  29. - Inside the Cambridge Corn Exchange. The hall in use as a music venue. Cambridge remains the centre of Barrett commemoration, and a major exhibition of his paintings and drawings was staged there in 2026.
  30. - Nick Mason's Saucerful of Secrets - Syd Barrett's Influences. Nick Mason and Gary Kemp on Syd Barrett's writing. Barrett's songs are the core of the Saucerful of Secrets set, and this is the only place they exist as current live performance.
  31. - Flooded meadows at Grantchester. "Grantchester Meadows" opens the studio side of Ummagumma. Waters wrote it about this stretch of the Cam, and it is one of the few pieces in the catalogue with a fixed, checkable location.
  32. - David Gilmour - Octopus (Syd Barrett Cover from the Von Trapped Series). Gilmour playing a Syd Barrett solo song. Gilmour produced parts of both of Barrett's solo albums and had known him since Cambridge.
  33. - David Gilmour - Dominoes (Von Trapped Series). Gilmour playing a Syd Barrett solo song. Gilmour produced parts of both of Barrett's solo albums and had known him since Cambridge.
  34. - Nick Mason's Saucerful of Secrets - Syd Barrett's Stories. Nick Mason and Gary Kemp on Syd Barrett's writing. Barrett's songs are the core of the Saucerful of Secrets set, and this is the only place they exist as current live performance.
  35. - The Corn Exchange from Wheeler Street. Barrett trained as a painter at Camberwell College of Arts in London and went back to painting after leaving music. The 2026 Cambridge season put that work in front of the public.
  36. - The Barrett plaque, close up. The plaque records that Barrett lived here from 1966 to 1967, the period in which he wrote almost all of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn and both early singles.
  37. - Hills Road, Cambridge. Hills Road in Cambridge, where the Cambridgeshire High School for Boys stood. Barrett, Roger Waters and David Gilmour were all pupils there, which is why the London band was already a Cambridge one.
  38. - Syd Barrett's mirrored Fender Esquire. Barrett's Fender Esquire, its body covered in mirror discs, which he played through the 1967 tours. He wrote almost all of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn and both of the band's early hit singles.
  39. - Barrett's Danelectro 59-DC. One of Barrett's guitars, exhibited at Pink Floyd: Their Mortal Remains. Free photography of Barrett himself barely exists; the surviving images are almost all by named professionals whose estates control them.
  40. - The Cam in spring at Grantchester. After 1970 Barrett returned to Cambridge and lived there quietly for the rest of his life, painting and gardening. His sister Rosemary Breen has said he neither suffered from mental illness nor received treatment in the decades she knew him.
  41. - Have You Got It Yet? The Story of Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd (US Trailer). From Have You Got It Yet? The Story of Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd, the 2023 documentary begun by Storm Thorgerson and completed after his death by Roddy Bogawa. Its title comes from a rehearsal-room story about a song Barrett kept changing.
  42. - Have You Got It Yet? The Story of Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd (Trailer). From Have You Got It Yet? The Story of Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd, the 2023 documentary begun by Storm Thorgerson and completed after his death by Roddy Bogawa. Its title comes from a rehearsal-room story about a song Barrett kept changing.
  43. - Syd Barrett & Pink Floyd: The "Have You Got It Yet?" Story (Full Interview). From Have You Got It Yet? The Story of Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd, the 2023 documentary begun by Storm Thorgerson and completed by Roddy Bogawa.
  44. - Teaser - Ep.9 - Rosemary Breen on her Brother Roger 'Syd' Barrett (Release: November 3, 2023). Rosemary Breen is Syd Barrett's sister. She has said he neither suffered from mental illness nor received treatment in the decades she knew him, an account that sits directly against the versions given by his former bandmates.
  45. - Ep.9 - Rosemary Breen on her Brother Syd Barrett: „He never sought celebrity“. Rosemary Breen is Syd Barrett's sister. She has said he neither suffered from mental illness nor received treatment in the decades she knew him, an account that sits directly against the versions given by his former bandmates.
  46. - SYD BARRETT WAS MY FIRST BOYFRIEND. LIBBY GAUSDEN CHISMAN interview "He was an incredible boy". Libby Gausden knew Syd Barrett in Cambridge before Pink Floyd, and kept his letters.
  47. - Syd Barrett's sister Rosemary Breen Admits What We All Suspected. Rosemary Breen is Syd Barrett's sister. She has said he neither suffered from mental illness nor received treatment in the decades she knew him, an account that sits directly against the versions given by his former bandmates.
  48. - The Syd Barrett plaque, Cambridge. The blue plaque to Roger Keith "Syd" Barrett in Cambridge. Barrett returned to the city in the 1970s, painted, gardened and lived under his given name Roger until his death on 7 July 2006. His sister Rosemary Breen has said he neither suffered from mental illness nor received treatment in the decades she knew him; Waters has said schizophrenia, Wright blamed acid, and Gilmour has said it would have happened anyway. No medical record has ever been made public.
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