Jazzjet

Difficult to imagine but you're probably right. I can't recall whether I've shared this before but here's my Spotify playlist based on Rob Young's wonderful 'Electric Eden' book. Over 13 hours but some good stuff : Electric Eden Whoops, try this link instead : Electric Eden

There's an excellent collection of the British underground folk scene, 1967 - 1972, Witchseason and beyond, titled 'Dust On The Nettles'. Some well known artists but quite a few obscurities and unreleased items. If I knew how to upload images of the right size here I would but anyway here's the track listing : Disc One 1. LET NO MAN STEAL YOUR THYME – The Pentangle 2. WILLOW’S SONG (FROM THE WICKER MAN) - Magnet 3. COME ALL YOU TRAVELLERS - Wight 4. LOVE IS A FUNNY THING - Spirogyra 5. IMAGES OF PASSING CLOUDS – Gary Farr 6. PEEK STRANGELY AND WORRIED EVENING - Synanthesia 7. GLASS OF WATER – Bob & Carole Pegg 8. WINTER IS BLUE – Vashti Bunyan 9. WINTER IS A COLOURED BIRD - Comus 10. THE SEAGULLS SCREAM – Chrissie Quayle 11. STORIES OF JESUS – Clive Palmer 12. AMANDA - Steve Peregrin Took’s Shagrat 13. CURIOUS CRYSTALS OF UNUSUAL PURITY - Bridget St. John 14. ROSES FOR COLUMBUS – Mark Fry 15. TILL THE MORNING COMES – Dando Shaft 16. BLACK GIRL – Mary-Anne 17. THE GARDEN OF JANE DELAWNEY - Trees 18. WEIRDSONG OF BREAKING THROUGH AT LAST - Principal Edwards Magic Theatre 19. MINAS TIRITH – Oberon 20. PRISONERS, VICTIMS, STRANGERS, FRIENDS – Paper Bubble Disc Two 1. PILGRIM – Gerald Moore 2. RIVER LANE – Melton Constable 3. WAY OUT HERMIT - Moonkyte 4. ALL THINGS ARE QUITE SILENT – Steeleye Span 5. UPON REFLECTION - Heron 6. LOVE IS COME AGAIN - Parchment 7. STARGAZER – Shelagh McDonald 8. THERE ARE NO GREATER HEROES - Tony Caro & John 9. VISIONARY MOUNTAINS – Joan Armatrading 10. GLOW OF THE FIRELIGHT - Tuesday 11. SEARCHING FOR LAMBS – Warm Gold 12. SAMANTHA CAROL FRAGMENTS - Benjamin Delaney Lion 13. FOTHERINGAY – Fairport Convention 14. YOU KNOW WHAT HAS TO BE – Frozen Tear 15. MEANWHILE BACK IN THE FOREST - Hunt Lunt & Cunningham 16. FIRST GIRL I LOVED - The Incredible String Band 17. HALFDAN’S DAUGHTER – The Moths 18. THE MUTANT – Trader Horne 19. MEETING BY THE MOONLIGHT MILL – Dry Heart 20. HIGHWAYS (MISTY MIST) - Tyrannosaurus Rex 21. GABILAN – Duncan Browne 22. SAND ALL YELLOW – Kevin Coyne Disc Three 1. GARDEN SONG – Bill Fay 2. MUSIC OF THE AGES - C.O.B. 3. A SONG FOR THE SYSTEM – Everyone Involved 4. THE COLOUR IS BLUE – Country Sun 5. SILENT VILLAGE – Wild Country 6. WELCOME TO THE CITADEL – Marc Brierley 7. THE EVIL VENUS TREE - The Occasional Word 8. STANDING ON THE SHORE – Anne Briggs 9. KIND SIR - Agincourt 10. EAGLE – Mick Softly 11. ROSEMARY HILL – Fresh Maggots 12. THE HAPPY KING – Music Box 13. ME AND MY KITE - Fuchsia 14. WIZARD SHEP - The Sun Also Rises 15. SCARBOROUGH FAIR – Folkal Point 16. PRISONER – Marie Celeste 17. PATRICE – Simon Finn 18. GIRL OF THE COSMOS – Shide & Acorn 19. ELEGY TO A DEAD KING - Chimera 20. SILENCE RETURNS - Beau 21. ORANGE DAYS AND PURPLE NIGHTS – Mother Nature OK, here's the box set front cover.

Interesting to see Kate St John on the bill. With Dream Academy she had a hit with 'Life In A Northern Town', a tribute to Nick Drake. Her solo albums are wonderful though, particularly 'Indescribable Night' and 'Second Sight', neither of which feature on her Wikipedia page for some reason. There's a beautiful song called 'There Is Sweet Music Here That Softer Falls' on 'Indescribable Night' that's well worth seeking out on Spotify etc.

Thanks, Bev. I tend to overlook folk when searching for new music, despite the fact that I have a lot of it my collection (particularly the Witchseason variety). The Marry Waterson is right up my street and I'm also enjoying the Rheingans Sisters. Not sure about Stick In The Wheel though. Sounds like it might appeal to bearded hipsters in Hoxton (as opposed to bearded hipsters in Cornwall).

11 iPods? That prompts the same sort of question put to women on why they need so many pairs of shoes when they only have two feet.

Absolutely. I've recently spent around $7,500 on a decent audio/video system and I'm very pleased with the sound quality. However, I'm unlikely to want to upgrade further with ludicrously expensive cables etc. You reach a level where you're happy with the sound quality you have and, as importantly, the flexibility of the various sound sources you need.

I guess the thinking was - 'we've designed these incredibly ugly, huge pieces of equipment so why not improve things by finishing them off in the kind of colour usually found in a baby's nappy'!

I'd forgotten about the Borders on Charing Cross Road. I used to visit there quite a bit and usually ended up in the coffee shop. It's strange that nowadays book shops are inextricably linked with coffee shops. Grabbing a book from the shelves and enjoying a Grande Cappuccino is one of life's more civilised pleasures. I've just remembered that there was a good music book shop just round the corner on Denmark Street, called Helter Skelter (now closed by the look of it). I grabbed quite a few bargains there.

Whatever happened to Borders in Oxford Street? That was an enormous shop but it closed about 6 or 7 years ago (?). I can only assume it was caused by some corporate upheaval. I did come across a very good book shop in London a few years ago - Daunt's in Marylebone.

James Asman did indeed specialise in New Orleans, Swing etc but I remember buying Miles' 'Miles In The Sky' there. How we remember where we bought specific LPs over 40 years later is a mystery. I'm not sure I remember that store. You're sure it wasn't Foyles? Doesn't really fit with your description but it certainly had a lot of music books. Before its makeover (1980s?) it was ruled with an eccentric rod of iron by Christina Foyle. Most bizarre was its payment system which is accurately described in Wikipedia : 'The shop operated a payment system that required customers to queue three times: to collect an invoice for a book, to pay the invoice, then to collect the book, simply because sales staff were not allowed to handle cash. Equally mystifying to customers was a shelving arrangement that categorized books by publisher, rather than by topic or author. A quote of this period is: "Imagine if Kafka had gone into the book trade." In the 1980s a rival bookshop placed an advertisement in a bus shelter opposite Foyles: "Foyled again? Try Dillons".

The Collets I remember in New Oxford Street had the ground floor dedicated to folk and blues while the basement was Ray's jazz domain (what is it about jazz and basements). I recall the folk section was managed by a fairly fearsome woman named Gill Cook (you can see her in the photo on the blog). Actually, rather than fearsome she reminded me most of Candice Marie in Mike Leigh's 'Nuts In May' (now there's an obscure cultural reference for you!). Just down New Oxford Street from Collett's was Imhof's which was more a competitor to HMV but also sold equipment, styli etc. They had an incredibly relaxed listening policy in the basement record shop. I used to go there before I got into jazz and bought mostly comedy LPs as I recall. Things like 'Songs For Swinging Sellers', Victor Borge, 'Not Only But Also', The Goons, Hancock etc. The comedy market must have been been quite big then, something that seems to have pretty much disappeared today. The internet is a wonderful thing but it certainly seems to have destroyed the rich culture in cities like London of small, independent book and record shops. Imhofs

Great memories, Big Beat Steve. I had forgotten about the Chilton's book shop, oddly because I used to work just around the corner. I grabbed some wonderful bargains there including some discographies which I still have and a battered,original copy of Leonard Feather's 'Inside Bebop'. Plus I used to buy my copy of Jazz Monthly there - always used to prefer JM to Jazz Journal. And, of course, the 'Rare As Hen's Teeth' rack in Ray's. Even further back there was Collet's on New Oxford Street, where Ray ran the basement. I have fond memories of that basement as it was there that I did that rare thing - buying an LP on hearing it over the P.A. Twice in fact - Charles Lloyd's 'Forest Flower' and Don Ellis's 'Live at Monterey'. Back to Ray's and those great window posters - 'From Bunk to Monk', 'From Barry Harris to Harry Barris'.

I certainly remember those damp walls in Johnny Kendall's basement! My abiding memory though is of the turntables in the listening booths. They looked as if they had been sourced from the Flintstones, with an incredibly heavy tone arm which can't have done the LPs any good.

Those who remember shopping for jazz in London from the 60s onwards will appreciate these memories. First, Dobell's in Charing Cross Road. Loads of great photos and comments: Dobell's And a site dedicated to Ray's Jazz Shop, with loads of memories. Even a video of Ray doing the twist with lots of 60s art luminaries, Peter Blake, Pauline Boty etc ; Ray's

I certainly hope that the English fans join in and fully respect the Marseillaise. Regrettably, some of the more knuckleheaded fans usually seem to make a point of booing the national anthem of the opposing team.

Anyone interested in experiencing John Peel's shows from different eras might like to have a look here : The Perfumed Garden It seems he was still playing live sets by Family deep into Year Zero (1977)

As a Brit I'm not sure he shaped my world either but I think he did for a lot of people, mostly because the opportunity to listen to the music he espoused was so limited here in the UK. Radio exposure of his kind of music was pretty much limited to John Peel's shows, at least in the 70s and 80s. And in the 60s there were very few other ways to listen to imported US rock (Quicksilver Messenger Service, Spirit etc) except via his Radio London and BBC Radio One shows (unless you lived in London and were close to Soho where there were two import shops).

BBC Radio 4 documentary on Dylan's 'Highway 61 Revisited' today at 1330. It includes outtakes from the sessions that apparently haven't appeared anywhere before, including bootlegs : Highway 61 Revisited

I echo this completely, Bev. Have a very happy retirement. If you're like me, your time will be swiftly swallowed up volunteering (in my case at the Royal Cornwall Museum in Truro).

Interesting piece here on the need for tangibility of records versus the 'everything, everywhere' streaming model: I have seen the future of expensive hi-fi and it's not for me, I'm afraid

Listening booths were particularly important because a) you just couldn't afford to make a mistake in infrequent purchases of LPs and b) there was really no other way of hearing before buying. Radio at the time hardly played any pop outside the narrow mainstream and hardly any modern jazz. It wasn't until the pirates came along, Peel included, that you stood a chance of hearing anything interesting. In one sense the rarity value of hearing 'new' music added too the excitement of the times unlike now when you can't escape the stuff! There used to be a fairly decent CD shop in the main street in Newquay but I doubt it's still there. Haven't been to Newquay in years.

'The idea of the sweeping away of dinosaur Prog by youthful, virile Punk is interesting from another perspective - this habit of seeing music as the rise a fall of dynasties. What actually seems to happen is an enormous amount of continuity but what changes is the attention paid by the media and taste-makers. After all, Trad Jazz appeared to have died in Britain in the 60s (it still turned up on TV variety programmes well into the 70s). But I bet you could go into any British city (and many smaller towns) and find that music being played and enjoyed today. Sometimes what is written as the 'cultural' history of specific areas of the 'arts' like music is little more than the history of when the media paid attention. ' Generally agree very much with this. The rise of punk really coincided with the decline of decent music in the charts, ie Queen and all those dreadful 'novelty' records - The Wombles, Clive Dunn's 'Grandad', 'Matchstick Men', 'Convoy' etc. I suppose Queen could be loosely described as 'prog' but it was more 'pomp'. I suggest that punk was really filling a vacuum in popular culture at the time. The idea of continuity of different styles and cultures is very much the case. Another case in point is the 'Swinging 60s'. This 'revolution' was really bounded by an area roughly bounded by South Kensington, Notting Hill and Chelsea and there was very little evidence of it outside London. I should know. I was in the middle of it at the time. The provinces continued to be largely indistinguishable from the way they were in the late 50s/early 60s. Which is why, for most people, 'the 60s' really happened in the 70s. One other change that impacted the music scene from the late 70s onwards was that the industry increasingly became controlled by accountants rather than people who actually cared about music.

I use the iPod for the same. You can set up 'smart playlists' that play what you order it to randomly; and programme it to not repeat anything for a time period you select (1 year works for me). Amazing how you rediscover things that way. A song ten tracks into an LP that you don't notice so much suddenly appears out of context and you think 'Why had I not noticed that before?' The good thing about exploring a new genre (like classical in your case) now is that you can try before you buy instantly via a streaming site. Back in the olden days you invested what little money you had in your weekly LP - taking chances which didn't work out could quite spoil your week! On the other hand, you didn't half listen to that one LP. That's why we took the trouble to check out LPs in listening booths ( I have fond memories of Dobell's and their antique record decks ). Back in those days we had fewer LPs but played them to death whereas now we have so much music that we don't know what to play next.

Not sure how you feel about downloads but you might want to check some of the classical labels that claim to offer high definition downloads, some of which are supposed to to be superior to CD. Gimell, a label that specialises in Early/Renaissance vocal music, offers them in 6 different alternatives other than MP3. Have a look here: http://www.gimell.com/recording-Allegri-Miserere-Palestrina-Missa-Papae-Marcelli.aspx They also do 4 physical formats other than CD - DVD-Video in the NTSC format; DVD-Video in the PAL format; Pure Audio Blu Ray; Super Audio Compact Disc; and Vinyl though the catalogue is extremely limited there. Many of the classical labels are well ahead of the game in new formats. I recall an item on the BBC Radio 3 CD Review programme a year or so back where the presenters were getting terribly excited by some of these formats for their surround-sound capabilities. Gives me VHS/Betamax nightmares! You've probably seen a number of new download companies popping up recently aggressively promoting themselves as high definition purveyors (playing an "MP3 is dead" line). For example, Classics Online that I've used happily for some years, has recently reinvented itself as Classics Online HD_LL. There seem to be a glut of these starting up at present - can't imagine many surviving. And in the end whoever survives will probably be absorbed by Amazon! Have a look at the online physical shops too. Presto alows you to search on formats: SACDs; DVDs; Blu-rays; Presto CDs; Studio quality downloads http://www.prestoclassical.co.uk/ MDT and Europadisc are reliable too. I've used all three for DVD Opera purchases. You probably know all of this but just in case... Thanks very much for this information. I'm a relative neophyte as far as classical music is concerned so any guidance is much appreciated. My Dad was heavily into classical music while I was very much into jazz and rock so back then I couldn't possibly admit that I liked any of his records. However, we did agree to 'crossover' once and he came to a Charles Lloyd concert with me (Keith Jarrett et al) and I went to see Carmina Burana with him (this was when this work wasn't widely known). I've tried a few digital HD downloads (jazz) and they're fine but somehow I still prefer physical formats. My new equipment is at its best when playing CDs and, I've found, music on USB memory sticks via a port in the front of the Oppo. This latter feature is tremendous as I can create themed USBs, eg Miles Davis, Prog Rock, Favourite Albums etc and just let them play. Kid in a sweet shop continued!

Upgrading my system has made me buy some audiophile classical recordings: Elgar - Enigma Variations - Michael Stern & The Kansas City Symphony (Reference Recordings) Beethoven - Symphony No. 9 - Claudio Abbado & The Berlin Philharmonic (DG) Beethoven - Symphonies 5 & 7 - Fritz Reiner & The Chicago Symphony Orchestra (RCA Victor, Living Presence Remastered) Holst - The Planets - Charles Dutoit & The Montreal Symphony Orchestra (Decca) Not very adventurous but I can't remember the last time I bought classical recordings. Probably the wrong thread but any other audiophile classical recordings suggestions?