BillF

Of course, there was far less available in those days, but it didn't matter as records were very expensive. An LP cost about a third of a student's weekly income! A typical collection might have a dozen items in it, so of course, you got to know every note! That's why you would put up with bad radio reception to hear other jazz from the Voice of America or American Forces Network in Europe. (The BBC didn't like jazz and at one time had bans on both boogie woogie and bebop!) No, I no longer own the records I bought back then. Keeping pace with the times in the last decade I've been using streaming. So my jazz listening career stretches from 78s to Spotify!

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I remember gazing at that album with its striking image in a shop window in Chorlton, Manchester in 1959 when I was 19-year-old student. It was probably brand new. American music took a year or two to reach the UK in those days.

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I saw Roland live at Ronnie's around that time and knew the rhythm section members well. (Sadly all now passed.) Gigs of course were in the evenings and during his seasons in London Roland liked to spend day time in Dobell's jazz record shop in Charing Cross Road. He almost stopped the business of the shop, leaning on the counter, blocking the narrow passageway and demanding that record after record be played. Turns out his favourites were by Fats Waller. (I guess that figures when you hear Mingus' "Eat That Chicken" on which he played.)

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