RIP Brian Rust

[Tenor Freak]

I've uploaded one of Brian Rust's Mardi Gras radio programmes.

You can save directly to your computer by Right Click/Save Target As...

http://www.r2ok.co.uk/Mardi_Gras_1975-03-23.mp3

It's from 1975, long before I knew Brian. In those days I expect very few of the records he played had been re-issued on LPs, he was playing from his own 78rpm collection, mainly very rare stuff from 1920s US labels.

Thank you very much for this. It's 100% gold (and that includes the old jingles and adverts).

[John Wright]

Lat and Tenor Freak,

Ok, I'll upload one show per week for a while, say every Sunday, that way something for you to look forward to :)

I don't have playlist listings for the shows that I have, but for next week I'll try and find one that includes British band/recordings from the 20s/30s

[Lateralthinking1]

John - Looking forward to it - Lat.

[John Wright]

I've uploaded another of Brian Rust's Mardi Gras radio programmes. From 1974, it's mainly hot jazz on US 78's.

You can save directly to your computer by Right Click/Save Target As...

http://www.r2ok.co.uk/Mardi_Gras_1974-10-06.mp3

A full hour programme from Capital Radio, about 58Mb to download

[Lateralthinking1]

Thanks John - I am sure he always ended the programme in the same way so now we will get to hear it along with the tremendous music - Lat.

[Tenor Freak]

Thank you John


Downloading now....

[John Wright]

Another sound file from the archive of Brian Rust's shows for Capital Radio, this one from 1974, and particularly interesting as it's a selection of Brian's own favourite vintage music, including some hot British dance band recordings, and some non-jazz,

http://www.r2ok.co.uk/Mardi_Gras_1974-09-29.mp3

[John Wright]

Enjoyable as they are, that show will have to be the last one linked here. There are plans to gather together all surviving broadcasts by Brian Rust and make them accessible via a more appropriate site. I'll leave the three shows linked here, on my server for another week.

[Lateralthinking1]

Hi John W - I have just listened to the third one. Would it be possible to keep the second one available for a while longer? I haven't heard it yet. I was without a computer connection for five days last week which set me back a bit.

A lot of sweet music on this the third edition as well as swinging. The Choo Choo one was fun - Jack Payne and the BBC Orchestra. I liked the Al Bowlly track best. I think Brian must have had a Bowlly recording in most of his programmes.

Bowlly was an unlucky man, made redundant, found his wife in bed with another man on their wedding night, he was sadly killed by a bomb outside his flat following a decision not to accept an offer to stay overnight in town, and then on the headstone of the mass grave he was placed in, they spelled his name wrongly.

The jingles and the news are fascinating. The jingles which seemed so modern in 1974 still sound great but dated. The news is far less of a radio machine. Rather than being as now smooth and overly packaged, it sounds like a series of phone calls from newspaper journalists. There is more urgency to it and it has more humanity somehow. Ford, of course, did end up running for President in '76 after all and lost to Carter.

Finally, Brian says about the Artie Shaw recording - "just 37 years ago". The same distance in time, then, as that between today and the year the programme was broadcast. The young rock DJs of the period are the Brian Rusts of now!

[Rcartes]

Was it Brian Rust (or maybe Rex Harris) who said that "Coleman Hawkins might have amounted to a decent jazz musician if he had stuck to the clarinet"? His crime, of course, was that he played - shock, horror! - the [tenor] saxophone!!!

[John Wright]

Don't know about the quote on Hawkins.

Lateralthinking1,

Brian Rust compiled the first ever discography for Al Bowlly about 50 years ago and revealed to collectors that he didn't just make records with Ray Noble, Roy Fox and Lew Stone but there were hundreds of records he made with studio bands, uncredited. And over the years collectors have been listening to obscure records on obscure lanels and finding his vocals there, his distinctive voice has made it easy to identify him. So his total output is now known to be over 1000 recordings over about 14 years 1927-1941. Much of his output has appeared on 100's of CDs.

I 'published' the first on-line biography on Al Bowlly back in 1998, still here:

http://www.jabw.demon.co.uk/bowlly.htm

A new book biography was published end of last year by Ray Pallett, I should put those details on the page.

[Lateralthinking1]

John W - That is a tremendous biography you have produced. I have now had an opportunity to listen to the second Brian Rust show. Some familiar names - Earl Hines, Fats Waller, Coleman Hawkins and King Oliver who he often featured and clearly really appreciated - but as he said, it was a mixed bag. Who did the Rachmaninoff piece? Did he say Eddie Long? I am not very learned in this area of music as you know. I liked the Clarence Mitchell one and the ones by Miff Mole and the Little Moles and the Mills Blue Rhythm Band. And then there was that excellent curiosity piece, Robins and Roses, which I think was by Red Nicholls.

The news showed again how much Ireland was an issue. Wilson refusing to enter into a television debate because the political problems were "too grave and complex" was very interesting given what happened in 2010. Funny timing for the news - midnight - which seemed to imply that Brian's programme ran from 11.30pm. I find that odd because from memory all of Capital's shows began and ended on the hour. I think we heard in the commercials the voice of Tony Myatt and there was certainly Kerry Juby, Tommy Vance and Roger Scott. The latter was one of the greatest broadcasters of his era in my book.

Brian had a slightly old fashioned, rather literal, way with his presentation that had some echoes of wartime communication styles. He was well-spoken but not at all plummy like some you hear nowadays. At the other end of the scale on today's radio, we probably have more regional accents which is all very well. I often hear though in presenters a rather fake just-like-everyone-else, tone. It implies that radio should sound like everything else although it is generally so contrived that it comes across as an act.

By contrast, the Capital presenters then were almost classless, they had a certain radio-style voice that later came to be condemned, but we have had so much of the other stuff in the past twenty years it sounds fresh to me. It wasn't quite as transatlantic as I recalled, and had an amateurish professionalism rather than the professional amateurishness of radio presentation today. It was certainly more urgent sounding, less lazy, more clear in concept, and groundbreaking.

Anyway, John W, after that trip down memory lane - and it is fascinating how two eras have been brought back together with these recordings - I really do hope that you find a good place for all of the programmes Brian made that have been retained. I would certainly log onto that website so please post the details here when they emerge - Lat.

[John Wright]

I am not very learned in this area of music as you know.

I'll help you with the names.

Miff Mole's band was the MOLERS, he was one of finest white trombone players in the 20s.

Red NICHOLS was one of the top white trumpeters (jazz cornet) in the 1920s-early 30s, and played a lot with Miff Mole. Robins And Roses was recorded in 1939 near the end of Red's useful career, the song is a dance band tune so an unusual one for a jazz band, but they made the most of it!

The Rachmaninov piece was played by Eddie LANG, arguably the first of the great jazz guitarists, he made so many recordings that every jazz fan knew his name, particularly for the duets he used to play in band recordings with violinist Joe Venuti, and he accompanied many of Bing Crosby's early solo recordings, but died at the age of 30 in 1933 from complications after throat surgery.

Clarence WILLIAMS is one of the lesser known big names in early jazz, he was involved with the Okeh label and directed countless recordings for many black jazz artistes and bands, and his own band Clarence Williams' Washboard Five recordings are much sought after.

[Lateralthinking1]

Thanks John W and my apologies for getting the wrong Clarence. I really enjoyed the programmes and listened to them a lot more closely than I did at the time. I now have bits and pieces of knowledge about jazz from all eras and have a book from the library to help me to join some of the roads together. It is a bit like when I knew the Finsbury Park area well and Green Lanes a little bit and then years later discovered that they were virtually round the corner from each other. I couldn't believe how I hadn't known it before. Anyway, thanks very much indeed for posting these shows - I am occasionally dipping into the current jazz outputs on Radio 3 too as it is one of the areas of music I don't know loads about and I am getting something out of the learning. - Lat.

[Tenor Freak]

Thanks once again for the third instalment.