Calling all the local heroes
Jul 23 2008 By Pete Chambers
TOWARDS the end of next year, the stunning new Herbert will play host to a music exhibition that goes all the way back to the birth of rock 'n' roll.
Provisionally titled More Than Two Tones, it will tell the tale of music in Coventry and Warwickshire. It is planned to include many angles of this great scene of ours.
The team behind the project is working on ideas and concepts, all aimed to bring the whole thing to life. It promises to be spectacular, but partially reliant on what exhibits we can obtain.
This is where you, my Backbeat friends come in; I'm asking people to be part of this by contributing to the exhibition. Be you an amateur or professional musician, a player or a fan, in a band now or an artist in the past six decades, we are looking for your help.
So what are we looking for? Well, anything with a musical connection. Be it with a national, international or local connection.
* RECORDS: What would music have been without all that lovely black flat vinyl? Yes long before we had the curse of the innocuous MP3, music had a bit of a fun factor about it, even in its packaging. I for one, recall the ride home with that new LP. Delicately removing the inner sleeve from the cover, and the joy of discovering that a lyric sheet was included.
So now is the time to drag out that almost-forgotten record box, and find that special album. We are not looking for your common garden LP, EP or single. We want something that has a tale behind it. Maybe it was your band on the disc, or as a fan you met the record's artists and got it signed.
* POSTERS: Probably the most highly-priced music collectible these days. I've seen Beatles posters outselling a complete set of the Fab Four's signatures. The very essence of a poster was to promote that one-off event, then discard it. The clever ones did no such thing, and hey presto, a collectible is born.
I have a few local posters in my collection, Covaid, Blitz Kreig Zone 2020 and Attrition. You may have one from a Coventry Theatre show, or Tiffany's, or even more exciting from the Orchid Ballroom. Remember, it doesn't have to be advertising a local artist; the exhibition will focus on any music that has a connection with the area. Including acts that played the city.
* CLOTHING: This is always an exciting one, you can roughly deduce what records and posters are likely to be available. Not so with clothing. Already we have pledges of some very interesting items. Such as Paul King's famous red suit, an amazing military-style coat from Edgar Broughton, and Tom Long has offered us the chance of borrowing his blue Gino of Will Brookes tailored stage jacket he wore when he was a member of the hit Rugby band Pinkerton's Assorted Colours.
You may have an original teddy boy drape coat, or have kept hold of your stage costumes, or even some 70s platform shoes that you wore to a gig. We are looking for many types of interesting clothing - male or female.
AWARDS: An interesting one; I'm talking about gold discs and the like.
I know that we already have people such as Coventry's Mark Rattray who is happy to loan his precious Opportunity Knocks Trophy. Cov legend Hazel O'Connor has pledged the loan of gold discs and her Best Soundtrack BAFTA she got for the Breaking Glass movie. Producer Roger Lomas is on the committee, so we may even get to exhibit the Grammy award he won for his production of the Lee Perry album Jamaican ET.
* EPHEMERAL ITEMS: Literally means lasting just one day. Like posters, this section will include throwaway items that never were thrown away, such as flyers, hand-bills, postcards, business cards and ticket stubs.
* PHOTOGRAPHS: The key to any exhibition. I'm happy to have a large picture collection of local music as part of my job as a local music historian. Though many of those images have already been seen, and I'm excited by what other photographs exist out there. So now's the time to get the photo box out, and have a good look at what you may have.
* INSTRUMENTS: Grand pianos and church organs don't really fit this bill. Guitars certainly do though, and maybe an odd drum kit (or a bass drum at least). Some may have concerns at lending such precious irreplaceable items. The Herbert has assured us that, as always, all items will be stored securely and will be well looked after in gallery conditions.
* GO ON SURPRISE US: Above is a broad outline of what we are likely to see, what we really want is the public to surprise us. To offer something we had never thought of.
I have every faith in the great Coventry public and I know we are going to get at least a few items in this category.
So what happens next? OK, what we want right now is a rough description of the item (or even better a photo), please don't send anything in at this stage. Letters can be addressed to me: Pete Chambers, at the Coventry Telegraph, Corporation Street, Coventry, CV1 1FP, or via my e-mail at tencton@hotmail.com
Delia Derbyshire famously arranged Ron Grainer's Dr Who theme electronically and
produced the first form of modern
dance music more than two decades before it became a popular cultural phenomenon.
In Godiva Rocks, Coventry music journalist, Pete Chambers wrote -
"Delia Derbyshire was one, if not the most important pioneers of electronic music..Delia was born in Coventry in 1937. She attended Coventry Grammar school and went on to achieve a degree at Cambridge in Mathematics and Music. A perfect combination for her chosen career. Originally rejected by Decca records in 1959 because they didn't employ women in their studios, she went on to join the BBC's Radiophonic Workshop. Her most famous work was arranging a Ron Grainer composition - the Theme from Dr Who. Such was her ability though, Graiger was astounded to hear what she had done with his composition, asking her 'Did I really write this?' It is of course one of the most famous theme songs in history.
Throughout her career she was to mix with the creative minds of the 60's (Brian Jones, Paul McCartney, George Martin and the great Karl Heinze Stockhausen) The 70's (Pink Floyd, John and Yoko, Jimi Hendrix). Right up to the new breed of electro artists with her influences on such forward thinking artists as Sonic Boom and the Chemical Brothers. her two most definative releases are : An Electric Storm (1969) under the name White Noise (released on Island Records, the world's first all electronic group) and BBC Radiophonic Music 1971. Delia sadly passed away in Northampton 2001 aged 64. Her legacy lives."
More recently Delia, who struggled for recognition of her talent, has at last been been celebrated in the media with the discovery of some of her lost works. On July 18th 2008 the Guardian ran this article Here claiming -
"A long-lost collection of tapes representing the legacy of the musical genius who arranged the Doctor Who theme has been rescued from irreversible decay by a team of academic musicologists."
"Her experimental work fell out of fashion following the advent of the synthesizer but, in recent years, she has enjoyed a revival of interest especially among bands like The Chemical Brothers and Portishead to whom she is a legendary figure."
The Guardian tells us that a collection of 267 tapes, correspondence and scores were found.
"The material had languished unheard for 30 years until it was passed to Manchester University’s School of Art, Histories and Culture to catalogue and preserve. The material, in poor condition, had to be played on a 1960s Studer A80 tape machine lent by the BBC’s Manchester studios before it could be digitised."
"Ms Derbyshire was also a woman of her times, clad in Biba or Mary Quant, her hair in a Vidal Sassoon bob, a fixture at the parties of Swinging London where she was known for her chaotic but exuberant love life. She worked with Brian Jones, the late member of the Rolling Stones, Yoko Ono and Jimi Hendrix and met Paul McCartney to discuss an opportunity to work on Yesterday"
"She left the BBC a disillusioned woman. She and struggled with drink and a series of unsuitable jobs, including radio
operator. At one time she married an out-of-work miner but eventually settled in the Midlands where she lived in relative obscurity and would rail, between drinks, against her lack of critical recognition."
"The composer, who always kept a book of logarithms in her back pocket, used a combination of musique concrete techniques including the tape manipulation and electronic gadgetry to create her sounds. Her favourite instrument was a green lampshade which she would strike and then manipulate the resulting sound to achieve the desired effect."
The BBC News site have uploaded examples of Delia's earlier work including a piece from the late 60's that is a proto dance music track.
BBC achive of rare Delia Derbyshire sound bites
"A hidden hoard of recordings made by the electronic music pioneer behind the Doctor Who theme has been revealed
- including a dance track 20 years ahead of its time.
Delia Derbyshire was working in the BBC's Radiophonic Workshop in 1963 when she was given the score for a theme tune to a new science fiction series.
She turned those dots on a page into the swirling, shimmering Doctor Who title music - although it is the score's author, Ron Grainer, who is credited as the composer
Most unexpected of all, however, is a piece of music that sounds like a contemporary dance track which was recorded, it is believed, in the late sixties." Here is a direct link to the dance track - Delia's Dance Track from the late 60's
From this biography site Delia Derbyshire Bio we read - "she created by
recording the individual notes onto bits of tape and then assembling the song by hand. On hearing the finished piece, Grainer asked: "Did I really write this?" "Most of it," Delia replied. Yet despite Grainer's
In 1966 she formed the group Unit Delta Plus with Brian Hodgson and Peter Zinovieff. Though the group existed only for a year, they staged some of the earliest concerts consisting entirely of electronic and tape music. Famously, the group performed at the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave in 1967 at the Chalk Farm roadhouse in London, a four-day electronic music event which featured Paul McCartney's sound collage Carnival of Light (now lost in a vault somewhere).
In 1968 David Vorhaus enlisted Derbyshire and Brian Hodgson (also at the Radiophonic Workshop) for his psychedelic electronic music project White Noise, releasing the seminal album An Electric Storm in 1969."
From her Obituary in the Guardian -
"Among her outstanding television work, one of her favourites was composed for a documentary for The World About
Us on the Tuareg people of the Sahara desert. It still haunts me. She used her own voice for the sound of the hooves, cut up into an obbligato rhythm, and she added a thin, high electronic sound using virtually all the filters and oscillators in the workshop.
"My most beautiful sound at the time was a tatty green BBC lampshade," she recalled. "It was the wrong colour, but it had a beautiful ringing sound to it. I hit the lampshade, recorded that, faded it up into the ringing part without the percussive start.
"I analysed the sound into all of its partials and frequencies, and took the 12 strongest, and reconstructed the sound on the workshop's famous 12 oscillators to give a whooshing sound. So the camels rode off into the sunset with my voice in their hooves and a green lampshade on their backs."
Link to her album - Electrosonic
by Delia, Brian Hodgson, Don Harper - Glo-Spot
And a review
Review
ALBUM OF THE WEEK- Delia Derbyshire/ Brian Hodgson/ Don Harper- 'Electrosonic' LP
Something a bit special for those of you that care about the evolution of music. The force that is electricity revolutionised the ways that sound could be produced and there were many pioneers. Among these were the BBC's Radiophonic Workshop who were instrumental in creating sounds that never existed. Sounds from other worlds, planets, time and space. Among the equipment used to produce these strange futuristic sounds were modular synthesisers. Huge things with cables and twiddly knobs everywhere. Basically if you dig this kind of early synth stuff then 'Electrosonic' is an essential piece of musical history that deserves a place in your collection. The music is composed by some relatively unknown colleagues of Delia Derbyshire (The White Noise, BBCRO) nameley Harper/ Russe/ St. George which we're guessing are pseudonyms for Delia Derbyshire/ Brian Hodgson/ Don Harper. This was previously only issued by KPM in 1972 as on obscure library record. If you enjoyed the 'Tomorrow People' record on Trunk or like Pauline Oliveros' early work then I suspect you'll be wanting this gorgeous chunk of extremely limited green vinyl released on Scottish label Glo-Spot. I'm not even going to attempt to describe the sounds on here. Light years ahead of their time. Ace.- Ant x
Andrew Wagner's tribute -
Andrew Wagner's tribute and pop art painting
http://www.adrianwagner.com/awgalleryPopArtGallery.html
Delia was a guide and an inspriation to me in all the many years I knew her and I miss her more than I can possibly express. I met her at the age of 18 years and she took me in hand and pointed me at many directions in Electronic Music. She was a true genius and her love and passion infected everyone who knew her. This is a very special painting of her and, I hope, reflects her many dimensions in the prime of her creativity. (She his pop art portrait of her on his site).
Delia Derbyshire in the Scotsman
"Drew Mulholland, a Glasgow-based composer and musician who got to know Derbyshire in the last five years of her life. "She was a hero, a pioneer," he says. "She was a completely unique, one-off composer. Her stuff sounds ahead of its time even now, never mind in 1965. When you realise she was just beavering away at the BBC in Maida Vale with the most basic equipment, it is amazing."
Susan Mansfield
"WHEN THE DR WHO THEME MUSIC beamed out into the living rooms of Britain for the first time, in 1963, it began a
new era in sound. The unearthly whines, throbs and howls seemed to come from the future. In a way, they did. The great British public was getting its first taste of electronic music.
While the theme went on to become one of the most recognised in TV history, Delia Derbyshire, who created the eerie futuristic soundtrack, is virtually unknown. Yet she was one of the pioneers of electronic music in Britain. Among Derbyshire many credits is the music for a film by Yoko Ono.
Now the fascinating, often turbulent, life and tragic death of Derbyshire will be brought to a wider audience for the first time in Standing Wave: Delia Derbyshire in the 1960s, a theatre production being developed at the Tron in Glasgow by Reeling & Writhing Theatre Company, with a script by Nicola McCartney. Each performance will be followed by a programme of new electronic music composed in Derbyshire memory by Scottish contemporary composers.
Derbyshire was born into a working-class Catholic family in Coventry in 1937. She would later say that growing up to the sounds of air-raid sirens and the clatter of clogs on cobbles first awakened her lifelong fascination with sound. She studied piano to performance level and graduated in mathematics and music from Girton College, Cambridge.
She excelled, demonstrating an instinctive grasp of sound which enabled her to find extracts of orchestral music simply by studying the grooves in an LP. As soon as she could, she sought an attachment at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, created in 1958 to supply music and sound made with the day "new technology". Although the secondment was for a maximum of three months, Derbyshire stayed for ten years.
..........................
Link to the Radiophonic Workshop with Vid
Continued from Pt 1.
1986
King Torture 23 4 wks
Hits Produced by Stock Aitkin and Waterman -
Brilliant Love is War 64 4 wks
Brilliant Somebody 67 4 wks
Haywoode You'd Better Not Fool Around 82
Princess I'll Keep on Loving You 16 8 wks
Princess Tell Me Tommorow 34 5 wks
Princess In the Heat of a Passionate Moment 74 1 wk
Bananarama Venue 8 13 wks
Banarama More Than Physical 41 5 wks
O 'Chi Brown 100% Pure Pain 97
Paul Fearon I Can Prove It 8 9 wks
Paul Fearon Ain't Nothin But a House Party 60 2 wks
Mondo Kane New York Afternoon 70 2 wks
Dead or Alive Brand New Lover 31 4 wks
Mel and Kim Showing Out (Get Fresh at.. 3 19 wks
1987
Paul King I Know 59 5 wks
Coventry Cup Final Squad Go For It 61 2 wks
(The following are hits produced by Stock Aitkin and Waterman)
Rick Astley Never Gonna Give You Up 1 18 wks
Rick Astley Whenever You Need Somebody 3 12 wks
Rick Astley When I Fall In Love / My Arms Keep Missing You 2 10 wks
Bananarama I Heard a Rumour 14 9 wks
Bananarama Love in the First Degree 3 12 wks
Mel and Kim Respectable 1 15 wks
Mel and Kim FLM 7 10 wks
Dead or Alive Something in My House 12 7 wks
Dead or Alive Hooked on Love 69 2 wks
Pepsie and Shirley Heartache 2 12 wks
Mandy I Just Can't Wait 91
Ferry Aid Let it Be 1 7 wks
Debbie Harry In Love with Love 45 5 wks
Carol Hitchcock Get Ready 56 5 wks
Samantha Fox Nothing's Gonna Stop Me Now 8 9 wks
Sinitta Toy Boy 4 14 wks
Sinitta GTO 15 9 wks
Stock Aitkin and Waterman Roadblock 13 9 wks
Stock Aitkin and Waterman Packjammed with.. 41 6 wks
Laura Branigan Shattered Glass 82
Edwin Starr Whatever Make Our Love Grow 98
Steve Walsh Let's Get Together Tonight 74
1988
All About Eve Wild Hearted Woman 33 4 wks
All About Eve Every Angel 30 5 wks
All About Eve Martha's Harbour 10 10 wks
All About Eve What Kind of a Fool 24 24 wks
T'Pau Valantine 9 8 wks
T'Pau Sex Talk (Live) 23 7 wks
T'Pau I Will Be With You 14 6 wks
T'Pau Secret Garden 18 7 Wks
T'Pau Road To Our Dream 42 6 wks
Primitives Crash 5 10 wks
Primitives Out of Reach 25 4 wks
Primitives Way Behind Me 36 4 wks
(Produced by Paul Sampson or Reluctant Stereotypes)
(The Following are Stock Aitkin and Waterman Productions)
Rick Astley Together Forever 2 9 wks
Rick Astley She Wants to Dance With Me 6 10 wks
Rick Astley Take Me To Your Heart 8 10 wks
Bananarama I Can't Help It 20 6 wks
Bananarama I Want You Back 5 10 wks
Bananarama Love, Truth, Honesty 23 8 wks
Bananarama Nathan Jones 15 9 wks
Mel and Kim That's the Way it is 10 7 wks
Jackson Five I Want You Back (Remix) 8 9 wks
Stock Aitkin and Waterman SS Paparazzi 68 2 wks
Brother Beyond The Harder I Try 2 14 wks
Brother Beyond He Ain't No Competition 6 10 wks
Sigue Sigue Sputnik Success 31 3 wks
Sabrina All of Me (Boy oh Boy) 25 7 wks
English Football Team All the Way 64 2 wks
Mick and Pat Let's All Chant / On the Night 11
Hazell Dean Who's Leaving Who 4 11 wks
Hazell Dean Maybe We Should Call it a Day 15 6 wks
Hazell Dean Turn it into Love 21 7 wks
Sinitta Cross My Broken Heart 6 9 wks
Sinitta I Don't Believe in Miriclas 22 8 wks
Kylie Minogue I Should Be So Lucky 1 16 wks
Kylie Minogue Got To Be Certain 2 12 wks
Kylie Minogue The Locomotion 2 11 wks
Kylie Minogue Je Ne Sais Pas Pourquoi 2 13 wks
Kylie Minogue & Jason Donovan Especially For You 1 14 wks
Jason Donovan Nothing Can Divide Us 5 12 wks
1989
T'Pau Only the Loved 28 6 wks
Primitives Sick of It 24 4 wks
Primitives Secrets 49 3 wks
(The Following are Stock Aitkin and Waterman productions)
Cliff Richard I Just Don't Have the Heart 3 8 wks
Reynold Girls I'd Rather Jack 8 12 wks
Various Ferry Cross the Mersey 1 7 wks
Band Aid 11 Do They Know It's Christmas 1 6 wks
Jason Donavan When You Come Back to Me 2 2 wks
Jason Donavan Too Many Broken Hearts 1 13 wks
Jason Donavan Sealed with a Kiss 1 10 wks
Jason Donovan Everyday I Love You More 2 9 wks
Kylie Minogue Hand on Your Heart 1 11 wks
Kylie Minogue Wouldn't Change a Thing 2 9 wks
Kylie Minogue Never Too Late 4 10 wks
Samantha Fox I Only Want to be with You 16 8 wks
Bananarama Help 3 9 wks
Donna Summer This Time I Know It's For Real 3 14 wks
Donna Summer I Don't Want to Get Hurt 7 9 wks
Donna Summer Love's About to Change My Heart 20 6 wks
Donna Summer When Love Takes Over You 72 1 wk
Pat and Mick I Haven't Stopped Dancing Yet 4
Sonia You'll Never Stop Loving Me 1 13 wks
Sonia Can't Forget You 17 6 wks
Sonia Listen To Your Heart 10 10 wks
Big Fun Blame it on the Boogie 4 11 wks
Big Fun Can't Shake the Feeling 8 9 wks
1990
All About Eve Scarlet 34 2 wks
(The Following are Stock Aitkin and Waterman Productions)
Kylie Minogue Tears on My Pillow 1 8 wks
Kylie Minogue Better the Devil You Know 2 2 wks
Kylie Minogue Step Back in Time 4 8 wks
Lonnie Gordon Happenin' All Over Again 4 10 wks
Lonnie Gordon Beyond Your Wildest Dreams 48 2 wks
Loniie Gordon If I Have to Stand Alone 68 1 wk
Kakko We should be Dancing 101
Big Fun Handful of Promises 21 6 wks
Big Fun Hey There Lonely Girl 62 1 wk
Jason Donovan Hang on to Your Love 8 7 wks
Jason Donovan Another Night 18 5 wks
Jason Donovan Rhythm of the Rain 9 6 wks
Jason Donovan I'm Doin Fine 22 6 wks
Sonia Counting Every Minute 16 7 wks
Sonia & Big Fun You've Gotta Friend 14 6 wks
Sonia End of the World 18 7 wks
Pat and Mick Use it Up and Wear it Out 22 6 wks
Romi and Jazz One Love, One World 98
Yell One Thing Leads to Another 81
Grand Plaz Wow Wow, Na Na 41 4 wks
Sybil Make it Easy On Me 99
La Mood Ole Ole Ole 78
Errol Brown Send a Prayer to Heaven 78
Delage Rock the Boat 63
1991
Frank Ifield The Yodelling Song 40 4 wks
Primitives You Are the Way 58 2 wks
T'Pau Whenever You Need Me 16 6 wks
T'Pau Walk on Air 62 2 wks
(The following are hits by Stock Aitkin and Waterman)
Donna Summer Breakaway (Remix) 49 4 wks
Kylie Minogue What Do I Have to Do 6 8 wks
Kylie Minogue Shocked (DNA Mix) 6 7 wks
Kylie Minogue Word is Out 16 5 wks
Kylie Minogue & Keith Washington If You Were with Me Now 4 7 wks
Kylie Minogue (Vision Masters) Keep on Pumpin' It 49 1 wk
Hazell Dean Better Off Without You 72 1wk
Pat & Mick Give Me Some 53
Pat & Mick The Concrete Megamix