| Initially I was occasionally recording programmes such as Folk on Friday and Hancock's Half Hour off the radio via the small ribbon microphone, purely for my own enjoyment. These were often almost unlistenable too – FM clarity and stereo broadcasting were not available back then. I have, over the years, built up a large and important archive of field recordings of Hampshire singers, music and mummers plays. Some of them were made on my 1970s Grundig C-430 stereo cassette, others recorded on my Uher portable or my DAT. Great Oaks from little acorns grow! I, along with Steve Roud and Reg Hall, am the custodian of the Mervyn Plunkett collection of field recordings made by Mervyn during the 1950s and 1960s. These include unique and very important recordings of some of the 'greats' of English traditional song and music, among them Harry Cox, George 'Pop' Maynard, Walter Bulwer and 'Scan' Tester. I now own some 15 tape recorders of all different types including a professional Revox B77 MkII with 10.5 inch reels that runs at 15 ips and 7.5 ips with a variable speed. I use a Sony TC 366 4-track for the majority of tapes. This is more than adequate for general transfers as most tapes were recorded on domestic tape recorders at 3.75 i.p.s. The variety is necessary to be able to play all the different types of recordings that I am asked to transfer to CD. I also have a Casio Portable DAT recorder, which I now use for all my field recordings. Bought back in 1993 this brilliant technology is now described as VINTAGE!! I have made over sixty field recordings on my DAT. They vary from an evening of Blues with Pete Harris and Bob Pearce, played in a pub in Winchester to top traditional Irish musicians such as Danny Meehan, Sean Casey, Joe Whelan, Liam Farrell and James Carty recorded in various venues in London.
I take my tape recorder almost everywhere with me, like others might take a camera. I enjoy capturing the moment and being able to relive and preserve memorable events and great music. Sadly these recordings, although very important because of their social history content, are of little commercial interest although I have made 'one-off' CDs for some of the performers. |
| I have several projects on the go at the moment: I am working on a double CD (non-commercial) of material from the early days of The Balladeers – a folk group from Southampton consisting of Dave Williams, Pete Mills and Vic Wilton with occasional appearances by Mike Sadler (Gutta Percha) – from their earliest gigs back in the 1950s up until their 'hit' record: The Woolston Ferry. I'm part way through transferring to CD Master the original Master tapes of Forest Tracks and Andrew Smith's recordings of his father Bill. These too are non commercial and are purely of interest to Bill's family. Future projects include transferring Mervyn Plunkett's archive and the audio tapes/ interviews of the Roud/Marsh Hampshire Mummers collection to CD. Although this is a very expensive and time intensive 'hobby' I get great pleasure from using my skills, acquired over the years, to produce a finished item. So I'm sure that I will have plenty of things to keep me busy in the near future. Back to Top |
