Keith Summers (1948-2004)
[by Ken Hunt, London] One of my fondest memories of Britain’s specialised music magazine scene of the 1980s into the 1990s is how little ego and rivalry there was for the most part. There were a couple of exceptions (no names, no pack drill) and, strange though it may seem, not a single ornery person from that bunch stayed within music criticism. Keith Summers wrote about music, collected it (as in made field recordings of such as Jumbo Brightwell, the Lings of Blaxhall, Cyril Poacher and Percy Webb as well as later contributing to Topic’s multi-volume series Voice of the People) and published magazines about it. He had the fall-back trade of accountant that funded his passions.
16. 1. 2011 | read more...
[by Ken Hunt, London] Winter draws on in London but on the fictitious tropical island the sun is shining. Helping to banish gloom this month is a rather fine selection of music. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, this month’s haul of traveller’s tales embraces Martin Simpson, Ella Ward, Yardbirds, Shashank, Don Van Vliet, David Lindley & El Rayo-X, Rickie Lee Jones, Swamy Haridhos & Party, Cyril Tawney and Anne Briggs.
[by Aparna Banerji, Jalandhar City] Wintertime in Jalandhar gets chilly. If you have a wan sun by early afternoon, you’re lucky. The kites can barely get above the mists in Model Town. But there’s this big tree not far from the gurdwara where the guards smile and, in friendly recognition to strangers, do that little head shake thing. That tree is alas not a peepal or Sacred Fig but a koel (Eudynamys scolopaceus) flies there each afternoon almost unnoticed after the mists lift. (If you know the particular tree, keep quiet.) On the island there is no fug, no koels, no peepals. As you sup coconut milk through a desert-island straw, the only strains are lilting musical ones from faraway. 
[by Ken Hunt, London] An Evening of Political Song, explained the Southbank literature, “drew upon a rich history of political song” before, sigh, spoiling things slightly by lamely billing this night in Richard Thompson’s Meltdown as “a night of songs in the key of revolution and protest”. Still, mustn’t grumble, ‘political song’, as dictionary definitions go, is about as precise as ‘folk song’ in its handy one-size-fits-all solution to issues that just won’t go away.
[by Ken Hunt, London] The Polish revue artist, singer and actress Irena Anders, born Irena Renata Jarosiewicz on 12 May 1920 in Bruntál, in what is nowadays the Czech Republic, went under the stage name of Renata Bogdańska. Her father was a Rutherian pastor while her mother came from the Polish gentry. She studied music formally at the National Academy of Music in Lviv. The invasion of Poland in September 1939 put paid to her studies and over the next few years the tides of war and the various fortunes of Poland, its citizens and army determined her own life’s course.
[by Ken Hunt, London] The year started brilliantly, thanks to the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Then nothing much seemed to happen for the longest while – well, a month or so – and then the sluice gates opened and a wonderful year’s musical experiences began pouring out. It did, however, prove a disappointing year for quality new recordings of Indian music.
[by Ken Hunt, London] Winter draws on in London but on the fictitious tropical island the sun is shining. Helping to banish gloom this month is a rather fine selection of music. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, this month’s haul of traveller’s tales embraces Methera, Amy Rigby, Ida Kelarova, the Hallé Orchestra under Mark Elder, Dave Bartholomew, Bonnie Raitt & Was (Not Was), the Oysterband, Alim and Fargana Qasimov, The Byrds and Czech Philharmonic Orchestra under Rafael Kubelík.
[by Ken Hunt, London] “Ten years ago on a cold dark night/Someone was killed ‘neath the town hall lights./There were few at the scene, but they all did agree/that the man who ran looked a lot like me.”
[by Aparna Banerji, Jalandhar City] For this month’s super ten I start with Shubha Mudgal followed by Gayatri Iyer, Sahaj Ma, Jagjit Singh and Lata Mangeshkar, Surinder Kaur, Kailash Kher, Richa Sharma and Sukhwinder, Bhupinder and Chitra, the Wadali Brothers and Suraiya and Shyam.
[by Ken Hunt, London] Winter draws on in London but on the island the sun is shining. Helping to banish gloom is a rather fine selection of music this month. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, this month we have Norma Waterson, Mohammad Reza Shajarian and Mohammad Reza Lotfi, Tükrös Zenekar, O’Hooley & Tidow, Ronu Majumdar and Kishan Maharaj, the Butterfield Blues Band, Santana, Wizz Jones, Bukka White and Melissa Etheridge. It begins with a song of mortality and the acceptance of mortality and ends with one bitter and not accepting. In between all human life is there.