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Dr. Kostas Kardamis, from the Ionian University Music Department, brought to my attention the order apparently given in Athens to Greek Radio by the British Military Authority (under General Scobie). It started me thinking about why the British Military might have wanted to promote rebetiko music. These are my questions, thoughts and notes to date. I welcome comments and further information (corfubooks at hotmail dot com). Is it possible to find the original document or order?

In late 1944- early 1945 (after “Ta Dekemvriana”): the HQ of the British Forces Military Authority, under General Scobie, sent an order/instruction strongly encouraging Greek State Radio to broadcast and disseminate rebetiko music, little known at that time to the bourgeoisie of Greece (sources: Yannis Konstantinidis, Alekos Xenos, George Leotsakos-see G. Leotsakos, “Alekos Xenos” in “Eptanisiaka Fylla” XXV/3-4, Fall-Winter 2005).

It seems unlikely that such an order would have been issued before the truce of 11 January, 1945 or until after the Varkiza agreement was signed on 12 February 1945, but that is my own speculation.

Nikos Politis has written that “after the war there has been a small interval of less than one year, where censorship was forgotten, but immediately thereafter it came back.” (“Censorship in Rebetiko, 1937 onwards”, Hydra Rebetiko Conference, October 2005). Censorship was reimposed in 1947, according to Ed Emery.

If it's true that the British Military encouraged the rebetiko, the
question is WHY? What was their motive?

Was it:

a) The influence of the post-war mood in Britain (away from Churchill and the Conservatives, towards the Labour Party- election victory under Attlee, July 1945, breaking down class barriers, new solidarity, new society, health service, welfare state, employment);
b) The fact that they liked rebetiko music;
c) They wanted (indirectly) to win the hearts and minds of alienated Greeks.

d) The fact that no rebetiko recordings were made in Greece during the period of Axis Occupation, 1941-1944, when the Germans promoted and encouraged light music, tangos and waltzes (Gail Holst-Warhaft, “World Music and the Orientalizing of Rebetika”).

e) That there had been censorship of rebetiko songs during the Metaxas dictatorship

f) That the British perhaps wanted to encourage a spirit of freedom of expression (and of the press) after the censorship of the Metaxas dictatorship and the German Occupation? But unlikely at this stage, while EAM-ELAS still a serious threat?

The early issues of the Anglo-Helleniki Epitheorisi carried articles about the need for a free press. And soon there would be articles and lectures at the British Council on Theophilos; popular, “primitive” and naïve art became fashionable (Zographos, Tsarouchis, as well as Karaghiozis shadow-theatre and the memoirs of General Makriyannis). For instance on 11 August 1947, Seferis notes in “Meres, 1945-1951”, “Marvelous! We found Theophilos and Makriyannis, in the way that nymphomaniac tourists find shepherd boys to make love to them: primitivism in reverse. And those people have found this piece of candy and keep on chewing on it, with pleasure” (translated by Athan Anagnostopoulos, “A Poet’s Journal, Days of 1945-1951”, 1974). Left wing reactions to the Theophilos exhibition at the British Council appeared in Rizopsastis on 8 May 1947; also discussed by Rex Warner in "Views of Attica" (1950).

Right-wing conservatives “suspected subversion in the fuss about popular art and ‘popular Greek humanity’ (Sikelianos on Theophilos in 1947)”. The Marxist movement was “suspicious of any tendency which could seem hostile to technical civilisation and resolutely opposed to populism” (Nicos Hadjinicolaou introduction to ‘Four painters of 20^th century Greece’, Wildenstein, 1975).

It was not just the bourgeoisie that was unfamiliar with or disapproved of rebetiko.

Many Communists were opposed to it too (cf Klisidis, “Aspects of Rebetiko”, cited by Daniel Koglin). Stathis Gauntlett, in “Rebetika, Carmina Graeciae Recentioris” ( a modified version of his Oxford DPhil thesis To Rebetiko Tragoudi, March 1978) writes (p. 195, note 2) about politically motivated denunciation of the genre in Rizospastis in the mid-forties and thirty years later, in March and April 1976: “The ‘Rebetiko’ is now decried as part of an imperialist plot to obliterate the memory of the heroic Resistance and Civil War.” Gauntlett refers to D.Liatsos, Oi prosfiges tis Mikrasias kai to rebetiko tragoudi, Athens 1982, pp. 54-8.

Alekos Xenos, who was in EAM-ELAS and KKE, wrote in 1947, "The evil caused by the sickly atmosphere of the drug-related, pornographic rebetiko songs", which had been "made out of melodic bits and pieces left behind by the Turkish conqueror" and were "sung amongst those strata the pauperizaing economic policy of capitalism
had reduced to utmost poverty"... (from a letter in Rizospastis, February 4, 1947, quoted by Daniel Koglin in “Marginality-A Key Concept to Understanding the Resurgence of Rebetiko in Turkey”, www.music.ucsb.edu/projects/musicandpolitics/archive/2008-1/koglin.pdf

At that period (from 1945) Communist Party ideologists and intellectuals were largely negative about the rebetiko and the “mangas”, and argued that the music undermined and sapped the revolutionary strength and will of the people, and was unsuitable for political prisoners or for leftists sent into internal exile. It was considered music which could have a bad psychological effect, with its elements of “weariness, escapism and fatalism” (G. Giannaris, p. 133). They favoured the use of indigenous, traditional Greek folk songs (ta demotika) and partisan or guerrilla (antartika) songs as an educational means to further the national liberation struggle and to build solidarity, group revolutionary consciousness (as well as the use of optimistic, international Communist and Russian revolutionary songs). They certainly insisted on the exclusion of narcotics-related and mangas songs from the repertoire. See Panagis Panagiotopulos’ chapter in “Rebetes kai Rebetiko Tragoudi”, 1996. Which is not to say that some rebetiko songs did not deal with political topics on occasion. Nearchos Georgiadis cites examples of several songs about the death of Aris Velouchiotis in 1945.

“Rebetika was also attacked by the Communist Party, for instance by Nikos Zachariades, who described it as the music ‘of knife-fights and decadence’”, Ed Emery, Introduction to “Songs of the Greek Underworld, The Rebetiko Tradition” by Elias Petropoulos, 2000. On the other hand, Theodorakis claims that General Serafis “was crazy about rebetika”, and Theodorakis himself and the other inmates sang rebetika at Ikaria and in Makronissos (Interview with Vassilis Vassilikos, Euros, no 5-6, Sept-Dec 1993), cited by Emery.

Elias Petropoulos writes (“Songs of the Greek Underworld), “The Marxist viewpoint that sees the rebetes merely as lumpenproletarians is theoretical claptrap” and “In 1947 the official newspaper of the Greek Communist Party opened the first debate on the nature of rebetiko song. A constellation of Marxist reactionaries came together to condemn the ‘immoral’ songs of the hashish-smokers and the lumpenproletariat.”

Proclamation of ELAS Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1943: “It asked every Greek to compile all the Resistance songs he knew, both lyrics and music, and send them as best he could to the nearest ELAS office”, George Giannaris, “Music and Social Change”, 1973. Greek music has always been plagued by identity politics, as Gail Holst-Warhaft observes.

This suggests another alternative motive why the British Military might have sent the instruction to the Radio Station:

g) Most Communist intellectuals disapproved of rebetiko and wanted to discredit it,
so the British promoted it?

h) Maybe rebetiko was considered a better "pacifying" option, since it was
largely non-political, non-revolutionary and dealt with themes of love, jealousy, ‘erotic rapports’, wine, longing for home and for the mother, laments about poverty and social problems etc, less risky than a resurgence of political resistance songs, and ELAS-sanctioned themes?

i) It was in the commercial interests of British-owned gramophone record companies operating in Athens, which would soon want to start up production again (in 1946).

Incidentally, the hostility of many of the Communists and bourgeois elites towards the bouzouki as an instrument was as strong as the hostility towards rebetiko songs. It was seen as an instrument brought in with the Asia Minor refugees after 1922. It is interesting in this respect to read Archduke Ludwig Salvator’s comments (1887) on musical instruments played in the Ionian island of Paxos in the 1880s:

„Fűr Musik haben die Paxiniotten wie alle Griechen Vorliebe. Violine und Mandoline sind die beiden Haupt-Instrumente. Letzterer ähnlich die Busukki, Lauto und Protolauto, und manche Guitarren, die man Taburá nennt. Diese Instrumente werden theils hier verfertigt, theils aus Corfu importiert; sie variiren in der Grösse von einander, gewöhnlich macht man sie in drei Grössen“ ("Paxos und Antipaxos", Wűrzburg and Vienna, 1887).

The bouzouki seems to have been accepted as another instrument suitable for folk music. Nothing is as simple as it might seem!

NB For Manos Hadjidakis' lecture of 31 January 1949 on the Rebetiko song, go to www.hadjidakis.gr/english/homeweb.htm , select Ergography, then Publications

TEXT FOR CD "NEUROMANTICS" (2009) Music by Raul Scacchi, Lyrics by Jim Potts:

Songs: "EVE", "EURYDICE", "NARCISSUS", "LYSISTRATA", "TERESA", "Mme MARCHADIER", "ELVIRA", "MAN FRIDAY", "MARIA"

“Neuromantics” (or “neuro-mantics”) is an exploration of love in all its diversity and aspects, in some of its archetypal forms and syndromes, as well as in its often painful and mystifying humanity.

Devotion, ecstasy, rapture, friendship, desire, blind love, vanity, narcissism, erotic and neurotic obsession, addictions: these were some of the words, feelings and ideas we played with while we were focusing on characters, some historical or mythological, who would represent different aspects of love in all its contradictions.

It was a philosophical and psychological investigation about people's basic needs, their dreams of escape, of excitement and romance, but also about the love of nature, the love of country, the spiritual love of God, the love of a mother for a child, self-love, even murderous love..

Technically, the collaboration was challenging. An Italian composer, an English lyricist, a Greek singer: we all had very different backgrounds and musical tastes, but Corfu provided us with the opportunity to get together and to create a work which we hope is new and original, and more romantic than neurotic. That is for the listener to judge.

REVIEW OF JIM'S FIRST CD, "ON THE MEMPHIS ROAD!", by Arild Rønes, on Rockboard, www.rockaround.org

"I really liked the CD. Your love for blues & rock & roll music really shines through.... Listening to your CD actually made me feel like I was listening to the soundtrack from a TV-show. I even saw the pictures in my head, of you taking us on a trip around Memphis (and the rest of the south) talking about blues and rock & roll and taking us to the important/historic places in blues/rock & roll history! "

Here's an extract from Arild's review, in Norwegian (posted 30 August 2006):

Jim Potts har spillt inn låtene alene med sin gitar og sitt munnspill, og kan minne mye om John Lee Hooker, både når
det gjelder gitarspillingen og det vokale. Selv "That´s All Right", "Mystery Train" og "Movie Magg" er mye mer blues
enn rock & roll når Jim Potts gjør dem. Ellers får vi fine versjoner av bluesklassikere som "I Can´t Be Satisfied", "How
Many More Years" og "3 O´Clock Blues".....

Tracks played on Greek Radio Neo, 97.8 FM ( 5 May, during 45-minute interview with Nick Anthis) and

Jim's CD "On the Memphis Road!", recorded at the Sun Studio in Memphis on 7 July 2004, is now available. Subtitled "Celebrating Sun Studios and the Fiftieth Anniversary of Rockabilly Blues", the CD features Jim Potts on vocals, guitar and harmonica, performing mainly blues and 1950s rockabilly blues associated with the early years of Sun Records and the Memphis Recording Service, including tributes to Howlin' Wolf, BB King, Rosco Gordon, Carl Perkins and the hillbilly cat. The CD contains an 8-page booklet.

"Perfect command of the genre...a magnificent job" : Rockin' Fifties magazine, December 2004.

"I listened to your CD and was very impressed" Billy Lee Riley, 24 March 2005

"A hell of a feeling for the blues....delightfully authentic album....I look forward to hearing much more from a genuinely gifted performer". Bryan Chalker, Music Maker magazine, June/July 2005.

"Music to listen to at home, late at night with a bottle of whisky" The BlackCat (Marijn Raaimakers)

Illustrated and reviewed by Bernd Kratochwil in Germany's excellent "Rockin' Fifties" magazine (December 2004): "Diese CD ist wirklich eine Uberraschung.....Jim Potts beherrscht dieses Genre perfekt. Man höre nur "That's All Right" und "No More Doggin'". Was aus dem Blueseinfluss geworden ist kan mann bei "Movie Magg" registrieren. Jim Potts macht einen grossartigen Job."

Bryan Chalker , Music Maker, June/July 2005: "Jim Potts loves the old blues of Memphis Minnie, Leadbelly, Blind Willie Johnson, Sleepy John Estes but also acknowledges the music of Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Cliff Carlisle and Lonnie Glosson and this delightfully authentic album was recorded at the legendary Sun Studios in Memphis on July 7, 2004...Jim has a hell of a feeling for the blues....and also proves to be a promising writer with the final track and I look forward to hearing much more from a genuinely gifted performer."

"Jim includes tracks from his favourite legends such as Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, BB King, Junior Parker, Arthur Crudup, Rosco Gordon and he plays them all "moanin' blues style...The opening John Lee Hooker song, "The Hobo" can be compared to Hooker's basic work...a pretty good interpretation....Music to listen to at home, late at night with a bottle of whisky"

The lyrics to the last track of the CD, Jim's composition, "It took fifty years in the making that rock 'n' roll" (copyright Jim Potts) can be found on www.rockabilly.com in the Lyrics section (BlackCat Rockin' Lyrix G-L).

The CD is currently featured on www.tradmusic.net under Independent`Artists.

Buy Now!

On the Memphis Road Jim Potts

The Hobo, Mystery Train, How Many More Years/Howlin'Wolf Tribute, 3 o'clock Blues/ Don't Answer the Door, I Can't Be Satisfied, That's All Right, Mama, No More Doggin', Movie Magg, Rockin' Chair Money, It Took Fifty Years in the Making, That Rock'n'Roll

Price: 10.00 GBP

www.tradmusic.net

Great Memphis and Delta Blues!

Vladimír Merta (wonderful Czech singer, http://www.vladimirmerta.cz/ ) wrote in an email: "The CD is wonderfully old-sounding. How did you manage to get the 50's slapping reverb? The atmosphere is present.... During the Velvet Revolution I insisted that any candidate for any function should sing a song. Just to be controlled from the un-political side of the brain. You pass for the President!"

The first track ("The Hobo") was featured on BBC Radio 4 "Home Truths", 19 February 2005. "What became of Jim Potts?" Michael Rosen had asked on air, on "Home Truths", 12th February 2005: "at the touch of a plectrum (as a student at Oxford) he could transform himself into a Mississippi Delta blues-singer; Jim was last heard of in Australia, serving up British culture". The answer to Michael Rosen's question came on the following week's programme. Check it out on the Home Truths web-site!

"On the Memphis Road!" was recorded at the Sun Studio, Memphis, Tennessee, on July 7, 2004, to celebrate Sun Records and the fiftieth anniversary of Rockabilly Blues (Elvis recorded “That’s All Right, Mama” after midnight on the evening of 5/6 July 1954).

The CD pays tribute to some of the great artists who recorded at 706 Union Avenue, singers like Howlin’ Wolf, Little Junior Parker, B B King, Rosco Gordon, Elvis Presley and Carl Perkins or who started their careers in the Memphis/Mississippi Delta region- Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Arthur ‘Big Boy’ Crudup (who all inspired and influenced the early rockabilly singers).

Apart from the classic rockabilly blues songs like Mystery Train and That’s All Right, Mama, deep blues like The Hobo, Three O’Clock Blues and How Many More Years? are given a strong, soulful treatment by Jim Potts, who also plays blues guitar and harmonica on the CD. The record also celebrates 100 years of the blues. Country songs like Movie Magg and a Hank Williams-influenced interpretation of Rockin’ Chair Money all find a place in a set which concludes with Jim’s own composition It Took Fifty Years in the Making that Rock ‘n’ Roll.

This CD may be as close as you’ll get in the 21^st century to the original Sun Sound as it was in 1954. Imagine an unknown blues singer wandering in to Sun or the Memphis Recording Service back in the early fifties to make a demo 10” LP, accompanied only by his own guitar and harmonica. That’s Jim Potts “On the Memphis Road”.

Currently in stock at the following record shops in Stockholm, Corfu and the UK:

1) Magnet Publishing Ltd, 28 Grafton Terrace, London NW5 4JJ, www.tradmusic.net

3) Muses Record Shop, Michael Theotokis 9 & 22, Corfu , 49100, Greece, FAX Corfu 23597

Three shots from Jim's performance at a juke-joint in Clarksdale, Mississippi, 1999.

Here's some information about some of Jim's early articles and papers on the blues, jazz and English music:

Ellington ad lib, an interview with Duke Ellington by Jim Potts, Stan Rodliffe, Bunny Warren, Ed Webb, Oxymoron, Oxford, December 1965

A Sociological Interpretation of the North-American Blues, Jim Potts, Sociology Dissertation, London University Institute of Education, 1968

Homer liked words aloud, Poetry and Song Lyrics, Jim Potts, Second Annual Festival of English Studies, University of Athens, 29 April 1982.

Australia and Britain: Literary and Other Links, Jim Potts, Lecture at University of Uppsala English Society, November 27, 2001 (illustrative recorded examples included Yothu Yindi's "Treaty", plus Anglo-Australia folk-songs like "Jim Jones at Botany Bay", and "Bound for South Australia".

Iannis Ritsos and Panagoulis, An Introductory Talk, followed by a lecture by Amy Mims, Greek Cultural Centre, Stockholm, February 2003.

There is an island...Poetry and Diplomacy, Friendship and War, A British Tribute to George Seferis, to Mark the 40th Anniversary of the Award of the Nobel Prize for Literature , at the Mediterranean Museum, Stockholm, May 6 2003, within the framework of the Greek EU Presidency. Readings by Kjell Espmark. With songs composed by Theodorakis and Moutsis (The Secret Seashore/Denial; Ligo Akoma; Einai Palio to Limani)

The Blues is Back, weekly programme on Sydney's Eastside Radio, 89.7 FM, 1998-1999

"EBB", written and directed by Jim Potts, with an original blues soundtrack by JLH. Produced by Wadham Film Group,Oxford, 1965. Excerpts:

Original field recordings of Ethiopian folk music and church singing on soundtrack

London, Overseas Students' Centre, 1970, Addis Ababa (Ethiopian Television, c 1973), San Francisco (Stanford University, 1978), Clarksdale, Mississippi (1999), Prague (1989), Eastside Radio, Sydney, 89.7 FM, 1997-98 (Monday Arts Live, The Blues is Back). There's a video recording of the impromptu performance at Hopson's Place, the Clarksdale nightspot (former Hopson Plantation Commissariat outside Clarksdale, beside Highways 61 and 49). LATEST GIGS: Sun Studio Memphis, 7 July 2004. Izzy Young's Folklore Centre in Stockholm, 7 October 2004. CD "On the Memphis Road!" released 15 November 2004. O'Reilly's Pub, Kentish Town, November 2005. 24 May 2009, Alternative Panigyri, Triklino Vineyard, Corfu. 27 July, 2009, "Music on a Summer Night", fund-raiser party in aid of The Ark Animal Welfare Charity, Villa Sylva, Kanoni, Corfu.

European Cultural Centre, Delphi, 10 September, 2003 (with Susan Bassnett, Stephanos Stephanides, Adrian Grima and Mary Farell).

FOR ENQUIRIES ABOUT ORIGINAL SONG LYRICS contact Jim via email address on home page.

Talking Language Laboratory Blues (published in English Teaching Forum, USA, c 1971)

BLUES, ROCK AND OTHER ARTISTS SEEN IN LIVE PERFORMANCE SINCE 1957: AIDE MEMOIRE

John Lee Hooker, Howlin´ Wolf, Sleepy John Estes, Muddy Waters, Son House, Arthur 'Big Boy' Crudup, Louisiana Red, Mississippi Fred McDowell, Lightnin' Hopkins, Duke Ellington, Johnny Hodges, Cat Anderson, Dizzy Gillespie, Jimmy Smith, Stanley Turrentine, Sonny Rollins, Count Basie, Sarah Vaughan, Oscar Peterson, Jiri Stivin, Original Prague Syncopated Jazz Band, Ella Fitzgerald, Stan Tracey Quartet, Chris Barber, Dimos Dimitriadis, Courtney Pine, Julian Joseph, Evan Parker, Beryl Bryden, Jimmy Reed, T-Bone Walker, Eddie Taylor, Curtis Jones, John Henry Barbee, Big Joe Williams, Sonny Boy Williamson, Jimi Hendrix, Junior Wells, Koko Taylor, John Cephas and Phil Wiggins, Snooks Eaglin, Little Walter, B.B. King, Carey Bell, Tina Turner, Ike Turner, Johnny Johnson, Ray Charles, Keb' Mo, Eric Bibb, Etta James, Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry, Big Jay McNeely, Champion Jack Dupree, Buddy Guy, Taj Mahal, Willie Dixon, Lloyd Price, Margie Evans, Mojo Buford, Hammie Nixon, Johnny Winter, Eric Clapton, James Brown, Hubert Sumlin, Sunnyland Slim, Eddie Boyd, Big Mama Thornton, Sugar Pie Desanto, J.B.Lenoir, Fleetwood Mac, Duster Bennett, The Mighty Reapers, Linda Tillery and The Cultural Heritage Choir, Brian Kramer Trio, Chris Thomas King, Keith Dunn, Tommy Smith, Robert Mitchell, Dr John, Charlie Musselwhite, Sonny Terry, Brownie McGhee, Bukka White, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Jo Ann Kelly, The Groundhogs

Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Billy Lee Riley, Sonny Burgess and the Pacers, Gene Vincent, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Everly Brothers, Charlie Gracie, Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Oasis, Tom Jones, Stereophonics, Radiohead, Duane Eddy, Eric Burdon, Paul Jones, Manfred Mann, Marianne Faithful, Wildfire Willie and the Ramblers, Phil Trigwell, The Mull Historical Society, Bruce Springsteen and E Street Band, Tony Joe White, Paul McCartney, Little Gerhard, Rock-Ragge, Jose Gonzalez, Elin Sigvardson, Karin Ström , Brian Wilson (Beach Boys)

Reggae

Folk, Country, Political/Satirical

Doc Watson, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Tracy Chapman, Dick Gaughan, Martin Carthy, Alistair Hulett, Dave Swarbrick, Jack Clement, Alias Ron Kavana, Vladimir Merta, Jan Vodnansky, Jeanne Bichevskaya, Lenka Filipova, Magna Carta, The Yetties, Lonnie Donegan, Donovan, Gina Jeffreys, George Hamilton IV, Shenandoah Jubilee, Ralph Stanley, Patty Loveless, Ricky Skaggs, Norman Blake, Dan Tyminski, The Whites, The Nashville Bluegrass Band, Del McCoury Band, Seldom Scene, Alison Krauss, Emmylou Harris, Porter Wagoner, Mountain Heart, Osborne Brothers, T Graham Brown, Fiddlers' Bid, The Wrigley Sisters, Joan Armatrading, Väsen, Brian Ellerick, Malinky, Ellika & Solo, Shoogenlifty

Mikis Theodorakis, Maria Farantouri, Olympia Georgiou, Aliki Kayaloglou, Sotiria Bellou, Antonis Kaloyannis, Alkisti Protopsalti, Margarita Zorbala, Maria Dimitriadi, Martha and Tena Elefteriadu (Greek-Czech), Taximi (Greek-Swedish), Sakis Papadimitriou, Floros Floridis, Dimos Dimitriadis, Christoforos Stabogli and Stavros Lantzias, Nikos Theodorakis.

Classical, early music, contemporary music, organ, piano, guitar and song recitals and opera

The Swedish Chamber Orchestra (premiere of Sally Beamish Viola Concerto no 2, The Seafarer, solo Tabea Zimmermann)

Kungliga Filharmonikerna (Royal Philharmonic, Stockholm) , Dvorak's 8th Symphony

Storkyrkan kör och orkester ( Nyårskonsert). Bethoven's Ninth Symphony, op.125 and Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus" from The Messiah

"From the House of the Dead", Janacek, ENO, 97/98 Season (for me, the most meaningful of the 30-40 operas I've seen)

"Billy Budd" by B. Britten, The Queensland Conservatorium of Music Opera School, 1993, conducted by Brian Hughes, designed by Michael Holt

Conductors: Sir Charles Mackerras, Libor Pesek, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Christopher Bell

Tom Waits, Louise Hoffsten, Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, Hank Williams, Jimmie Rodgers, Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Big Joe Turner, Carl Perkins, Doc Watson, Blaze Foley, Howlin' Wolf, Ray Charles, Jerry Lee Lewis, Billy Lee Riley, Sonny Boy Williamson, Ronnie Self, Billy Lee Riley, Snooks Eaglin, Gus Cannon's Jug Stompers, Bill Monroe, Leadbelly

Most of Alfred Schnittke (especially Four Hymns for Chamber Instrumental Ensemble, III and IV, Alexander Ivashkin et al)

Mozart's "Adagio and Fugue in C Minor, K. 546" (Czech Chamber Orchestra, Josef Vlach).

Aboriginal didgeridoo music. I listen to it a lot. Old Northern Territory (Arnhem Land) field recordings and Yothu Yindi*. It wasn't on offer very often at the Sydney Opera House. Nor was Slim Dusty..

One very talented didgeridoo player is Cedric Talbot. I once performed my poems "The Apocalyptic Blues" and "Jindyworobak 1997" at the Lyric Theatre, Sydney, with his expressive didj accompaniment, for the Sydney Poetry Olympics (for three consecutive years, 1995-1997, I was invited to be one of the judges/adjudicators; in '97 they asked the judges to perform too, the others being Chin Woon Ping and Jill Jones). In 1995 , to launch the first Sydney Poetry Olympics, I wrote and performed an antipodean Olympic ode in praise of Komninos, the "Aussie Pindar" (included in "Corfu Blues", Ars Interpres Publications, 2006), a great performance poet ( now also a cyber- poet). My fellow judge in ´95 was Yusef Komunyakaa. That year the Sydney Writers' Festival organised the opening event at the Opera House (Northern Foyer). In 1996 the Nuyorican# poets, including Dale Orlandersmith and Emily XYZ , took part in a poetry slam at the Museum of Contemporary Art and together we attempted to judge the best poems and performances for the Poetry Olympics, never an easy matter).

Nowadays I'd probably describe that as a post-colonial(ist) poem. Cedric Talbot really brought it to life as an accompanist. Some members of the audience wondered why an Englishmen and an Australian Aboriginal were collaborating in this unlikely way.

Anglophonix! Blues , Rockabilly and some of that Jazz in the Swedish Music Industry.

How many of you remember Sweden’s great record label, Sonet Records ? How many of you know of Lars Strandheim’s 1950s- style recording studio in Småland or of Joe Allan’s Recording Service in Hallstahammar ?

Do you jive , jitterbug or lindy-hop to Wildfire Willie (alias Jan Svennson) and the Ramblers, Phil Trigwell and the Deputies, Jyrki Juvonen, Hank C Burnette (alias Sven-Åke Högberg from Sveg) ? Forget about Sun Studios in Memphis. It’s in Sweden that the spirit and musical energy of 1950s rockabilly lives on.

And blues ? Brian Kramer and Eric Bibb are real Americans. The tip of the iceberg. Try “All that BLUES From Sweden” (SBACD 12650 and its companion Norwegian blues CD). Take a listen to the CD of the Brian Kramer Trio “Live at the Folklore Centre” at Wollmar Yxkullsgatan 2 in Stockholm (where Izzy Young presides, the same Izzy Young who provided early opportunities to the young Bob Dylan; for it was Izzy Young who organized Dylan’s first important New York concert in 1961 at the Carnegie Chapter Hall –53 people came according to David Hajdu). Louise Hoffsten is my favourite Swedish blues-singer. Knäckerbröd Blues is phenomenal- best blues album for years-, and From Linköping to Memphis has some incredible songs (bluesy without being blues). Can't stop listening to it.

Dylan dedicated his “Talking Folklore Centre Blues” to Izzy Young, when the Folklore Centre was based not in Stockholm, but in Greenwich Village, New York (having opened in April 1957[1]).

The shopwindow at Izzy’s Folklore Centre in Stockholm currently features copies of the original lyrics for Bob Dylan’s still-relevant song “With God on Our Side”.

Eric Bibb has just moved to England, after ten years in Sweden where he recorded his best CDs with Swedish blues musicians. Kramer can usually be found at Saturday afternoon blues-jams at Stampen. He plays a mean version of Muddy Water’s classic “I can’t be satisfied”.

Swedish record retailers like Enviken Records and Sunjay (as well as Goofin’ Records in Helsinki) keep the good times rolling; magazines like American Music, Jefferson, Om Jazz are as good as they get, although Norway’s BluesNews, published by the Norwegian Blues Union (a fantastic touring network of several hundred active Norwegian blues-clubs) is unrivalled. A few years ago I found myself in a Clarksdale (Mississippi) blues venue and before long I was singing and playing with a wonderful Norwegian harmonica player. The Norwegians take their blues seriously. So do the Swedes.

European interest in the blues owes a lot to the legendary Samuel Charters, author of the classic “The Country Blues” (1959) as well as “The Poetry of the Blues” (1963), “The Bluesmen” (1967),”Robert Johnson” (1973), “The Legacy of the Blues” (1975, from his Swedish years); but Sam Charters and his wife Professor Ann Charters are also authorities on Jack Kerouac and the Beats.

Settling in Sweden after leaving McCarthy-ite America, Sam has also translated poetry by Tomas Tranströmer and Edith Södergran, and published many volumes of his own poetry, as well as novels and criticism. As a record producer he has produced LPs by Snooks Eaglin, Big Joe Williams, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Bukka White, Champion Jack Dupree and many other great blues singers, to Bill Haley and Country Joe and the Fish (“I Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’- To- Die-Rag”). At the time of writing he has a two-part Swedish radio on the blues, P2. Every serious blues collection contains his albums of Blind Willie Johnson and his original Country Blues anthology.

Many musicians in Sweden, and I guess in the Nordics as a whole, are masters of their instruments, their preferred styles and genres. They seem to be able to play every category of music, every blues note and rockabilly lick, exactly as it sounded fifty years ago in Memphis or Clarksdale, or forty years ago in Liverpool (not to mention 1920s New Orleans ). In terms of world music, you don’t have to look far to find great rebetika, klezmer or reggae groups either; some great gigs can be heard at Stallet, and on Rikskonserter’s Caprice CD label (they even have a CD featuring my one-time masenko (Ethiopian one string fiddle) teacher , Alemayehu Fanta, from Addis Ababa ! As the Swedish Institute fact-sheet on Swedish Music in the 20^th Century( Mikael Strömberg, 1998) “The folk music concept has been globalised. For one thing, the music has become a kaleidoscopic stream of foreign music played by immigrants in Sweden: the Algerian rai, the Moroccan gwana, the Zairian kwaskwasa, the Argentine tango, and Russian accordion music.”

If you think all this intercultural collaboration is a new phenomenon, you only have to remember how brilliantly Swedish jazz-men accompanied Charlie Parker when he started his tour of Sweden in November1950. Perhaps it is due to the fact that the Swedes could concentrate on practising and playing their favourite types of music in the 40’s when other European countries were at war. Lars Gullin and Bengt Hallberg are just two of the great names of Swedish jazz.

Just a few years later the Swedes were hip to the sounds of rock ‘n’ roll before most Europeans, if we can judge by the success of the swinging cover of Bill Haley’s first American hit, “Crazy Man Crazy” by Swedish-American Ernie Englund and his Crazy Men. I have the Karusell 78rpm record and it really rocks, if quaintly !

So don’t let anyone tell you it all began the Beatles’ performances in Sweden in 1963 (although two weeks later 100 Swedish pop groups were formed as a result, according to Mikael Strömberg) , or with ABBA’s “Waterloo” win at the 1974 Eurovision song contest. You have to give it to ABBA that their command of English was perfect. Few people in the 1960s would ever have believed that anyone from a non English-speaking country would ever be able to sing rock’n’roll convincingly. The British never accepted Johnny Hallyday , French or German rock groups in those days. British films used to make fun of the sounds of Swedish as parodied in the style of Bergman’s films (Christopher Miles’ “Six Sided Triangle” short film stands out in my mind). How times have changed. The Sunday Times review of The Cardigan’s new CD (“Pop CD of the Week, March 23 03) comments on Nina Persson’s “consonantal precision” which “hits new heights” on ‘And Then You Kissed Me’: “At a time when the currency of pop is devalued as never before, the Cardigans have come to its rescue”, writes Dan Cairns.

Nowadays, international artists queue to come to Sweden’s recording studios and to work with Swedish producers. We shouldn’t overlook the small, specialist studios, the authentic and dedicated musicians, the know-how which could work even more wonders if more musicians from the UK and elsewhere took the time to explore the possibilities for creative collaboration. It would definitely be of mutual benefit, and could help revive both the British and the Swedish music industries, which have lost some of their impetus in recent years. I know I’m going to grab my guitar and head for the studio in Hallstahammar, if they’ll have me. It’s a lot closer than Memphis !

I've been listening to a lot of blues harmonica lately, Noah Lewis, Sonny Boy Williamson (Rice Miller) predominantly, but also Little Walter, Big Walter Horton, Sonny Terry, Jimmy Reed, Junior Wells etc. Finally discovered the right guitar tuning for the B Flat (A sharp) harp. Took me forty years ! I first started playing the harp around 1963. I recorded a couple of scratchy tracks in one of those do-it- yourself slot-machine recording booths:. Hoochie Coochie Man and Roll 'Em Pete.. My favourite harp-based records : Ripley's Blues (Cannon's Jug Stompers) and Help Me, Sonny Boy Williamson.

I wonder when the first record featuring blues-harp was issued in Britain ? Sleepy John Estes and Hammie Nixon "Drop Down Mama" ? Sonny Terry accompanying Leadbelly on Melodisc 78s like "Ain't You Glad" and "How long blues" ? London released some 78s of the country harmonica player Salty Holmes (quite bluesy).Chris Barber hadn't mastered blues harp when his skiffle group recorded "When the sun goes down", although he had been exposed to Sonny Terry's playing. Cyril Davies must have been one of the first Brits to play real blues-harp. Records by Muddy Waters and Little Walter started appearing in the mid 50s, soon after some Sonny Terry records. Billy Lee Riley and Louise Hoffsten blow some great harp these days.

October 7: "Beat Poetry and Mississippi Blues". An evening at Izzy Young's Folklore Centre in Stockholm, where I showed two films, read some poems and sang a few blues, including Dylan's tribute to Izzy, "Talking Folklore Centre Blues", slightly adapted to Stockholm.

October 8: My Sun Studio CD well (re-)mastered (ten tracks), delivered today.. "On the Memphis Road". Lena Eliasson did great job with the design of the 8 page CD insert-booklet.

Bob Dylan writes on Izzy Young (pp 18-19) and Sun Studio (p. 216) in "Chronicles" vol 1:

"I began hanging out at the Folklore Center, the citadel of Americana folk-music...Young occasionally produced folk concerts by the unmistakably authentic folk and blues artists..."

"I always thought that Sun Records and Sam Phillips himself had created the most crucial, uplifting and powerful records ever made...At Sun records the artists were singing for their lives and sounded like they were coming from the most mysterious place on the planet."

Highly recommended- wonderful, intelligent lyrics and a whole lot of soul. Both sing brilliantly in English.

Great early rock 'n' roll site with recorded examples of rare records http://www.hoyhoy.com/