My Early Love Of Music

It is not a very exiting subject but the story has to start somewhere. My father had a love of music and could play almost any instrument which he tried. Mostly piano, accordian and spoons and a saw. Not forgetting an harmonica.

Playing a musical saw. and musical spoons

Have you ever seen anyone play a saw by bending it to produce musical notes? I must have gotten a taste for music from him. Something for which I am eternally grateful. My first instruments were using the family piano (badly, but I could pick out a tune or two), a plastic trumpet upon which I learnt a few military calls, such as, "Come To The Cookhouse Door" and "The Last Post". No I never considered a military career but the notes for the calls were included with the instructions for the trumpet. I can also recall a mouth organ and a penny whistle, neither of which I seemed to be able to master at the time.

Around about, and probably before I was ten (I know -  it's not that young really nowadays ) I was bought a reel-to-reel tape recorder; That really got me going. I used it to record music from a small B&W TV which sat in our living room, taking pride of place. I still remember some of those songs and a favourite still today was Buffy St Marie singing Universal Soldier. Yes I know Donavan recorded it in the sixties but it was a poor cover of the original.

Buffy St Marie, A Canadian Cree Indian

I also used the tape recorder for recording myself, and sometimes my sister, singing. My mother often said that she could not understand how we managed to learn so many songs. It may be relevant to mention that I was chosen for the school choir at 7 or 8 years old, but on reflection it may be because of the power of my voice rather than the "pure tones" which I produced. the choir was entered for many school festivals but I do not recall ever winning anything. As an aside, I would sing all the time at home and to demonstrate how far my voice travelled mom used to get comments from neighbours who lived further away than I could have ever expected.

Mentioning my mother also reminds me that we used to have a radio on in the house most of the time. TV was only one channel and only on a few hours a day to start with. I guess I am remembering when I was 5 or six years old. A song I still remember from this time is Vera Lynn singing "The Little Boy That Santa Claus Forgot". The first time I heard it I was in inconsolable tears because I thought that the little boy was me. I still sing this song at Christmas, and may even have a video on my PC, which I may look up and post on the blog.

Before I finish this instalment I would like to mention two other memories; the first was that used to collect lyrics. Sometimes I copied them from my tape recorder  and sometimes cutting them out of magazines, such as "The Record Song Book" published in the 60's and 70's.

One last memory concerns a home made set of drums. Using a bass drum from a toy drum set as a snare drum (without the snare) various boxes and tins and I remember a circular biscuit tin lid into which I punched about two dozen nails. Hitting that "cymbal" gave a wonderful swishing sound. I mostly used pieces of thin dowel (sanded to round the ends) as drumsticks but Dad was able to get me a pair of steel brushes from a work mate who actually played the drums.

I did actually begin my song writing at this time. I could not yet play an instrument to play along with the songs (I could play a melody on the piano but not well enough to play along as a backing) so I knocked out a rythm on my drum kit. Songs were very simple and quite limpid as you might expect from a 10 year old. At least that is the best guess of my age at the time. Unfortunately I can no longer remember any of them or even their titles, must say something about them.

Apart from Buffy, other early inspiration came from Elvis, Buddy Holly, Billy Fury and so many others that I am not going to name them here. Most of them are not well remembered anyway.

OK, this post is rather longer than I expected but despite everything As I actually typed it in, I kept remembering odd bits of my musical experiences. And I haven't even mentioned the Zither. Maybe another time?