The Geriatric DJ on Radio CRMK.....
The guy who founded Leon Disco (Actually it was Headmaster Bradshaw who founded Leon Disco) I just ran it.......
BUT my greatest love of all is Classical Music so do join me on Wednesday morning 6am to 8am www.crmk.co.uk for WAKE UP WITH THE CLASSICS.
My next door neighbour and friend Graham said to me once that I should write my musical autobiography. Perhaps one day I will but here for this blog entry let me explain why Classical Music is my favourite genre.
If you read my SCHOOLBOY AUTOBIOGRAPHY you will
At junior school I taught myself to read music and to play the recorder so at secondary school I was at a
Mine was an all boys school. These were the days of The Beatles, girls screamed after the Fab Four - it was not cool for lads to do that so a lot of the pop music I enjoy and play now passed me by as a teenager.
But still, I loved music and so it was natural to select this as one of my GCE examination courses.
I could read music, I could play music. I played the trumpet but NO, I never learned to sing. I could play The Trumpet Voluntary, it was quite easy.
Score reading is where you simultaneously read all the music for each instrument in the orchestra. I was taught to score read, aged about 15, using Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik.
It was not hard, there are only: First & Second Violins, Viola, Cello and Bass in the piece. Having mastered that we were then taught to score read Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. That was not easy but I mastered it.
My great uncle George was a powerful businessman. Middle class ladies did not go out to work so his wife, my great aunt Alice, passed her time singing with the Birmingham Choral Society. Uncle George took me to Birmingham Town Hall to watch her sing with The Birmingham Symphony Orchestra performing Handel's Messiah.
I spent some pocket money on an LP of The Messiah, borrowed a copy of the score from the library and conducted the record player.
Every day at school commenced with assembly during which we boys had to sing two hymns. Our music class was given a piece of homework to write an alternative tune to a hymn. Two of use were picked out, myself and Gordon Willis, to have our tunes added to the school assembly repertoire. It was a mixture of pride and deep embarrassment
when the headmaster would announce: We shall now sing hymn number whateveritwas to the tune Ashford !
The deputy head was a Mr D C Wild - Wild by name and wild by nature ! He was a great musician and conducted the Solihull Gilbert And Sullivan Society. He took us to watch a performance of Pirates of Penzanze.
Here's something from Pirates with the late great John English as The Pirate King.
When people ask me what is the most significant piece of music in my life I tell them it is this. Not my favourite piece but the most significant. Watch the video and see why it is so important to me.
Leaving school I embarked on a a management
I was a smart management trainee, dressed in a suit and tie. Yes, I remember the hippies but some how they did not make it to Birmingham England and Lewis's Department Store !
I missed out didn't I ?
I continued to buy classical records, borrow the scores from the library and conduct the record player.
At Lewis's my friend, Tony, was supervisor in the record department. We all envied him. I learned to blend my love of classical music with the swinging sixties.
Mr H E Harris, Staff Manager at Lewis's, decided he could see within me a talent as a staff trainer and manager rather than a salesman. I was taken off the shop floor and given the job of recruiting school leavers.
Summer of 1969 I left Lewis's Department Store to become an assistant, unqualified, teacher in a boys preparatory school - Chetwynd House School. I was in charge of PE and games. When the headmaster learned of my love of music he put me in charge of that as well.
One of my students was David Stead, his father had been a Dambuster. I never stop telling people I knew a Dambuster !
I taught the entire school to play the descant recorder. The fingering for Silent Night is quite difficult but at playtime and lunchtime you could always find groups of lads playing, usually out of tune, Silent Night on their recorders while others kicked a football or grabbed a fag behind the cycle shed.
The local grammar school put on Gilbert and Sullivan's opera The Mikado, I took the boys to watch a performance.
The lads loved it. I read them a book telling the life stories of William Gilbert and Sir Arthur Sullivan. I then had them all conducting the LP on the school record player.
I spent two very happy years at Chetwynd House School before coming to Bletchley in 1971 to attend teacher training college. I did not study music. Did headmasters teach music ?
I never did make it to headmaster but was rapidly promoted to head of year at Leon School. Yes it was the headmaster who decided we would have Leon Disco. I just got dumped with the job of running it !
We did have some fun with that disco didn't we ?
A friend of mine ran a pub, he wanted to move up to manage a night club. Working towards his ambition he put on Bill J Kramer, then a retro-pop singer in his own right, on at the pub. He asked me to help him run the night.
Shortly before the performance was due to begin he came to me and said Dave, Billy's stoned out of his head in the dressing room. Together we pushed him onto the stage but WOW what a performance.
I was a judge at talent competition. One of my fellow judges was the AR Manager for The Bay City Rollers. He said to me: I know what people call them, I know what people say instead of "city" but they make me a fortune.
Music has always been a part of my life and always will be. It is even written in my will. Among the pieces to be played at my funeral is this.
It is tradition for people to clap during The Radeski March. At my funeral people will be invited to clap either to applaud my life or to say THANK GOODNESS THAT SILLY OLD SOD HAS GONE !
Of all music I love classical more than any other genre. I love opera. Here's the most well known song from the most popular opera - The Brindisi from La Traviata by Guiseppi Verdi.
La Traviata = The Fallen Woman = The Prostitute. Could you imagine a stage play or film today celebrating a prostitute.
Within my favourite genre of music my favourite sub genre is The Ballet. Here's my all time favourite - The Russian Dance from The Nutcracker.
Ballet is a combination of music, dancing, costume, set and mime. All blend together into a single unit. Watch this video and see what I mean.
CLICK HERE for the radio podcast from my
Some people fear that classical music can be a but stuffy, heavy and not easy to understand. NOT the way The Geriatric DJ plays it.
I will be playing all kinds of beautiful classical music from so many different composers and will feature my own little specialty - WHERE CLASSICAL MUSIC MEETS ROCK AND ROLL !
Wake Up With The Classic - every Wednesday 6am to
Just as I conducted the record player all those years ago I will be conducting the microphone so make sure you join me and conduct the loudspeaker at your end !
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