Growing up in South Africa the sound of Township Jazz was everywhere. It formed the background to my earliest musical memory which was dancing to a scratchy 78 rpm of Glen Miller’s In the Mood. This was played on a wind-up gramophone which used rapidly blunting needles requiring constant replacement with new ones kept in a metal tin. In the fifties my life was filled with the hi fidelity LP sound of Lena Horne, Billy Holliday, Dave Brubeck and my lifetime favourites, Ella, Louis and Oscar.  Learning to play the piano (badly) introduced me to Classical music, adding a  valuable dimension.

Thanks to Fine Music I now have the chance to present Jazz on Sunday Nights and Classics during the week and providing me with a heaven-sent opportunity to enjoy and play music from my own library of CDs – a far cry from the shellac.