RIP John Mayall

The time is the early 1960s; the place, a converted cinema in a town in the stockbroker belt of Surrey. A group of teenage white boys are listening to two (older) black men playing the Blues.  

There’s nothing unusual about this - for the white boys anyway. It happens once a week.  And it’s a scene that’s repeated up and down the country.  

For the musicians though, it’s almost unheard of.  And it didn’t occur to us that, back home, these black musicians would not have been allowed to play for a white audience.

Our exposure to the Blues - and black musicians - was in large part down to John Mayall. Thanks to him - and his Bluesbreakers - a lot of white boys would take the step from merely listening - to actually playing the Blues.  Some became so good that they would eventually take the Blues back to America. 

I consider myself really lucky to have been a teenager at that time - to discover music like this, live and raw - unmodulated by the technology of the download.  Thank you Mr Mayall.