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CP Lee interview on the history of music in Manchester

2020-08-02 By Aidan O'Rourke

Interview, transcript & photos, Multimedia Presentation


I recorded this interview with CP Lee on Friday the 28th of July 2006 and the recording has been available on my aidan.co.uk site ever since. For some time, I’d been planning to do an improved version with better sound quality and with a transcript.

And then on the 25th of July, 2020 came the terrible news about Chris so I decided to move ahead and complete this improved version and here it is. It’s presented using my ‘talking book’ or ‘visual podcast’ style or it could be described as Audio Visual Magazine style. Words and images are presented side by side on screen. Most of the photographs are by me. A few are from public domain sources.

Please check the subtitles for foreign language translations, and also please like the video and subscribe to the channel.

Published by Aidan O’Rourke | Sunday the 2nd of August, 2020

Told you I was missing, but I wasn’t lost

and I was walking through streets in the cold and frost of Manchester.

Looking for the place that I used to know

and then I saw some people and it started to snow on Manchester.

Manchester Anthem by James Herring

What is it about Manchester that makes it such a pre-eminent city of music?
Well that’s the question that’s bothered musicologists for quite some time. It is a city that seems to be uniquely placed in the history of popular music, because it repeatedly jumps in feet-first into great music, great scenes, and on an international level. And we can look at places like Newcastle, Birmingham, Bristol, we see groups come from there, but it’s never as consistent as it has been from Manchester. And I think that that’s because Manchester, if you look very closely, you can see the tracer bullets being fired throughout history.

There’s always been a tremendous musicians’ infrastructure here in Manchester that’s enabled the different movements or genres or waves of music to happen and to continue and carry on so that one builds on the other. And we can look right back into the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century. Mancunians demanded and devoured music at an incredible rate.

We’ve got the birth of the Hallé Orchestra, one of the great international classical orchestras. It’s here in 1855, but you go back in 1780 the Gentleman’s Concerts is the beginning of the Hallé. They would get audiences of two and a half, sometimes five thousand people wanting to hear the latest classical music, which if you think about it is very punk. This stuff, it wasn’t classical then it was contemporary but they wanted to hear it.

Also mixed in with that you’ve got the Jewish elements, you’ve got Celtic elements, you’ve got folk elements, all of them pouring into the city, devouringpeople at an astonishing rate, but also producing culture at an astonishing rate. So if you look at say The Making of the English Working Class by EP Thompson, he writes at length about the creation of working class culture, and music was an essential part of that. It’s not particularly radicalised or political. It’s there as a release mechanism, it’s there as a carriage system to take you away for an evening into a transport of delight.

So by the 20th century, we’ve got the dance bands, we’ve got working-class unemployed jazz bands, groups of people playing kazoos, wearing costumes, trying to outdo each other. They’d go to a football pitch or a recreation ground, then you’d get different jazz bands. Each street would have one, neighbourhoods would have them, cities would have one and by the 1930s they’d have competitions against each other. Who were the best marching jazz bands?

By the 1950s, because of the Second World War we’ve got Burtonwood Aerodrome, Burtonwood American base, which is 25 miles away Manchester and it means that every weekend we get an influx of American musicians who are based there coming into Manchester, also going into Liverpool at the same time, and feeding into the groups that exist, principally, at that time, jazz bands. And the jazz bands were not your kind of Acker Bilk trad, these were modernists, these were people who were influenced by Charlie Parker, Dexter Gordon, and they wanted authentic black American players if they could get them, but they’d settle for white ones if they had the chops.

A great interest began in Manchester to trace jazz back to its roots and those roots come from folk blues, from whatever. And this led to an interest in people like Muddy Waters, Chicago R&B. So that at the end of the 1950’s, you’ve got a lot of groups who’ve come up watching the emerging rock and roll scene on television or at the cinema. They’ve come through skiffle, so they’ve got instruments, they can play them, but the music that’s being developed is beat music, which essentially a kind of white English version of R&B. But it’s music with a beat, it’s music for dancing to.

And we get by 1964, we can find over 200 beat clubs in the Greater Manchester area. Some have come, some have gone, some are there for the whole period, but it’s an astonishing amount of beat clubs.
Now this mirrors what’s going on in Liverpool at the same time with what is known as Merseybeat, again the word ‘

beat’ races up there. But we get this strange separation. At one time both scenes were mutually symbiotic. It’s only 30 miles away (along) the East Lancs Road. In the early 60s groups from each city would be passing one another on the East Lancs, waving to one another, playing each other’s gigs, going backwards and forwards. People like Epstein, the promoters at Wooler at the Cavern, Danny Petacchi in Manchester, the Abadi brothers would book bands from Liverpool, Manchester, as I say, mutually symbiotic.

But then came The Beatles and The Beatles, for better or for worse, kind of destroyed that amicable relationship, because internationally, people only saw Liverpool and the Mersey poets, the Mersey scene, the Mersey beats, or whatever and Manchester, kind of, became the poor neighbour in musicological terms, so that even though Herman and the Hermit’s, (Herman’s Hermits) who were the second biggest selling English group in America after the Beatles, were from Manchester, if you asked an American, they would say that they were from Liverpool, because they thought there was only Liverpool.

Manchester began to emerge from under that shadow I would say with 10cc at the end of the 1960s, early 1970s, because they brought a studio to Stockport, and this is a major studio, and I think a very under-sung achievement. They put Manchester, Stockport on the map in terms of… “Oh yeah!”, I mean, people came from America to record there. Fascinating place.

So the next wave is created by the musicians themselves. It was in 1972 because there were so few gigs because, not a lot of people know this, Manchester is the only city that I’ve come across that had an Act of Parliament passed to stop beat clubs. They were so, I don’t know, morally outraged at the beat clubs that the 1965 Corporation Act which came into force oddly enough on the first of January in 1966, was designed specifically to stop beat clubs and crush teenage rebellion. Not that it was particularly rebellious, but there you go.

So there were very very few venues for musicians. And when I started playing in the mid-60s, I could play every night of the week in the Greater Manchester area. By 1970 you were lucky if there was one gig a week. So in 1972 Victor Brocks organised a meeting at the Bierkeller off Piccadilly and the Music Force was founded, which was a musician’s cooperative. And it was a socialist organisation which was going to be, and indeed was musicians taking control of their own destinies.

Now that meant that they had an office where they would ring up, create venues, force venues into taking Mancunian groups. They would provide the transport if it was needed, they rent out PAs, they’d do the posters. Now, all this infrastructure, they even had a newspaper called Hot Flash, a music paper, all of this infrastructure was in place when Howard Trafford, who becomes Howard Devoto, turns up in 1976 at the Music Force offices asking where he might put on the Sex Pistols. And they direct him to the Lesser Free Trade Hall and the rest, as they say, is history. Because we then get with Buzzcocks and Spiral Scratch, which set a template for the punk DIY ethos.

This is the first kind of internationally recognised Manchester music scene, which by 1983 we can lump in The Smiths, the Haçienda has opened, by 1988 we’ve got the whole Madchester scene, by 1996 we’ve got the international recognition of Oasis, by 2000 we’ve got Badly Drawn Boy, we’ve had M People, and it continues to roll. It goes on and on and on.

Manchester is a place that musicians now gravitate to. It’s a place which produces again and again consistently good acts which are capable of breaking it on an international scale.

I can’t remember who actually said this so my apologies, but it’s impossible to talk about Manchester without talking about music and it’s impossible to talk about music without talking about Manchester. I think it’s Haslam.

So it’s not just the fact that we have lots of different nationalities and it’s a place where people come to live, migrate, the point you’re making is also that there is an infrastructure there, going back a long time, that laid the foundation to organising bands and organising music and performances, that that’s also an important reason, which I wasn’t aware of.

I think that it’s definitely my take on it, that infrastructure has always enabled musicians to operate to their maximum ability. It encourages them and it doesn’t necessarily facilitate them in getting a van. I mean, nowadays we’ve got the Manchester Musicians Online, which is a kind of self-help agency. North West Arts are now very interested in… Why are all these musicians in Manchester? They’re also… North West Arts now interested in facilitating recording studios and that kind of thing, which I suppose is good.

We’ve got the Manchester District Music Archive, which I’m one of the trustees of. Even Urbis is very supportive of local musicians and the local music scene, in terms of looking at the graphic design, the posters, album covers, t-shirts, wellington boots. But, no, for me it was the I would argue it’s the fact that there was always an infrastructure there. The cultural influences, I haven’t even begun to scratch the surface of that, it’s fascinating. Yes, the Irish and the Jews have a lot to answer for.

And maybe something in the water, who was it said that there was something in the water?

Peter Hook said to me, he thought that it was definitely something in the water, when I put the question to him, and we both decided that we would agree on that, which would have been a much shorter answer for you.

What about the American influence and the Northern Soul thing. First of all, maybe you could explain what Northern Soul is. You recently did an excellent BBC radio programme about Northern Soul but for people who don’t know what it is, what is Northern Soul and why was it so popular in Manchester in the north of England?

Um, gosh, that’s like asking what is it about Manchester that makes musicians? Northern Soul is a genre, it’s a musical genre and it applies specifically to a kind of urban Black, urban American dance music that’s still being produced today, but over the sixties let’s say. So a grotesque example would be Tamla, though I know that that’s anathema to most Northern Soul… People would understand that. Black dance music, good good poppy, catchy dance music.

The phrase Northern Soul was originated by writer and promoter and all round genius Dave Godin in an article in 1971, where he’d come to Manchester and seen what was happening at the Twisted Wheel, and said “If this has to have a name, let’s call it Northern Soul” because Mancunian DJs had chosen a specific avenue of Black American music that was very popular in the North West of England.

Now it goes back to 1845 when the first blackface minstrel troupe, the Christy Minstrels appeared in Manchester. Now this might sound quite bizarre but it began a fascination with Black American music. The Blackface Minstrels were playing an approximation of black American music. That strangely enough filtered into Irish traditional music in the shape of the banjo and the bones. They saw them in Dublin and within 10 years people were playing banjos in pubs in Dublin and Galway and what have you, and the bones, which are free, if you’ve killed a cow. So the people in Manchester developed it, they loved it. They couldn’t get enough of this kind of entertainment and they came back again and again throughout the 19th century.

Now in the middle of the 19th century the American Civil War was a period of a great hardship in the North West of England. We’ve survived on cotton and cotton couldn’t get through, because the Union fleets were blockading the Southern ports. Now the cotton workers of the Greater Manchester area were starving, but they marched in their thousands to support President Lincoln for the emancipation of slaves, even if it meant that they would starve.
So it there had always been this very very close affinity between… or a recognition of African Americans and the struggle for freedom, for equality, which carries through into an appreciation of the music, up to a point in the mid 20th century where it becomes almost obsessive.

I think because there was a kind of a recognition or an empathy, a feeling that if you were a white working class kid in the great Industrial North, you in your own way were oppressed and you could look towards Black American music either providing you with a voice, in terms of Blues, or an articulation of your plight, or as a point of release. Within Northern Soul dance music it’s a release. It’s an effective system for carrying you out of your physical body for three minute bursts. As long as the song lasts, you’re dancing and you’re away.

And it also, to go out in another direction, there’s a kind of exclusivity with Northern Soul where people, I think, felt that they were onto something that nobody else was aware of, and that forms a very very tight bond with all the other people who had gathered there with you. So it’s very tribal and I think in the North, whether we’ve been one generation in Manchester or twenty generations, we are very tribal about being Mancunians.

What other influences do you think or connections are between America and Manchester? You mentioned about the cotton industry and how much of an effect…?

Well the River Mersey finishes, it flows down the Pennines and it finishes in New York. So you’ve got that direct straight line across the Atlantic, and will leapfrog over Liverpool. I mean Liverpool must have been so fed up when the Manchester Ship Canal said “Well, we’ll just bring the cotton to Manchester up this big river.”
Do you know it was supposed to end in Didsbury? The original Ship Canal Company had their first meeting at Fletcher Moss and the guy lived there, and he envisaged it being like on his doorstep, so you just step onto the ship and go to America whenever he wanted to. So it would have carried on through Northenden up to Didsbury Village, which… Imagine what it would have been like!

The affinities with America, that direct line, emigration, immigration, a two-way street. Lots and lots of business was with America, particularly Cottonopolis, which we’ve already talked about. Entertainment, musicians, Stan Laurel is from here, Charlie Chaplin was in the seven Lancashire Lads clog dancing troupe, before going with Fred Karno to America.

So the Mancunian Film Studios existed in the 1920s doing silents and then gave up when sound came along. But a guy called Burt Tracy who was from Droylsden had gone to Hollywood with Stan Laurel and had worked for Mack Sennett came back to Manchester and Laurel and Hardy were coming to visit at the Midland Hotel, and he said to Johnny Blakeley from Mancunian film company: “Oh, come along and meet the lads”. And they got there and Stan Laurel said “Well why aren’t you making films any more,” and he said “Wow, it’s too expensive,” and he said, “Well just hire a studio.” So they did and they made the first George Formby movie, which is a massive hit.

All because Laurel and Hardy came to Manchester and Burt Tracy knew them, Mancunian knew them, and we get the birth of the proper Mancunian Film Company, which feeds into Granada Television and the BBC in a direct bloodline in the same way that music is feeding in, in that Steve… I can’t remember his second name… sadly he’s been dead for a long time, if you look at the logo for Band On The Wall, there’s a man with glasses and a little beard and a beret, and that was Steve who revitalised the Band on the Wall in the 1970s.

Now in the thirties he’d been in the schoolboy jazz team in Ancoats, the Little Rascals jazz band and they played at the Cotton Club in Harlem. So he’d gone from Ancoats to Harlem, as a kind of novelty act, played there, came back obsessed with jazz and we get that whole thing in the 1950s, which feeds back into a desire to discover the roots of jazz, which takes them to see people like Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, John Lee Hooker, who were all regular performers in Manchester. Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, all these people loved playing in Manchester, and they also they used to say things like it reminded of America, probably just being nice. But Alexis Korner who’s one of the founders of the British Blues had a flat in Manchester because he played up here so much because kids wanted R&B, they wanted Blues.

Elton John when he was in Steampacket with Rod Stewart said that the greatest place on the planet to play in terms of audience reaction was The Twisted Wheel. If they liked you, that was it, you were made, you were back there every other week and you know, people had permanent residencies then, and Spencer Davis, Steampacket etcetera.

People like Neville who’s in one of my books about Bob Dylan, the first book I wrote, Like the Night, Neville worked at ABC television in Didsbury and every penny he had went on collecting Blues records. And he couldn’t believe it one night when Spencer Davis said:

“Oh, we need somewhere to stay for the night.”

He said: “You can stay at my ’ouse,”

and he lived in a council house in Wythenshawe with his mum. He took Spencer Davis group back. And he had a reel-to-reel tape recorder and they just sat in his front room all night and played Blues for him.

And you hear stories about kids in back-to-back terraced houses in the 1970s with lino on the floor paying fifty quid for a single because they’re that obsessed with the ownership, of that authenticity, of that belonging.

I’m out of the loop in a way now, but I don’t know if there’s still quite that same obsession with the authenticity and how House music pans out into Black dance music. Is Kenny “Dope” Gonzalez a black New York DJ or a white New York DJ? I wouldn’t know. But for years and years and years the white working-class kids in the north west of England were very very obsessive and very very possessive about Blues music because they had an affinity for it and they had a recognition of it.

I think I understand a bit more now actually from what you’ve been saying about why it is that Manchester has just got this magic, what I call magic about it, in terms of music. But you’ve really just scratched the surface. You’ve written… how many books have you written on music?

Specifically I’ve written, had published three books, one on Bob Dylan’s films, which we’ll forget about, even though it’s very good, but the first one is about Bob Dylan playing at the Manchester Free Trade Hall in 1966, which is a very pivotal moment for music generally.

What’s the book called?

That’s called Like the Night and in a sense it was the pivotal moment of the documentary last year, the Scorsese documentary, the ‘Judas’ shout, and it’s one of the great climactic moments in music history.

Now the most important book relevant to this is Shake Rattle and Rain, which is a history of popular music in Manchester from 1955 to 95, and if I only have the wherewithal, I would write Shake Rattle and Rain 2, which would be the history of popular music 1855 to 1995, because I just keep discovering more and more about it all the time, and how they all interlink.

And just as a little aside, tell me about a few of the famous musicians that you’ve interviewed, maybe Manchester ones, maybe other ones.

Well, met or interviewed in my time, I met Jimi Hendrix, Pete Townsend, it’s very hard to remember … Everybody! Because I was a professional musician for years and years.

And the name of the band that you played in?

Well, the first band was Greasy Bear then the next band was The Albertos or Alberto Y Lost Trios Paranoias, and we played our way around Europe and did the obligatory bit of America.

But in terms of interviews for the book, I got hold of as many people as I possibly could. So Peter Hook, Clint Boon, Pete Farrow, an old beat group member, yes he is old, so he’s an old beat group member.

Basically anybody I could get hold of. Bruce Mitchell, who’s been playing since 1955 and is still playing with the Durutti Column, Vini Reilly, Ed Banger, Howard Devoto, Pete Shelley, but then also other people like Richard Boon, who is essential to the history of Manchester music. He ran New Hormones, which was Buzzcocks’ management company, but they also facilitated Linda Sterling and John Savage. At the moment I’m compiling a list of people who are to do with Manchester music. Not musicians per se, because they get neglected.

And many of them are still around

Many, yeah.

But most people wouldn’t know they were.

No, no.

And yet they’re enormously influential.

Very very influential.
Can you give me an example of one of these influential people that you would see around?
Um, well, if you were in Stoke Newington, you’d see Richard. In Manchester you generally can find…

Tosh Ryan.

Tosh. Now what would we say about Tosh? I mean, the founder of Rabid Records, he was a jazz saxophonist in the 1950s. In the 1960s played with Victor Brock’s Blues Train. He’d also played with John Mayall, was a founder member of Music Force in 1972, founded Rabid Records in 1977, has been creating a massive kind of digital video archive of Manchester musicians, which we don’t currently know the whereabouts of! He’s misplaced it, but he was trying to interview every single musician he could get hold of. So there have been people trying to chronicle it and hold it together. That’s now being carried out by the (Manchester) District Archive, Music Archive.

That’s what I also wanted to ask you about, because if people are interested in finding out more about Manchester music in general, where can they find the information?

It’s on our website, which is just undergoing reconstruction, but if you do a Google for Manchester District Music Archive, you’ll find it. And it’s being relaunched at the end of September in an interactive way.

So what we want people to do, is… it’s a bit like Wikipedia, in that you can access the information we have and you can add your own information to it. And we don’t just want Jeff Davis, who played bass guitar in the Rattlesnakes, or The Denton Boomerangs, we want people who went to gigs who would say: “Yeah I used to go to Rafters and I thought it was fantastic, and I can remember Rob Gretton deejaying,” or what have you?

So we want the memories, because music can’t exist without the audience and we want their reaction just as much as we want the input from musicians. So this is the new website, which is launched at the end of this coming September, will be the springboard, it’ll be kind of virtual museum which is the springboard towards us hopefully opening up the actual physical premises.

Okay, well that was a fascinating little session there, scratching the surface…

…haha!

…of a fascinating subject so thank you very much.

Thank you very much!

Filed Under: AVZ-EN, Manchester, Music, Salford, Stockport Tagged With: 10cc, Alberto Y Lost Trios Paranoias, Chris P Lee, history of Manchester, Howard Devoto, Manchester concert venues, Manchester music, Manchester music scene, Manchester Ship Canal, Merseybeat, music in Manchester, music scene Manchester, Northern Soul, Oasis, Strawberry Studios Stockport, The Beatles, the Hallé Orchestra, Tosh Ryan, Victor Brox and the Blues Train

Aidan’s review of Cotton Panic by Jane Horrocks – Why mainstream reviewers got it wrong

2017-07-16 By Aidan O'Rourke

Jane Horrocks performing in Cotton Panic

Jane Horrocks performing in Cotton Panic


5-stars

As I understand it, one of the aims of the MIF is to stretch artistic boundaries, to encourage people, both performers and audiences, to move out of their comfort zone, to experiment, take risks and try out new things.

That’s certainly true of Cotton Panic, a unique combination of theatre, music, on-screen projections and sound effects, narrated and performed by Jane Horrocks, created by Jane Horrocks, Nick Vivian and the electronic band Wrangler. The show was fittingly held inside the decaying Upper Campfield Market hall on Deansgate.

I looked at a few reviews in mainstream newspapers and as usual I found them unhelpful, as they didn’t understand the concept and contained petty criticisms.

I decided to write a review myself to give proper credit to this very powerful and inspiring musical-theatrical creation.

In fact, I was so impressed with Cotton Panic I went to see it twice.

So what was it about the show that grabbed me? There are many reasons, many aspects overlooked and ignored by the reviewers.

One of the most striking things is it is self-contradictory, a merging of opposites. It combines modern electronic music and imagery to tell a story that takes place in the mid-19th century. Folk songs are combined with contemporary techno, produced on stage by the three musicians working behind the semi-transparent screen. It was exciting to see an old computer with glowing lights on the left, and a reel to reel tape recorder on the right. What would the people of 1862 have made of these instruments?

A couple of the reviews describe it as ‘gig-theatre’, a term I find condescending. It’s a mixture of music, drama, dance, on-screen imagery presented on a stage in front of a standing audience.

This is a story that’s an important part of the history of Manchester. It’s our history and it’s still relevant today. The cotton famine came about due to the American Civil War. Southern American ports were blockaded by the north. The supply of cotton was stopped, causing the Lancashire cotton industry to grind to a halt. This caused huge poverty. But the workers of Lancashire remained in solidarity with the American president due to his opposition to slavery. This fact is documented in Manchester’s Abraham Lincoln statue, which appears on screen.

The story is told by Jane Horrocks, sometimes singing in her very high voice, sometimes narrating, and occasionally shrieking, against the loud, techno musical backdrop,

The three huge screens, one behind the performers and two on either side, show images projected by industrial size digital projectors. Cotton dust like a snow storm is a constant feature as well as a ghostly female figure that could be called ‘Queen Cotton’.

At other times, we see quotations by authors describing the events of the time and the terrible poverty. We see a gigantic face of Glenda Jackson, reading a dignified description of terrible poverty that’s still shocking after a century and a half.

Later we see a facial close-up of an African-British actor – I’ve not managed to find out his name – delivering more powerful quotations.

Great review. The name of the very talented actor who recited the Frederick Douglass quote is Fiston Barek.

— Eimear O'Donovan (@EEmur) July 17, 2017

It’s always very interesting when new connections and juxtapositions are made. The deafening roar of the factory machines is echoed in the industrial beats of the electronic music. Could it be that Manchester’s electro sound was inspired by its industrial heritage? Maybe. A woman in factory overalls does a traditional clog dance to a contemporary beat. The clogs looked like they are very good quality, I wonder where they were made.

There were many transatlantic echoes. In the early part of the show, the Lancashire cotton towns are read out in time with the music, and later, towns in the southern US states. Jane Horrocks waves a mid-19th century US flag. Later there are contemporary media images of the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement, interspersed with glimpses of mayhem on the streets, Donald Trump and Brexit.

Jane Horrocks is the lynchpin of the performance, holding it all together from beginning to end. She is a unique actor, a talented singer and a powerful narrator, her voice often amplified with a megaphone. She can transform herself from an angry agitator into a helpless child beggar, emphasised by her very high voice.

In one section, she wanders into the audience, repeating the words ‘Can you help me a bit?’, over and over again, and then then she is lifted up on the shoulders of fellow performers. It was moving – you could see it in the reactions of audience members.

In the reviews I gather that commentators found this and other sections a bit long and perhaps self-indulgent. I totally reject this criticism. The long sections emphasise drudgery and repetitiveness, whether of a 10-hour working day in a cotton mill, or a long day spent begging in the streets for a few pennies. The architecture of the piece is spread out and not curtailed in order to pander to a short attention span.

Hall of the Upper Campfield Market

Hall of the Upper Campfield Market before its conversion for ‘Cotton Panic’

I’ve heard people complain films are too long, like 2001 ‘Oh, it was too long’. No, that’s wrong! Its length is the whole point! It’s like complaining that The Cruel Sea has too much sea in it, or Lawrence of Arabia has too much desert. Cotton Panic has long, repetitive sections that help to tell the story. If they are longer than the three second sound bite editing culture of today, so be it.

What other interesting juxtapositions are there? I loved the use of Slave to the Rhythm by Grace Jones in connection to the rhythm of the cotton spinning machines. In the latter stages of the story, the cotton workers decide to go for a meeting at the Free Trade Hall, which is just around the corner from the venue. She sings the words ‘Anger is an energy’ from the song by Johnny Rotten, co-founder of The Sex Pistols, who performed at an infamous gig at the Lesser Free Trade Hall in 1976.

I was astonished at the statistics and learned a lot. Whilst there was much poverty, some cotton Lancashire workers earned very high wages, the highest in the country. Seeing Cotton Famine has encouraged me to find out more about this forgotten period in Manchester’s history.

I saw the performance twice – on Thursday 14th and again on Saturday 16th and both times I was captivated. The second time I stood near the front, close to the stage and watched as Jane Horrocks came out into the audience just a few feet away. On both occasions I saw it, it was absorbing and the time flew.

It’s a shame the reviewers failed to appreciate these qualities. I often think that reviews should be mostly written by people who know how to appreciate a piece of music or theatre, rather than those who don’t, or perhaps they were asleep, or thinking about going to the pub afterwards.

This was a show about our city, Manchester, our history, our region, presented using the medium of the music that came out of our city – techno / electronic, presented by artists from around here. It has a clear and simple concept. It was very powerful musically, theatrically and historically and was perfectly in the spirit of the Manchester International Festival. I unreservedly give it a five star rating.

.

I couldn’t make it to Manchester so I watched it online, it made me want to dance, to cry and it was utterly moving in many ways!

— Jule Sverne (@s_jule) July 16, 2017

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: electronica, history of Manchester, industrial revolution, Manchester International Festival, music, musical theatre, techno music, Theatre

Why Manchester should be called: ‘City of Libraries’

2017-04-15 By Aidan O'Rourke

They incorrectly call Manchester the city of rain, but I think it should be called City of Libraries, as there four major historic libraries in the city centre. They are open to visitors and I went to all four libraries in one day in order to research this feature and take the photos.

John Rylands Library Manchester

At first sight, the John Rylands Library looks like an ancient cathedral but it is a relatively modern building.

in the first year of the twentieth century and was one of the first buildings in Manchester to be fitted with electric lights. After John Rylands died in 1888, Enriqueta Rylands founded the library in memory of her husband.

A modern extension was added to the rear and as you walk from the entrance up the stairs and into the original building, there is an interesting transition from bright modern to dark neo-Gothic. Many exhibitions are held at the John Rylands Library and anyone can go in and work there, I sometimes do.

It’s part of the University of Manchester Library. One of the locations in my Anglo-Chinese novel Stargirl of the Edge is a library inspired by the John Rylands.

There is unfortunately one negative aspect: The modern low energy light bulbs are less photogenic and atmospheric than the clear light bulbs that were used from the early years of the library until around 2013.

www.library.manchester.ac.uk/rylands/

John Rylands Library facade

Interior of Chethams Library, Manchester

Chethams Library is the oldest public library in the English speaking world and is housed in a 15th century building that’s part of Chethams School.

The library is a perfectly preserved time capsule from centuries ago, and is full of the atmosphere of the past, with its dark wooden walls and corridors. It’s not difficult to imagine Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels sitting in one of the alcoves by the window.

The Chethams website showcases many of the hidden treasures of Chethams Library. It is a remarkable place. Anyone can visit during opening hours. You just need to go to the main entrance to Chethams school. It’s best to check the opening times on the website and to phone up to make sure there are no events happening.

Go to www.chethams.org.uk

Chethams Library 2004

Interior of the Portico Library Manchester

The Portico Library is located on Mosley Street in a building with a Greek style portico which gives the library its name.

I’m impressed with its mission statement ‘The Portico Library is open to all and aims to enhance and develop life-long learning by providing and promoting access to knowledge and education in Art, History, Literature and Science.’

The Portico Library is located on the corner of Mosley Street and Charlotte Street. To enter, just ring the bell on Charlotte Street. You go up the stairs and when you get to the top, you will be amazed at the beauty of the interior. It’s virtually unchanged since the early 19th century.

The Portico Library has a friendly, homely atmosphere. The staff are welcoming and very helpful. It’s possible to become a member, and support the work of this institution, that has been a part of Manchester for over 200 years.

www.theportico.org.uk

The Portico Library on the corner of Mosley Street, Manchester

Restored reading room in Manchester Central Library

The Central Library is my favourite building in Manchester and like many, I used it during my schooldays.

It was opened in 1934 and apart from the cleaning of the exterior, remained mostly unchanged until the renovation of 2011-2014, which transformed the interior. The magnificent main reading room was restored but the book stacks below it were taken out to make way for a circular reception area with a cafe which is now a regular haunt of mine.

The Archives+ area is a high tech facility combining the local history collection with the North West Film Archive and other resources. The reading room has been restored and looks almost exactly as it did before the renovation.

The new Central Library has lost some of its 1930s character and eccentricity, its distinctive smell and the tiny lift. Now there are fast lifts housed in a glazed lift shaft. The building meets present day standards and is a striking mixture of old and new. The floorspace is much bigger than it was, extending under Library Walk into the neighbouring town hall extension. There are meeting rooms and spaces for events.

The only negative aspect of the renovation is the controversial modernist-style glass link building, which in spring 2015 is not yet open.

Apart from that, the Central Library is in my opinion the best public library in the UK and remains my favourite building in Manchester.

www.manchester.gov.uk/centrallibrary

Manchester Central Library exterior

So there we are, four major, historic libraries in one city centre, all open to the public and free for everyone to use. Definitely a reason to visit Manchester.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Architecture, books, cultural institutions, culture, history of Manchester, Libraries, literature, Manchester

Forgotten mansions of Manchester and Salford

2015-03-26 By Aidan O'Rourke

Clayton Hall Manchester in sunshine

Clayton Hall Manchester in sunshine

 
In the Manchester area, Tatton Hall, Bramall Hall, Lyme Hall and Heaton Hall are the most famous local mansions or houses that were once the homes of the rich and influential families. But there are smaller and less famous halls that are often forgotten and overlooked. Each one has a unique appearance and a fascinating history.

Clayton Hall is a suprisingly well preserved 15th century house in Clayton east  Manchester. It’s a Grade II* listed building, one of six ancient monuments in the City of Manchester. I was very impressed with the exterior which is remarkably photogenic. What makes it unique is its moat and the stone bridge across it. I understand there are plans to fill the moat with water. Clayton Hall functions as a Living History Museum and there are events throughout the year. Now that there is a Metrolink stop named after it, there’s no excuse not to visit!

Hough End Hall in the shadow of an office block.

Hough End Hall in the shadow of an office block.


 
Hough End Hall is a medieval hall in south Manchester. It was built at the end of the 16th century and is also Grade 2* listed. It was the home of the wealthy and influential Mosley family. Mosley Street in Manchester City Centre was named after them. Sadly two modern office buildngs were constructed on both sides of Hough End Hall, blocking the sun from falling on its façade. It is currently up for sale. The Metrolink line to Manchester Airport passes close by.

Baguley Hall, a medieval house in Wythenshawe Manchester

Medieval building Baguley Hall with front garden


 
Baguley Hall is a medieval house that was built in the 14th century about two miles south of the river Mersey in Cheshire. In 1931 this area became part of the City of Manchester and the surrounding area became known as Wythenshawe. It’s a Grade 1 listed building and is owned by English Heritage. As I was taking the photograph, a local resident told me it has an impressive wood ceiling inside. It’s one of Manchester’s Ancient Monuments and is on the ‘buildings at risk’ register.

Baguley Hall Manchester 1999 image from Eyewitness in Manchester
 
Longford Hall was the home of the cotton magnate and philanthropist John Rylands. His wife Enriqueta gave Manchester the John Rylands Library in his memory. The hall was built in 1857 and was run on a lavish scale. Later the hall passed to Stretford, then Trafford and was in use until quite recently. Due to unfortunate circumstances the house was lost and only the entrance portal remains. We can only imagine its former magnificence. There are plenty of photos available online. Longford Park has an enthusiastic friends group.

Longford Hall entrance portico

Longford Hall entrance portico


 
Let’s not forget Agecroft Hall, which was bought by a wealthy American in the 1920s, shipped across the Atlantic and reconstructed in Richmond Virginia where it is a tourist attraction today. Search for Agecroft Hall to find the official website.

Agecroft Hall, Richmond, Virginia (photo from Wikipedia0

Agecroft Hall, Richmond, Virginia (photo from Wikipedia)


 

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Architecture, history of Manchester, houses, Manchester heritage, mansions, stately homes

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