Bill Leader
This is the essence of the citation I gave when Bill was presented with the EFDSS Gold Medal in September 2013…
I’m a great believer in something called The Ripple Effect – when you throw a stone in a pond the ripples spread out and on and on. Likewise when somebody does something bad or good the ripples of that carry on spreading out and on…
Let me tell you a little story…
In or around 1971 Christy Moore was sleeping on our floor in Crumpsall Manchester. He had released an album called Paddy On The Road – produced by Dominic Behan which had been a minor success for him – but he wanted to make something less commercial – more folkier. I suggested that he give Bill a ring – “D’you think he would have me on the label?” he asked. I said I reckoned so. He did phone Bill, and Bill said he was more than happy to record Christy.
Christy went home to Ireland and gathered round him a cluster of musicians that included Liam O Flynn, Andy Irvine, and Donal Lunny. They spent a few days rehearsing and then Bill drove to the ferry with his old Revox tape recorder and a couple of AKG D12 Microphones and the result was that great album Prosperous, named after the big old house in Kildare where the album was recorded. The musicians and Christy stayed together, added Johnny Moynahan to the muster and became Planxty.
The effect of that band on the Irish music scene was phenomenal. I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that in Planxty the young people of Ireland saw their roots and their music as something alive and exciting – over the following years there were other bands like De Dannan, Dervish, Arcady, Beoga and Danu following in their steps. Christy of course has gone on to have a career that has spanned five decades and has taken him across the world. The wheel came full circle when it was Christy who presented Bill with his long overdue Good Folk Award at the 2012 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards.
I tell you that story simply to illustrate how the work of one extremely talented man working with a good pair of ears and a nose for great music can have a massive effect on the world of folk music.
I don’t think it is possible to overestimate the effect Bill Leader has had on the music we love – from his early work recording Ewan MacColl, Isla Cameron and A.L.Lloyd on the Topic label; his work with Nat Joseph of Transatlantic Records which produced the Dubliners, the Ian Campbell Folk Group, Davey Graham, Bert Jansch and Pentangle through to his own labels” Leader and Trailer.
On the Leader label you had traditional irish musicians like Martin Byrnes, Seamus Ennis and Seamus Tansey and that great 4 album box set by the Coppers A Song For Every Season.
And here’s just a few of the artists of the second wave of the Folk revival who found their voice on Trailer:
Christy Moore, Nic Jones, Archie Fisher, Barbara Dickson, Tony Rose, Robin and Barry Dransfield, Vin Garbutt, Pete and Chris Coe, Dave Burland, Martin Simpson, Bob and Carole Pegg, Bob Davenport, Martyn Wyndham-Read, Aly Bain, Dave and Toni Arthur, Roy Bailey, Leon Rosselson, John Kirkpatrick, Ray Fisher and many many more.
And of course there was that seminal release, Bright Phoebus by Mike and Lal Waterson.
In the early years many of the recordings were made not in a studio but in Bill and Helen Leader’s flat in Camden Town.
Robin Dransfield told me that their great album Rout of the Blues was recorded in the bedroom using a couple of AKG D12s and John Renbourn reckons he recorded one album with the tape machine in the sink and he himself in the broom cupboard. Bill says that’s an exaggeration – the flat was too small to have a broom cupboard.
For a while that flat at North Villas, Camden Town was part recording studio, part home and part hostel for any visiting folkie who happened to be passing through. I slept on the floor many a time and shared the space with Aly Bain, Mike Whelans, Hedy West and that great border singer Willy Scott – not all at the same time I must add.
But not only is Bill a great recording engineer and producer – he’s also a great cook and a great gourmand. It was Bill who introduced me and many more folkies to Tandoori Chicken – a rarity at that time I think the curry house was called Anwars – one of the first in the country with a real tandoor. Bill also seemed to know exactly when Yates Wine Lodge were releasing bin ends of great Irish single malt whisky at something like a tenth of their price. If you want to know what was hot in the folk world or where to get good food and drink in most of the cities and towns of the UK – Bill is your man.
One last story before I wrap up – when Harry Boardman got a gang of us together to record Deep Lancashire, Bill came up with his Revox and his mics to what was then UMIST and set up in one of the lecture halls. He didn’t use the stage – which had drapes and rostra and a table as you might expect. He wandered round the hall clapping until he found the exact spot he wanted for the recording. After that we all lined up – the Oldham Tinkers, Harry, Bob Diehl, Dave Brooks, Harry Ogden and the rest of the gang and we did our bit. Deep Lancashire I think still is the best selling album Topic ever had.
So – after more than 400 albums to his credit the great man is still working with people like John Ellis who produced the two Oddfellows albums and Bill has also worked with The Woodbine and Ivy Band on that great young label The Folk Police.
The ripples in the water are still spreading….
Links:
Dyverse music: Bill Leader Discography
Illustrated Leader/Trailer Records Discography