Andrew Kershaw | |
---|---|
Born | Andrew J. G. Kershaw 9 November 1959 Littleborough, Lancashire, England |
Occupation | Disc jockey |
Years active | 1981–present |
Children | 2 |
Relatives | Liz Kershaw (sister) |
Andrew J. G. Kershaw (born 9 November 1959) is an English broadcaster and disc jockey, predominantly on radio, and known for his interest in world music.
Kershaw's shows feature a mix of country, blues, reggae, folk music, African music, spoken word performances and a wide variety of other music from around the world.
Kershaw was born in Littleborough, Lancashire, [1] on 9 November 1959. [2] His older sister is broadcaster Liz Kershaw. A headmaster and headmistress, Kershaw's parents instilled in him the ethics of education and self-improvement at an early age. [3]
As a party trick aged two, he would name the whiskered military men in his father's history books of the Great War, but he never felt the love or pride from his parents that he got from his grandparents, who provided a home from home. [4]
He was educated at Hulme Grammar School in Oldham where he took A-Levels in History, Economics and Spanish. He left the Economics examination halfway into the allotted time in order to attend a Bob Dylan concert but still achieved a Grade A pass in the subject. [5] He then studied politics at the University of Leeds from which he failed to graduate, his decision to apply for a place there being solely with an eye on the position of Entertainments Secretary for Leeds University Union. [6]
Kershaw was elected Entertainments Secretary in 1980, midway through his second year. A full-time commitment to a non-sabbatical office, he booked bands including Ian Dury, Dire Straits, the Clash, Elvis Costello, Iggy Pop and Duran Duran - the latter were paid £50 from Kershaw's own pocket to support Hazel O'Connor. [7]
Kershaw's first engagement after the University of Leeds was to oversee backstage operations of the Rolling Stones' epic 1982 Roundhay Park concert in Leeds. [8]
Kershaw began work for Radio Aire as Promotions Manager, a position he used - with station presenter Martin Kelner - to ruthlessly promote the UK's third-largest town without city status, Northampton. Unintentionally, at Radio Aire, he helped to launch the media career of Carol Vorderman, and made his broadcasting debut, fronting a late night alternative show and a weekly blues programme. After being made redundant from Radio Aire in 1983, Kershaw was employed as a driver and roadie by the singer Billy Bragg. [6]
His big break came in 1984, when he was asked to present BBC TV's flagship rock programme, The Old Grey Whistle Test , by its producer Trevor Dann, whom Kershaw had met when filming with Bragg the previous week. He subsequently recorded a television interview with his hero Bob Dylan, and a loud session from the Ramones. He co-presented BBC television coverage of Live Aid in 1985. In July 1985, Kershaw began life as a BBC Radio 1 DJ, ear-marked by the station as a possible successor to John Peel. [9] Room 318 of Egton House was to house Kershaw, Peel and their mentor, producer John Walters, whose Reithian motto was, "We're not here to give the public what it wants. We're here to give the public what it didn't know it wanted." His weekly Radio 1 shows were characterised by their high levels of enthusiasm and musical eclecticism. [9] [10]
Kershaw's "boredom" with Anglo-American rock led him to seek out sounds from further afield, especially Africa. Fellow DJ Charlie Gillett introduced him to Stern's African Records shop in London, and Lucy Durán exposed him to musicians like Youssou N'Dour and Toumani Diabaté, playing impromptu sessions in her London front room. Peel and Kershaw discovered Zimbabwe's Bhundu Boys simultaneously; the band began to feature heavily on their playlists. The Bhundus' singer Biggie Tembo became Kershaw's great friend. [11] [12]
This first year of broadcasting won Kershaw his first gold Sony Award in 1987. Kershaw was the first to play Ali Farka Touré on mainstream national radio, and the documentary they made together in Mali was the first ever to be broadcast simultaneously on Radios 1 and 4. [13]
Kershaw's contract with Radio 1 ended in 2000. His last months on the network featured sessions by Willie Nelson, Warren Zevon and Lou Reed. He then worked at BBC Radio 3 the following year, where he soon completed a musical tour of the so-called Axis of Evil: Iraq, North Korea and Iran. [14]
From July 2007 Kershaw was absent from his BBC Radio 3 show for an extended period, returning in 2011 with Music Planet, co-hosted with Lucy Durán. [15]
In September 2020 Kershaw returned on air on BBC Radio 3 presenting a two episode sunday feature, The Kershaw Tapes.
Kershaw has worked as a journalist for BBC Radio 4's From Our Own Correspondent , the Today programme and The World Tonight . He reported from the 1994 Rwanda's genocide, [16] Angola's civil war in 1996, Sierra Leone in 2001 and repeatedly from Haiti. [17] Kershaw covered the 2010 Red Shirt Revolution in Bangkok for The Independent . [18]
In his 1998 documentary for Radio 1, Ghosts of Electricity, Kershaw tracked down and unmasked, 32 years after the event, the heckler who shouted "Judas!" at Bob Dylan in 1966. [19] In June 2005 Kershaw criticised Bob Geldof over the choice of artists due to play at Live 8 , which included few black performers and even fewer Africans. [20] Kershaw has put together two compilations, Great Moments of Vinyl History (1988) and More Great Moments of Vinyl History (2004), which document his wide musical taste. [21]
Kershaw's autobiography, No Off Switch, was published in July 2011 by Serpent's Tail (later republished by Buster Press) and was praised by Stephen Fry among others. [22] [23] It received a negative review from Rachel Cooke in The Guardian , who says "He is always right, and those who disagree are always stupid". [24]
Kershaw had a 17-year relationship with Juliette Banner, with whom he has two children. [25] They moved to the Isle of Man, where the relationship broke down; he repeatedly harassed her. In October 2007 he was convicted of breaching a restraining order which required him not to contact her, and of driving under the influence, [26] [27] and in January 2008, he was sentenced to three months' imprisonment for repeatedly violating this order. [28] [29] He was arrested a few days after his release, and at the end of that year he was given a six-month suspended sentence. [30]
A much-advertised BBC Radio 4 interview with him, On the Ropes, was cancelled the day before transmission in April 2009 "over fears it would impinge on the privacy of his former girlfriend and their children". [31] In August 2010 he was due to return to working at the BBC. [32]
In July 2003, Kershaw was awarded an honorary doctorate of music by the University of East Anglia, [33] and in 2005 he was similarly honoured by his old university, the University of Leeds. [34]
In March 2007, Kershaw appeared on Desert Island Discs . [35]
John Robert Parker Ravenscroft, better known as John Peel, was an English radio presenter and journalist. He was the longest-serving of the original disc jockeys on BBC Radio 1, broadcasting regularly from 1967 until his death in 2004.
The Old Grey Whistle Test is a British television music show. The show was devised by BBC producer Rowan Ayers, commissioned by David Attenborough and aired on BBC2 from 1971 to 1988. It took over the BBC2 late-night slot from Disco 2, which ran between September 1970 and July 1971, while continuing to feature non-chart music. The original producer, involved in an executive capacity throughout the show's entire history, was Michael Appleton.
Christopher David Moyles is an English radio and television presenter, author and presenter of The Chris Moyles Show on Radio X.
The Bhundu Boys were a Zimbabwean band that played a mixture of chimurenga music with American rock and roll, disco, country, and pop influences. Their style became known as jit, and is quite popular across Africa, with some international success, and has influenced later groups like Nehoreka and Mokoomba. British world music DJ Andy Kershaw said that at the height of their magical powers they were "...the single most natural, effortless, catchy pop band I've ever heard"; the BBC's John Peel famously broke down in tears the first time he saw the band perform live.
Melody Maker was a British weekly music magazine, one of the world's earliest music weeklies; according to its publisher, IPC Media, the earliest. It was founded in 1926, largely as a magazine for dance band musicians, by Leicester-born composer, publisher Lawrence Wright; the first editor was Edgar Jackson. In January 2001, it was merged into "long-standing rival" New Musical Express.
Fluke are an English electronic music group formed in the late 1980s by Jon Fugler, Mike Tournier and Mike Bryant. The band were noted for their diverse range of electronic styles, including house, techno, ambient, big beat and downtempo; for their reclusivity, rarely giving interviews; and for lengthy timespans between albums.
Elizabeth Marguerita Mary Kershaw is an English radio broadcaster. She is one of the longest serving female national radio DJ's in the UK, celebrating 30 years on national BBC Radio in 2017.
Richard Anthony Crispian Francis Prew Hope-Weston, known professionally as Tommy Vance, was an English radio broadcaster. He was an important factor in the rise of the new wave of British heavy metal, along with London-based disc jockey Neal Kay, in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Vance was one of the first radio hosts in the United Kingdom to broadcast hard rock and heavy metal in the early 1980s, providing the only national radio forum for both bands and fans. The Friday Rock Show that he hosted gave new bands airtime for their music and fans an opportunity to hear it. He used a personal tag-line of "TV on the radio". His voice was heard by millions around the world announcing the Wembley Stadium acts at Live Aid in 1985.
Huw Meredydd Stephens is a Welsh radio and television presenter, currently broadcasting on BBC Radio Wales, BBC Radio Cymru and BBC Radio 6 Music.
"Teenage Kicks" is the debut single by Northern Irish punk rock band the Undertones. Written in the summer of 1977 by J.J. O'Neill, the band's rhythm guitarist and principal songwriter, the song was recorded on 15 June 1978 and initially released that September on independent Belfast record label Good Vibrations, before the band signed to Sire Records on 2 October 1978. Sire Records subsequently obtained all copyrights to the material released upon the Teenage Kicks EP and the song was re-released as a standard vinyl single on Sire's own label on 14 October that year, reaching number 31 in the UK Singles Chart two weeks after its release
Michael James Whale is a British radio personality, television presenter, podcast host and author. He gained initial prominence in the 1980s as the host of The James Whale Radio Show on Radio Aire in Leeds, which was simulcast on national television. From 1995 to 2008, Whale hosted a night time radio show on talkSPORT, followed by stints on LBC 97.3 and various BBC radio stations.
Transistor Blast: The Best of the BBC Sessions is a 4-disc boxed set by the English rock band XTC, released by Cooking Vinyl in November 1998, just three months prior to the studio album Apple Venus Volume 1.
"When an Old Cricketer Leaves the Crease" is a track on the Roy Harper album HQ, a prominent example of cricket poetry. Released as a single twice, in 1975 and 1978, it is possibly Harper's best-known song. The song captures the atmosphere of a village cricket match and is an elegy to the game as played during Harper's youth. It features Harper's 12-string acoustic guitar, and is backed by the Grimethorpe Colliery Band.
Greatest Hits Radio West Yorkshire is an Independent Local Radio station serving West Yorkshire on 96.3 and 106.8 FM, DAB, online and via the app.
Maida Vale Studios is a complex of seven BBC sound studios, of which five are in regular use, in Delaware Road, Maida Vale, west London.
Radio Aire was an Independent Local Radio station, serving Leeds and West Yorkshire.
Mark Page is a former English radio presenter, former Middlesbrough Football Club stadium announcer and convicted child sex offender. Between 1983 and 1987, he was the presenter of the BBC Radio 1 early weekend Breakfast Show.
Harry Agius, known professionally as Midland, is a British DJ, producer and record label owner who began his career in Leeds and is now based in London. He founded his label Graded in 2013 as an output for his own productions.
Pink Peg Slax are a rockabilly band from Leeds, England, formed in 1980. The band recorded a number of sessions for BBC Radio One, including for John Peel, and received day-time Radio One airplay during 1984-88. However, the band's records were commercially unsuccessful, and they never signed to a major label. Pink Peg Slax appeared on the 2023 Cherry Red Records release Where Were You?, a history of the Leeds indie music scene in the 1980s.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link){{cite news}}
: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)