Robert Brown Customer
(Curator note: Record cover or bags oftern had the customers name on)
Dad loved music and going dancing.
He grew up in Byker in Newcastle and lost his father when he was a small boy (my Grandfather died at Dunkirk) so there was a sadness about that and never very much money. I think music was an escape, and a window into a more glamorous world. He loved the big bands, and also Latin American rhythms like the Bossa nova and Rumba, which arrived on Tyneside in the 1950s and 60s. He paid for dancing lessons, which by all accounts was quite an extravagance, but he was keen to impress my Mum, so when they got together it was money well spent!
He joined the navy and became an engineer. He was a talented mathematician and worked on the design of De Havilland fighter jets.
All through our childhood, he was happiest with his music playing in the background, crooning with the crooners and scatting to jazz. He liked anything with good rhythm (from Benny Goodman to Jamiroqui) but especially big band music from the 1940s and 50s. His record collection covered so many genres, - I was surprised to find opera alongside classical guitar, next to disco classics and rock! It reflected a man who just loved music and got great enjoyment from it.
When Dad got dementia, his love of music remained intact when so many other things unravelled, and he would happily talk about going to dances and then rushing out to the record shop the next day to track down particular songs that he'd heard, so that he could practice the steps along to them for the next dance.
I hope this gives you a snapshot of my Dad. He kept an amazing database about his music which we found later. In about 30 spiral bound notebooks he wrote the name of each track and artist, and then a comment on what he thought about the song. His favourites got underlined in red! I have listened to some of his records on the old Bang and Olufsen stereo while I've been clearing his house and although I've really liked most of it, I'm sad to say it doesn't give me the same intense feelings of enjoyment (I think I'm more affected by visual art).
Anyway, here he is in his youth and then at 90yrs, with the same cheeky smile!
Thanks and kind regards,
Denise
