[teachercreature]

Words can’t describe my sadness at reading of David’s passing. I had been totally out of the jingle collecting hobby for a couple of decades. Then, I discovered Jinglemad and shortly therafter..David. We swapped jingles across the pond numerous times and I owe my rekindled interest in the hits between the hits to “Barras.” He will be sorely missed by all of us in the jingle community.

[NickySMember]

There really isn’t much more that I can add to what everyone else has said. Such sad sad news. RIP David – our little jingleworld is a lesser place without you.

[robynretro]

My jaw had dropped when I’ve read the news about David’s passing. There’s nothing that I could say that has already been said.

My sincerest condolences to family and friends. He will be missed.

:>(

Robyn

[DWSharp]

Just read about David. I met him here on Jinglemad this year and did not really get to
know him. He was a true jingle lover. Condolences to his family and friends.
DWSharp

[darenjhMember]

A very helpful and insightful gentleman to me, a complete novice. My one and only discussion with him was not necessary on his part, but he found the time. Thank you David, rest in peace.

[radioboy949]

I am incredibly depressed over this news. David and I traded jingles for years and we both expanded our collections as a result of our trades. A nice guy who was always willing to share, even embargoed packages with me. This is terribly sad news. Nice fellow. RIP David.

[AndyWMember]

May I add my condolences to this very long list.

Mr. Barras did hid best to swell my jingle collection and my already deep appreciation of JAM! A lot of his trades to me have become much played treasures. Unfortunately I only ever exchanged emails with him, some date back to the start of this site. I remember around five years ago we pestered the people at EMI to try and work out where the EMISON archive is and even if one existed. I think he got a Lindisfarne Metro Radio cut out of it but we never found the EMISON stuff. My last trade his way was from an EMISON master tape that was kindly given to me back in the summer. He even asked me to send him a photo of the tape box!

He was generous to a fault, always extremely helpful and full of anecdotes. I lost count of the number of emails which started, “This is Embargoed but I know you’ve been after this for years”.

This forum will be worse off for his passing. God bless David.

[bobgreenradioMember]

oh my my my. im at a loss for words.
everytime he would message me; i would fall out of my chair laughing. i dubbed him “dB”, and he never objected. i recall messages from him on a recent vacation trip that i very much wished i was on too! every time he talked about something there was a multi page list, quite accurate, of what he had in his stash, and i would ask where he learned to type so much and fast. a talent i wish i had!

but the last time he left me laughing for hours was for a photo of the wolferts backyard swimming pool, dead grass and all!

“my god david, where do you get this stuff” ?

a one of a kind guy. now silent.

[DavidHemsley]

Very sad indeed, was only a few days back that I was playing some of David’s material he did send me over the years.

Well as you know we did the Collector Tales series last year, sadly David could not voice his own piece but he did share his jingle collecting life in the form of written words, and by way of tribute to David, I reproduce below the original text he did send me.

David Barras – Collectors Tale:

Hello,

my name`s David Barras, I`m a radio ID jingle collector.

I was aware of radio jingles at a young age when I first heard jingles on Radio Luxembourg, Radio 1 and Radio 2 and when we visited relatives in London and I heard jingles on Capital Radio and then on my local commercial station in North-East England, Metro Radio.

I would say it was around 1977 when I first seriously, started to collect jingles and I still thank, to this day, a radio man/broadcaster called Len Groat. Len was a presenter on Metro Radio and got me “into” jingles in a big way. On Len`s radio show called “Stateside” Len would play American radio station jingles along with the Metro Radio jingles, I guess it would have been confusing for that little, elderly woman listening to WABC New York City and KHJ Los Angeles jingles on her radio in Newcastle-upon-Tyne !

I wrote a letter to my local DJ (Len !) about jingles and Len actually rang me at home and we talked jingles, at that time, family and friends didn`t really “understand” my interest in jingles but Len did.

Len kindly sent me some cassette tapes with lots of jingles including some demos from a jingle company called JAM Creative Productions of Dallas, Texas. I was fascinated to hear jingles sung for American radio stations that I had heard sung for Radio 1 and Radio 2. These tapes got me hooked on jingle collecting and I`ve never stopped to this day.

This is how the beginning of my jingle list reads:

Many thanks to Neal Bowden who has contributed a `vault` full of jingle audio to my collection…
Thanks also to Jeffrey T.Mason for a wealth of JAM & TM material…
And…a BIG “thank you” to Tracy Carman for being my jingle educationalist…

Thanks to everyone who has traded/donated jingles with me over the years, the list would be too long to mention everyone…….thanks to (in no particular order) – Pete Wilson, Len Groat, Adrian Allen, Gary Wilkinson (Nick Jordan !). John Barnes, Geoff Barton, Colin Ridley, David Hemsley, Dan Akers, Joe Caronetti, Iain Johnston, Sean Martin, Don Blesse, Richard Kell, Chris Roth, Mark Hodgkinson, John Quincy, Steve Fountain, Anthony James, Jon Wolfert, John Foster, Chris Stevens, Ken R, David Furness, Graham Collins, Stacey, Paul McGrath, Oldies Guy, Brian Anderson, Norman Barrington, Jeffrey Gray, Nicky Schiller, Rob Walker and many other individuals…

If you would like to trade jingles, please email at: davidbarras@blueyonder.co.uk

I`ve made a montage to go with the following text and the audio highlights jingle benchmarks of my jingle collecting life !

(1) The start of the montage features the first JAM demo that I collected in 1977, You`ve Got It and this remains not just my favourite JAM demo but my favourite demo of all time.
(2) WAEB was the first full package of an American radio station I collected, this dub is a JAM composite of Priority One, Positron, ProMod.
(3) The first full package of jingles I recorded from a UK station is the PAMS composite from Metro Radio. I knew a tech-op (Tom) via hospital radio and he worked at Metro. We dubbed the PAMS jingles onto reel-to-reel and I saved my pennies up to buy a reel-to-reel machine.
(4) I guess the first package of UK jingles I was given was the Steve England/Piccadilly cuts by JAM, another offering from Len Groat on one of his cassette tapes.
(5) There have been several major jingle acquisitions during collecting, one of them being managing to collect ALL the JAM dubs for Radio 1 and Radio 2 and nearly everything from Metro Radio except, my “Holy Grail” the Lindisfarne package, hear an example in the montage.
(6) Another jingle benchmark for me was when I first wrote a letter to Jon Wolfert at JAM in 1980 and Jon kindly sent me some cassette tapes of the Radio 1 and Radio 2 packages at that point in time, Jon also included a demo called Image Songs, also known as WNDE songs. I`ve included one of these jingle songs in the montage.
(7) When at school I did a week`s work experience as a “dog`s body” at Radio Tees in Stockton, Cleveland UK and actually recorded my first audition demo as a presenter in production at Radio Tees. I didn`t get the job but a man called Mark Page did ! – This sounds silly now but I was more intererested in recording the Radio Tees jingles from cart than concentrating on my DJ demo. The jingles were by Cath Baxter and remain my favourite set of UK local radio jingles, some examples in the montage.
( The very first package of jingles that I worked with as an on-air presenter was in 1990 at Wear FM in Sunderland. I`ve included the main theme jingles in the montage
(9) My favourite jingle company of all time is JAM of Dallas and as a presenter I got to use JAM`s Breakthrough package on-air in 1997 at Sun FM in North-East England.
(10) One of the best experiences of my jingle life so far has been the “Jingle Trip around Dallas” in 2004 with Neal Bowden and Jeffrey T.Mason, we visited Thompson Creative, TM, JAM i/c THE JAM VAULT !, PAMS and accidentally drove past N2 Effect.
(!1) Me and Neal visited with Tracy Carman in 2009 and saw the Media Preservation Foundation building with thousands and thousands of jingles housed there. There is more to this visit jinglewise
but I cannot mention here, all I can say is…….thank you Tracy !

Collecting radio ID jingles continues to be a great “hobby” for me and I`m not going to drone on about how easy it is to collect jingles nowadays i.e. the click of that mouse etc…one of things I miss about jingle collecting is finding a jiffy bag on the door-mat full of jingles.

Finally, allow me to quote the great Kenny Everett:

“There is nothing like a jingle to brighten up your day…”

Audio montage here:

http://soundcloud.com/eurojingles/david-barras-collectors-tale

[CHLOE]

mr barras sent me my first jingle package god bless his soul hes now in jingle heaven

[YarnelNicolas]

I’ve popped in and out of this website and hearing the news on David Barras’ passing…there are no words to describe it. So, I send my heartfelt condolences to the Barras family and to those affected. Thank you.

[gameswizardMember]

I didn’t know David personally, but we exchanged a few e-mails over the years.

He even sent me a couple of packages to add to my collection for nothing in return. What a super guy.

He will be greatly missed indeed.

RIP.

[ratnobMember]

Do make sure you listen to the new GEM-am JAM cut that Len has dedicated to David:
http://www.jinglemad.com/index.php?p=/discussion/9186/in-memory-of-david-barras#Item_3

[nostalgie]

Mes plus sincères condoléances. I am deeply sorry to hear the news.

« Those we love don’t go away,
They walk beside us every day,
Unseen, unheard, but always near,
Still loved, still missed and very dear. »

[WAVAMember]

This is very sad news.
Sincere condolences to his family & friends.

[Admin]

David with the 1997 Sun FM reference reel at JAM, Dallas Oct 2004.

TM Century, Dallas Oct 2004

JAM, Dallas Oct 2004

Neal Bowden, Tracy Carman & David Barras, Longmeadow, Massachusetts Nov 2009

[bobgreenradioMember]

nice pics.
is it out of the question to perhaps suggest a “david barras memorial storage wing” or something of the sort, be dedicated to the big guy on the site?

[Norman BarringtonMember]

I was dreadfully saddened to hear that David has passed away. He was one of the first collectors that I traded with via cassettes, when I returned to collecting after many years absence.

Always a generous gentleman with his time, knowledge and material, a key member of our rather unique fraternity. It seems to me that the thing that links us all, is above all, a real source of enjoyment, it’s creative, nostalgic, whilst also being cheerful and fun, a million miles away from our day to day troubles.

Recently another famous name from the jingle world passed away. Producer Tony Griffin.

His funeral was attended by a number of Dallas singers, and in a light hearted spirit they chose to sing a double acapella live as a farewell tribute to him.

I am told that it was very weird to hear these jingles coming from actual people in the church, rather than through the usual monitor speakers. I am sorry this is not customised for David, but I am sure we will all identify with the words and the spirit of a tiny song sung to a friend.

http://www.normanb.net/uploads/TonyFarewell.mp3

Not bad for a single take!

Cheerio David, it was a pleasure to know you.
Yours
Norman

[GrahamCollins]

That is beautiful Norman – I’m sure David would have been moved……

[ratnobMember]

Lovely post, Norman – spot-on.

[ratnobMember]

My tribute on the Bob Dinan blog:
http://www.bobdinan.co.uk/Blog/Jingle_Podcast/Entries/2012/12/9_Thank_you,_DB.html

[martinlesterMember]

I have just seen this and also shocked at the news 

While I never met David , I did exchange several packages with him over the years , david was also very helpfull in dubbing over my old tapes to CD’s

About 5 Years ago I put together what I called the ultimate JAM jingles competition

It was very hard as it contained about 1 or 2 seconds of various JAM jingles to identify 

David was the only person that came close to identifying all the cuts

RIP David JAM #1 FAN

[DunsBus]

Very shocked to hear of David’s passing – I always enjoyed reading his posts about the pre-split days of Metro and the packages used.

Having just recently suffered a bereavement myself I know how David’s family will be feeling just now and hope that they can take comfort from the joy he brought to them and of course to us all on Jinglemad.

Rest in peace, big man.

[DanielTennick]

I’m very saddened by this news.

David sent me my first ever Jingle package and got me hooked on Jingles. He always’s said if I ever need anything, just to give him an email and he would help me out as best as he could. Without him, I wouldn’t have a collection as I do now if it wasn’t for David and for that I’m forever great full. We exchanged our last email’s and Jingles in October when he was eager to hear my very first sung jingle.

I’m going to miss him, he was my ‘Jingle Mentor’ if you will. Always identifying Cuts and packages. If I ever had questions on anything, he always had the answers.

I now dedicate my collection to him, and I do so with pride.

My sincere condolences to his family & friends.

R.I.P Mr Barras, Legend of the Jingle world.

[Duncan]

This is really sad news. I only started trading with David this year and although we didn’t get to speak, his emails were so full of enthusiasm and he was very generous with his time… and collection. One of life’s real nice guys. Like eveyone here on JM, I’ll miss him

[Author]

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