[IainJohnston]

I was about to post a link about Lorne Balfe, who I was going to say composed a lot of the music
on the BBC TV series of Philip Pulman’s Dark Materials trilogy, currently on BBC One right now.
http://www.silvascreen.com/silcd1612-the-musical-anthology-of-his-dark-materials/

I was going to say that he is the son of David Balfe, who wrote/produced a great many of the jingle
packages for Edinburgh’s Radio Forth here in Scotland, in the pre-relaxed-conditions era from 1974 to
the late 1980s, and for several “associate” stations within the Forth Group, and elsewhere.

Sadly, while hunting for links, I found that David Balfe died just a few days ago.
https://www.inverness-courier.co.uk/news/tributes-paid-to-inverness-composer-david-balfe-who-has-died-aged-74-185432/

I know that a particular JMer has over time made great efforts to track down what might be the last extant tapes
of David Balfe’s radio work (other than cassette dubs, poor MP3s etc.)

Perhaps copies of his jingles from the days when “ILR stations” were just that might surface “In the clear”.

If anyone on JM has access to prime dubs of David Balfe’s earlier work at Edinburgh’s SoundHouse, it would
be good to see if they could be made public in appreciation.

IJ

[rakMember]

In a few weeks’ time, you could try contacting Lorne Balfe via Twitter https://twitter.com/Lornebalfe or his website http://lornebalfe.com/contact/ – whoever runs those accounts may be able to put you in touch.

[IainJohnston]

Thanks rak – I know that the other JMer had been in contact with the Balfe “family” (not sure
which family member) a wee while back and there was a discussion about “tapes”.
Possibly the usual “boxes of old stuff in the attic” situation as so often happens.
I’m aware that the JMer only got so far in attempting to get hold of anything.

Some of David Balfe’s earlier work, as “Highland Studios” of Inverness – e.g. Northsound stuff – I have,
but the Edinburgh “SoundHouse” packages especially for Radio Forth are proverbial rocking horse ****
and it would be tragic if that got lost for ever. Someone I tried in Scotland wasn’t even interested in
chatting about the dubs he might have (or other station stuff either).

Some of it was sometimes a bit …er… but other times as good if not actually a lot of individual cuts
better IMPO than Alfasound etc.

I’ll pop some samples on later (no, NOT the “JAM clones”, we all know about them!)

[IainJohnston]

A little bit of David Balfe – Radio Forth Christmas Charity Auction 1980 (?), and a listener wants
to hear some jingles – and they played them back-to-back in real-time, SWAPPING CARTS in and out !!!
– no “F4” on the PC – the “IBM-compatible PC” as we know it was barely invented!

https://soundcloud.com/allthebestjingles/ij-airbyte-radioforth-charityauction-jingles/s-EuGsK

Some other ones – especially the rare “Festival City Radio” small suite for the Edinburgh Festival, and what
I call the “News and Information Station” (well, no other know title!!!) which was actually some damn good jingles!

https://soundcloud.com/allthebestjingles/ij-airbyte-radioforth-balfejingles-low/s-7YDLG

Credit:- this 2nd particular audio is is an extract from an absolutely HUGE Radio Forth jingles aircheck made
at the time by Gordon Low – the amount of “listening hours” to bag all those jingles on-air must have been crazy! :^

[jonnoMember]

Superb audio clips Iain – I enjoyed those!

[IainJohnston]

Thanks Jonno!

I could have waded through the old “cassettes drawer” for a ridiculous amount of old Forth airchecks, but the “auction” one
I’d digitized a few years ago for a JMer.

The Gordon Low one is a fair piece of airchecking work. All credit due there.

Still to post other “Forth” grails by David Balfe – Great Music Radio, the Forth/Tay Together networking set.;
Possibly there’s a Max AM bundle somewhere.
We.ll ignore “Greatest Memories, Latest Hits” and “RFM” for their Copyright dodgyness!

[rakMember]

The ‘Close to You’ package was excellent. Hope the masters, or cart dubs, turn up at some point. There are quite a few in this YouTube video, accompanied by photos around Edinburgh. From 3’30” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLomTWkTk48

It would be nice to hear the Radio Borders versions of these, too. Just about receivable up on the hills above the Tyne Valley. Off-air will be fine.

[amigoMember]

Thanks for letting us know Iain. Such sad news.

[Author]

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