Category: Latest

17-10-2018

Our book “Hit and Miss: The Story of The John Barry Seven” is now available!

£22.50
(plus add postage for your region)

For postage and packing please add:
UK = £2.95 (2nd class mail)
Europe = £10.90
Rest of World (Excluding Australia) = £16.30

You can order now!

http://paypal.me/Geoffers007
Let us know if you aren’t able to do this and we’ll work out another way

The book’s cover price is £30
anybody ordering direct from us will receive a 25% discount
reducing the cost to £22.50.

We’ll also need your mailing address, of course!

Further discount if you want two or more copies – ask for details

We have a limited number of signed copies – let us know if you want one of these

Alternatively, send us an email message
and we will be in touch!

Thoroughly and painstakingly researched over a number of years, it will feature contributions from several ex-members of the band and from friends and relatives of John Barry.

Comprising of over 350 pages, it will also be packed with an array of rare photos of the band, and the singers they often supported, as well as some unique images of memorabilia and documentation from that era; some never previously published, many more seldom seen.

Even if you are not necessarily a devotee of The John Barry Seven per se, the book offers a fascinating historical insight into the British music scene of the period and, more importantly, provides an essential read for anybody remotely interested in discovering more about John Barry’s formative career.

It will be of great assistance to the authors if you would indicate an interest in purchasing a copy of the book *now*, without obligation. We will then be able to notify you as soon as the book is available with details of cost and how to order and pay.

Just send us an email message and we will be in touch in due course. Visit our dedicated web page here!

Obviously your personal details will be kept secure and not shared with anybody else.

04-10-2018

Matt Monro Jr. retirement tour – “goodbye to dad” gets underway.

Here is a  long interview straddling news bulletin – 45 minutes approx, starting 14 minutes into show.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p06kjr2l

submitted by Sebastian Melmoth.

September 23, 2017

Every week BBC Radio London’s Robert Elms asks his listeners to pick their top London tunes.

Matt has been added too:

September 16, 2017

We have received three new images of Matt, courtesy of Anthony Middleton who supplied them.

They are now on the Photos page.

Over the past few years stories have circulated suggesting that John Barry did not arrange and conduct Matt Monro’s 1972 single comprising of “This Way Mary” & “Wish Now Was Then”, both based on themes from Mary, Queen of Scots.

The instigator of these stories may have been Richard Moore, the Audio Restoration specialist, in his book about the recordings of Matt Monro, which was part of a special edition of a biography of Matt written by his daughter, Michele.

Richard credited Colin Keyes as arranger/conductor on these recordings; despite the fact the original single credits JB; and EMI repeated the credit when providing me with “label copy” for the CD, The Don Black Songbook. In view of this, I asked Richard for more details, and his explanation is worth repeating in full.

“Yes this was a mystery solved in many ways. The original single doesn’t list an arranger or conductor and no paperwork for this session other than the “red form” (which was the session booking form) survives and this has no indication of who it was. However, as I’m sure you’re aware; Matt does not appear on the soundtrack of the film so it wasn’t clear if John Barry had any involvement.

As luck would then have it, whilst Michele was interviewing Colin he spoke of his first session – This Way Mary/Wish Now Was Then.

A short while later Michele uncovered some contemporary paperwork which listed arrangers and conductors of all recent material (dating from about 1973) which once again confirmed Colin as Arranger and Conductor.

Matt must have recorded the songs due to his long association with Don Black without John Barry’s involvement, in a similar vein to the Alice in Wonderland tracks in 1972 – also arranged and conducted by Colin.

All arrangers and conductors have been verified in the book and if I can find no documentation as to who it was (this only occurs two or three times and often to unreleased material) this is specified in the text.

There are no alternate versions of those tracks so I can only assume that EMI were simply guessing when they gave you that information as they did not know themselves – after all how many times has John Barry been credited as arranger (and even sometimes composer) of “From Russia With Love” (even to the point where Matt’s version appears on one John Barry compilation when the recording has no JB involvement at all!).”

On the face of it his explanation sounds plausible, but he makes some assumptions which are contradicted by other evidence.

Firstly, he states that “The original single doesn’t list an arranger or conductor” — but it does; see the photos, kindly supplied by Gareth Bramley, below. Richard may have seen an on-line demo version which contains no credits.

Secondly, there is a photo of John, Don Black & Matt at a recording session, which, looking at their appearance, is clearly taken in the early 70s. There is no other Matt Monro recording involving John & Don at which this could have been taken. The later Matt Monro single of “Curiouser & Curiouser” & “The Me I Never Knew” was arranged & conducted by Colin Keyes.

Colin could easily have confused his session with the earlier one when asked about it by Michele — it was decades ago, after all.

Thirdly, the paperwork found by Michele “dating from about 1973” — could have been compiled some time after the 1972 recording, and if, as suggested above, the paperwork for the session is missing, somebody could merely have assumed Keyes was involved, based on his work on the tracks from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

Finally, I think we should also trust our own ears. If you listen to the two singles, it seems clear, at least to me and those with whom I’ve discussed it, that John was responsible for the MQOS recordings.

Hopefully, this will put the matter to rest!

Geoff Leonard

Article added: “Hard luck, Matt!” to the Articles page. Matt injured his right foot in December 1961.

3 April, 2017

While scanning for a new website called

http://www.ohboy.org.uk/thank-your-lucky-stars

I ran into several articles about Matt. We have posted them on our Articles page, at the bottom, for your convenience.

6 Feb 2017

“It’s lovely and for me, the highlight is when I’m singing with my dad again.” Matt Monroe Jnr tells us about his new tour