No more tracks from Geoffrey Carnall

Geoffrey Carnall 1 February 1927 - 20 February 2015

My father died yesterday aged 88. Much will be said in his memory in the coming days and months by the many who knew him, but the contribution I can uniquely make here is to highlight his brief career as a dub recording artist. At the time he was making fairly frequent visits to various London libraries, researching his biography of Horace Alexander. This meant that I had the pleasure of his company on several evenings. As my great passion at the time was creating tracks in a little digital recording studio I had set up in my front room, it was only natural to offer me dear ole pop a turn at the mic.

Part parlour game, part digital experiment, working under a poster that read "Trust me, I'm an artist," I'd quickly diddle a basic dubtrack into existence, before my father proffered his vocal improvisation, in a single take, ministry of quaker-style. Much more might be said about the detail of the process, but it's perhaps only important to note that the tracks were produced for instant online release on my weblog at the time, entitled "dougie's blog." Edits were light, decisions instant, regrets few, and there's a freshness and spontaneity to these tracks that I still enjoy to this day, besides the obvious satisfaction of immortalizing my dad's voice.

All who knew him are invited to the funeral (483kB pdf): Mortonhall Crematorium in Edinburgh at 1500h, Friday 27 February 2015. No flowers; donations to the Peace and Justice Centre, St John's Church Crypt, Princes Street, Edinburgh