A London born fan who discovered the blues in 1962 via the Alan Lomax documentary record, Blues In The Mississippi Night (Pye-Nixa, 1957), Paul Oliver's Blues Fell This Morning (1960) and the writings of Derrick Stewart-Baxter (Jazz Journal) and Albert McCarthy (Jazz Monthly). His main area of expertise is the life and music of Sam Lightnin' Hopkins and began writing about blues and related matters in 1966 for a variety of specialist and non-specialist UK magazines. Formerly a co-editor of Blues-Link (1973-75), news editor of Black Music (1976) and consultant to Talking Blues (1976-78), he has advised companies such as Polydor on their blues catalogues as well as compiling and programming releases for others like EMI, Pye and DJM. His knowledge and tastes span the whole range of black folk music and folklore: worksong, jugbands, gospel, rural blues, urban blues and R&B. An occasional contributor to Blues & Rhythm and Juke Blues magazines, today he is better known for his involvement with major research and discographical projects like Blues Records 1943-1970. ~ Alan Balfour, Rovi