Alastair Robertson was a great contributor to British and American jazz through his Hep Records label, which he founded in 1974 and was still operating at the time of his death.
Alastair discovered jazz via the Voice of America Jazz Hour, hosted by Willis Conover and broadcast from Frankfurt by The American Forces Network in the early 1950s. He launched Hep Records while teaching art at Portobello High School in Edinburgh’s coastal suburb. The label’s first release was an LP by The Boyd Raeburn Band, an innovative NYC ensemble from the mid-1940s, and Alastair would go on to issue a substantial output over three categories: The Metronome, the 1000 and the 2000 Series.
Metronome featured reissues of classic works by musicians including Buddy Defranco, Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Claude Thornhill, Alec Wilder, David Allyn, and the Dorsey Brothers. Similarly, the 1000 Series would include many of the black big bands from as far back as the 1920s, including Fletcher Henderson, Don Redman, Bennie Moten, and Chick Webb as well as the small groups of Slim Gaillard, Roy Eldridge, Teddy Wilson, Stuff Smith, and Coleman Hawkins.
Alastair’s unique and possibly most remarkable contribution to jazz, however, was his 2000 Series, which commissioned studio recordings from living artists from the US and the UK. The British contingent included trumpeter Jimmy Deuchar, pianist Eddie Thompson, saxophonists Bobby Wellins, Tony Coe and Joe Temperley, guitarist Jim Mullen, and singer Tina May and the many Americans included saxophonists Don Lanphere, Spike Robinson and Frank Griffith, guitarist John Hart and pianist Dan Nimmer.
Hep’s final CD was recorded in June 2024 and is still awaiting release. Referred to by Alastair as “The Last Hurrah”, it features a tentet celebrating Scottish musicians and Scots-themed pieces. Among the stellar ensemble are guitarist Malcolm Macfarlane, trombonist Gordon Campbell, pianist Dave Milligan, drummer Tom Gordon, saxophonist Konrad Wiszniewski and bassist Ewan Hastie. I had the privilege of leading and organising the session as well as contributing five pieces along with English trombonist/arranger Adrian Fry, who wrote three pieces and conducted.
Trumpeter and author Digby Fairweather said: “Alastair was a man of the highest integrity whose many reissues on Hep were of outstanding quality and unfailing integrity in terms of both production and production issues. His catalogue remains one of the finest in LP/CD formats, a lasting contribution to the world of jazz discography. He was also a hugely informed celebrant of the finest, and sometimes the more obscure or under-celebrated areas of jazz, and an extremely important figure in British jazz history. We shall not see his like again.”
Alastair didn’t court publicity and wasn’t a schmoozer in the public arena. He could be a bit gruff and didn’t suffer fools gladly. He and I had plenty of, let’s say, animated exchanges in our twenty-five years of working together, but he’ll be remembered for his total and consistent perseverance in producing more than three hundred recordings. Rest in peace, Alastair. You and HEP Records will be remembered and treasured into eternity.
Alastair Robertson, born March 3, 1941, in Aberdeen; died October 23, 2024, in Perth.
Frank Griffith is a Liverpool based saxophonist and arranger. His weekly radio show, The Jazz Cavern airs on www.purejazzradio.com
