It is sad to report a genuine jazz hero and lover of the music, the founder of Hep Records Alastair Robertson.
He was originally from Aberdeen, lived most of his life in Edinburgh where his day job was as an art teacher at the old Portobello High School, and retired to Pitlochry.
His original aim when he founded the label in 1974 was “to issue albums of well known jazz musicians and bands of the mid 1940’s drawn from radio acetates and transcriptions.”
But his enthusiasm was far wider than that, and the Hep catalogue is vast. He has been a massive supporter of more recent jazz in general, and of British/Scottish jazz from Bobby Wellins and Spike Robinson to Joe Temperley, Jim Mullen and Tina May.
His enthusiasm was responsible, for example, for reviving the career of American saxophonist Don Lanphere (1928 -2003) from the late 1970s onwards which resulted in seven albums. He also released five albums by pianist Jessica Williams.
And his enthusiasm kept going…The last album which Alastair Robertson produced was recorded this summer in Glasgow, a tentet of Scottish musicians led by Frank Griffith which will be released in the next few months.
We welcome memories and expressions of gratitude and expect/hope to publish a fuller tribute in due course.
One Response
Like the late Tony Williams and Spotlite, Alistair Robertson started out with issues of old material on vinyl, much of it previously unreleased, and developed the label into a showcase for later talent. I remember hearing the orchestra of Boyd Raeburn for the first time in one of those very early HEP LPs, back in 1974. Sad to think that after 50 years we are losing another fine label, with a producer who really cared about his productions. I will always be grateful that he produced, back in 1979, Jimmy Deuchar’s final record (“The Scots Connection”), Jimmy lived till 1993, so was not over-recorded, despite his great talent. Till Alistair recorded him, Jim hadn’t recorded under his own name since his final sessions for Tempo in 1958.