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Walter Love RIP 2024
26/01/24 - "Very sad news
received this afternoon. Walter Love MBE, the iconic
broadcaster, best known to 'Jazz North West' readers for his
outstanding Radio Ulster Jazz Club programme aired on Sunday
evenings, died in a nursing home at the age of 88 after a short
illness." - David Evans. 27/01/24 - Very sorry to hear
of the death at 88 of BBC Radio Ulster's 'Jazz Club '
programme's Walter Love. A true gentleman and superb ambassador
for Jazz. - Eddie Little, Secretary Manchester Jazz Society 03/02/24 - Walter Love RIP – The Last BBC Man Standing, Courtesy John Petters and written for Just Jazz Magazine
Long gone are the days of Humphrey Lyttelton, Peter Clayton, Campbell Burnap and Paul Barnes (who held sway on BBC Eastern Counties and retired some years ago) when jazz presenters were given shows as a result of their expertise and knowledge, rather than celebrity. BBC Radio 2, the station charged to give coverage to the genre, ignores its licence conditions, which state, “The remit of Radio 2 is to be a distinctive mixed music and speech service, targeted at a broad audience, appealing to all [my underlining] age groups over 35. It should offer entertaining popular music ….” Instead it has become a geriatric Radio One. Rumour has it that I’m over 35 and so, I would respectfully suggest, is the readership of JJ. Manifestly, BBC Radio 2 fails in its requirement to cater for the significant traditional jazz audience. It therefore fell to a distinguished professional at BBC Ulster to step in where the UK’s national station failed – and to do it very well. Walter presented “Jazz Club” on Sunday evenings for many years, which with the availability of the internet, became extremely popular throughout the world. His career stretched back to the ‘50s and led to him hosting a series of mainstream shows on the network – but his devotion to jazz and its creators and innovators was never far from Walter’s mind. I met him in the ‘80s, when I played my first gig in the province. Walter was involved in helping to promote the live jazz scene as well as via the BBC. He was a key figure in setting up two dates for Wild Bill Davison and Art Hodes, as part of my Legends of American Dixieland package, which played Belfast and Enniskillen in May 1989.
Over the years, he called me to do occasional interviews about the current jazz scene. At the suggestion of the much missed, Mike Pointon, Walter made the trip across the Irish sea to conduct a series of interviews in 2018 and I was deeply honoured to be included. I remember picking him up from Kings Lynn station and driving him back to my studio in Long Sutton. We conversed about the state of the jazz scene and the considerable losses in recent years. We did the interview, had dinner and it was back to London for the next interview. When Mike Pointon left the building, Liz Biddle asked me to take over the job of compiling reissue CDs for Upbeat Recordings, and I had great fun talking again to Walter about jazz history and our idols, as he reviewed the CDs. His clear love for the music shone through his presentations – and he always did his homework. I spoke to Walter over the Christmas holidays and he was recovering from a fall and expected to take up the reigns of Jazz Club again in the new year. Sadly that was not to be and he passed away at the age of 88, on 26th January. Our music has lost an irreplaceable ambassador. RIP Walter. See more in the Belfast Telegraph
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