My abiding love of music was fully kick started in Ilkley. On a Sunday night there in March 1967 I saw Jimi Hendrix at the Troutbeck Hotel. Not only did I see him but we sat chatting for twenty minutes which was the first conversation I’d ever had with a black American. Prior to this my first brush with live music was the memorable evening I snuck into the Leeds Mecca to see Edwin Starr when I was fifteen. We were so naive that we started cheering when a black guy came onstage who we assumed must be him. It turned out to be the drummer in Edwin Starr’s band who sang a few numbers to warm the crowd up. At home we had a university student as a lodger. Fortuitously, he was not into music or drinking and so gave me his student union card on Saturday nights. This enabled me to get into gigs at Leeds University. I often tell people that I saw The Who at Leeds and they assume that it was when the famous ‘Live at Leeds’ was recorded. Sadly it was two months before that performance and I watched three members of the band mooch disconsolately around the stage waiting for Pete Townsend, who never showed, before sloping out and catching the bus home.
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