BERYL BRYDEN

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Bryden, Beryl                      1920-14th July 1998

Beryl Bryden was born in Norwich on the 11th May 1920 and raised at the family home in       Street. It was whilst working as a shorthand typist that Beryl started performing with the Cambridge Jazz Club, her distinct vocal style and stage presence soon made her a crowd favourite. Relocating to London in 1945, Beryl first worked as a shop assistant in a record store and then later within the music business for Melodisc Records. She soon found herself becoming a part of the growing trad-jazz movement keeping up her spare time appearences with acts such as Chris Barber, George Webb, Freddy Randall and Alex Welsh. and even took to playing the washboard full life often returning to the city to appear with local & big name acts. Her biggest claim to fame must still be playing washboard on the Lonnie Donigan hit Rock Island Line in 1955, from this Beryl was offered a recording deal at Decca, four recordings were made, over two sessions but only two were released as the other two tracks suffered recording imperfections, both sessions featured Alexis Korner on guitar who was to eventually lead the R&B explosion of the early sixties. Beryl then pushed two solo singles on Columbia I’m Movini’ On & I’ve Been Living with the Blues in 62 & 63 respectively. During her forty four year career has seen her record over 100 hundred tracks in 12 different countries, the discography below though only lists those two records that elevated her to fame. She celebrated her seventy fifth birthday with a party at      , despite anouncing her retirement in the early eighties Beryl continued to record and perform especially at collegues birthday parties and reunionsing onon but sadly died in  1998.   

Discography:

7” Rock Island Line b/w John Henry Decca F10647[ ]55

7” Kansas City Blues b/w Casey Jones Decca FJ10823[ ]56

also recorded were Rock Me & This Train in January 57 but not issued.

7” I’m Movin’ On b/w Moanin’ DB4860[ ]62

7” I’ve Been Living With The Blues b/w Big Daddy DB7010[ ]63

Mediography:

Blues Singer in a hurry EEN 07/01/1956[ ](P)

Beryl Blues in EEN 28/08/1956[ ]

Publications

 ‘Skiffle’ a detailed biography on skiffle music written by a legendary skiffler himself Chas McDevitt

TV & Radio
BBC British Jazz Club - Ldn 13/12/54
GVox with Chris Barber’s JB on After You’ve Gone
BBC British Jazz Club - Ldn 19/12/55
GVox and WB with The Cy Laurie JB on I want every bit of it & All the girls go crazy about the way i walk
BBC Six-Five Special - 17/05/58
Alex Welsh & His Band with Beryl Bryden unk trks
BBC Jazz Saturday Night at the Royal Albert Hall - 02/02/57
Lonnie Donegan / Humphrey Lyttelton / Cy Laurie
Beryl Bryden / George Melly / Ken Rattenbury
BBC The Trad Fad & All That Jazz - 19/08/61
Mr Acker Bilk & His Paramount Jazzband
Monty Sunshine’s Jazzband with Beryl Bryden          
BBC The Trad Fad & All That Jazz - 09/09/61
Bob Wallis & his Storyville Jazzmen
Monty Sunshine’s Jazzband with Beryl Bryden
The Fairweather-Brown All-Stars
?? Young At Heart 18/04/62
ATV The Story Of Trad - 01/08/62
The story of traditional jazz as told by George Melly
(joint 17th in the network TAM ratings for that week)
Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen / Humphrey Lyttelton & his Bd
George Melly / Bob Wallis & The Storyville Jazzmen
Monty Sunshine’s Jazzband / Beryl Bryden / George Webb
Acker Bilk - Band of Thieves film clip / Ken Colyer /
Granada West End / The Temperance Seven

Caterina Valente / Bobby Van / Alan King    
Southern: Day By Day - 09/08/62
Beryl Bryden      
BBC Juke Box Jury - 27/10/62
The Jury - Polly Elwes, Sid James, Steve Race, Beryl Bryden
Southern: Day By Day - 25/12/62
Adam Faith / The Beverley Sisters / Humphrey Lyttelton
Beryl Bryden / Tommy Loughra
BBC The 625 Show - 30/04/63
Beryl Brydon / Jan Burnnette / The Koalas / Alan Randall
Johnny Sandon & The Remo Four /
Ricky Wilson & The Young Ones
Southern: How To Enjoy Jazz Without Really Trying - 03/09/63
George Chisholm / Beryl Bryden
A-R Stars And Garters - 04/09/63
Clinton Ford / Kathy Kirby / Julie Rayne / Tommy Bruce
Vince Hill / Sandra Gale / The Don Harvey Trio
The Nigel Brook Singers / Alan Braden & his Band
Beryl Bryden
BBC2 Jazz 625 - 19/05/65
George Lewis with Mr Acker Bilk’s Paramount JB & Beryl Bryden