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A Conversation With Blues Broadcaster, Music
Presenter, Podcaster and UKBlues Federation Founder,

Ashwyn Smyth

Ashwyn Smyth began broadcasting back in the 80’s. He’s continued on,
right through to the digital broadcast era with his current show, aptly
named Digital Blues! He’s published an electronic newsletter called the
Gig Guide, he’s hosted and presented live Blues shows, he’s produced
podcasts for the magazine Blues Matters, and he founded the UKBlues
Federation. It’s a very impressive resume!

I’ve known Ashwyn through his spinning my albums on his show, for many
years now. But it’s been an internet over-seas acquaintance, focused on my latest releases. We have never met face-to-
face or had the chance to really get to know one another.

I took this opportunity to find out all about Ashwyn
Smyth. This is what he told me …….

LL: Let’s start at the beginning! Would you tell
us about where you grew up and how you
experienced music in your family?

AS: A long time ago I was born in a nursing home
run by nuns in Keymer, near Burgess Hill in Sussex
but spent the first eleven years of my life living in
Brighton. My father, a teacher, was then appointed
deputy head of a prep school near Woking in Surrey
and so we moved there in 1959. Apart from going
back to Brighton to board at Brighton College for
five years from 1961, I lived in the Woking area until
my divorce in 1988 when I moved to Essex. Music
has always been one of the most important things in
my life; it has always been there. My paternal
grandmother played piano, violin and sang and my
father was a very talented and accomplished pianist
as well as playing flute and piccolo. He also
composed music and way before I was born he
conducted the first (and I think only) performance of
his concerto for cor anglais and orchestra at the
Brighton Dome performed by the Orchestra of the Royal Artillery, the regiment that his father had served in for most
of his life. I was always singing, in school choirs, in the bath, to records, whenever I could, and, at age 13, I played
Mabel, the leading ‘female’ part in a school production of Gilbert & Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance hitting top Cs! I
am told I made a very pretty girl!!

B In addition, during my time at Brighton College, I appeared on TV a number of times as part of choirs of various
sizes and sorts ranging from just six voices up to choral societies of nearly 100. I also sang in the Chapel choir, the
biggest bunch of non-believers you ever came across but all with a passion for singing! I sang a lot of choral stuff,
ancient and modern, as well as attempting, unsuccessfully, to learn piano and trumpet. I played the latter in the school
Combined Cadet Force and became Sergeant in charge of the CCF Band! I still have my trumpet but never play it
other than to frighten the grandchildren!

LL: When and how did you discover the Blues?

AS: The Blues has come into my life twice. The first time around it was the 60s and at the time you either loved the
Beatles or you loved the Rolling Stones! I was definitely a Rolling Stones fan and, of course, through listening to
them, particularly their first LP, ‘The Rolling Stones’, I heard a type of music that was new to me and which I loved,
which got inside me!