Restoring London's lost dance tapes of the 1930s

Available for over a year

You might associate dance music with the likes of David Guetta, Calvin Harris and others from the 21st century. But what did dance music sound like in the 1930s? Jonathan Holmes is a BBC journalist in Bristol, who, in his spare time has an interest in "old fashioned" music. Jonathan has a YouTube channel with almost 5,000 subscribers, where he shares the best of British jazz and dance band music from the 1920s and 30s. The music is taken from his own gramophone record collection and restored digitally. One day not so long ago, Jonathan was contacted by Malcolm in East Finchley, who is the grandson of a 1930s dance band pianist. Malcolm said he had some discs in his attic and had no way of playing them. He was doing some research on the family history and saw some of Jonathan's record uploads featuring his grandfather, who was called Alf Kaplan and was part of the 'Oscar Rabin band'. In a 21st century radio first, we hear the lost tapes and how hearing his grandfather's music has enabled Malcolm to connect with his family history.