Club News

  • Club Meeting 25th July

    Every Wednesday –   All Months -Informal weekly gathering at the Clubrooms, for coffee or tea and a chat. 9:30 am.

      • Club News :
      • ZL1SK  Merv Thomas – It is with much sadness the Club advises the  Passing of life member Merv Thomas – ZL1SK.
      • As Per the Family Wishes – A private Service Will Be held – RIP Merv.

      • Thanks to AudioCulture

      • New Zealand has lost a giant in its popular music history. Merv Thomas, whose career goes back to the early 1950s, died yesterday, two weeks short of his 95th birthday.
        Only in February did he retire from his role as the MC at the Auckland Jazz and Blues Club.
        Graham Reid, introducing his AudioCulture profile of Merv, did a good job of summarising just part of his vast contribution to New Zealand jazz and popular music:
        “No other musician could claim to have backed the young rock’n’roller Johnny Devlin, and built the tape machine on which they originally recorded his debut single ‘Lawdy Miss Clawdy’ in 1958, to have played Dixieland jazz at Mt Eden’s Crystal Palace ballroom during its heyday in the late 1950s into the 60s, to have played the four-note trombone hook crucial to Allison Durbin’s biggest hit – and also to have appeared on the Verlaines’ Flying Nun album Bird-Dog in the late 80s. But Merv Thomas can say that. And so much more about his crowded life …”
        Merv seemed ubiquitous on the Auckland music scene from the moment he arrived in Auckland, from Whanganui, in 1954. Soon he was playing in jazz combos at St Seps and at the Mt Maunganui festivals. He was in the first rock’n’roll band, formed by Frank Gibson Sr, and resident at the Trades Hall.
        Leading the Dixielanders, he drew thousands to the Crystal Palace, also duetting with Marlene Tong in a Louis Prima/Keely Smith style act. He was a regular member of the elite radio dance bands who broadcast live from the 1ZB radio theatre. In the mid-60s he became a rarity: a freelance trombonist, at a time when he and his wife Carol had five children.
        Only Merv could pull that off.
        Our condolences to his family and his countless friends in music.
        Graham Reid’s account of Merv’s extraordinary life, based on an interview by Chris Bourke, and research by Dennis Huggard, is here: https://www.audioculture.co.nz/profile/merv-thomasets
      • The 80-metre HF Net is on 3.650 MHz at 8:00pm every Friday. +/-10 kHz if QRM/QRN is a problem.
        The net roster is on the club’s website. VHF Net is on Wednesdays at 8:00pm on 146.525MHz. The
        40-metre Net, when operational, is also on Wednesday at 8:15pm on 7.090 MHz after the VHF Net.
        Because night time conditions have been poor for the 40-metre net in recent weeks, we have
        decided to suspend the 40-metre net until further notice.
      • Click here for  – HF.VHF.UHF. NETS
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