Judy Dyble was an English singer-songwriter. Her first band was Judy and The Folkmen (which existed between 1964 and 1966). They made homemade demo recordings, none of which were released, but some are included on a mooted anthology of Dyble’s career, (but the release was cancelled when Sanctuary was taken over by Universal.) She then became the original vocalist with Fairport Convention from 1967 to 1968.
In November 1966 Ashley Hutchings asked her to sing and play in some of the various band incarnations with himself, Richard Thompson and Simon Nicol. They were all part of jug-bands and anything that needed a female vocal, mainly because of their reluctance to sing. This became the nucleus of Fairport Convention, initially with Shaun Frater as a drummer and later Martin Lamble. The group recorded their first album with her, their repertoire at the time consisting of both American singer-songwriter works, plus originals.
This track which times out at almost 8 minutes was part of concert recorded in 1968 on the Baton Rouge French TV show. Their sound at this point could easily be mistaken for Jefferson Airplane. After her stint with Fairport Convention, Dyble (along with her then boyfriend Ian McDonald) joined the English pop band Giles. Giles and Fripp by famously advertising in Melody Maker. Dyble contributed to demo recordings for the group, but left after her relationship with McDonald ended. Giles, Giles, and Fripp – retaining McDonald – would later evolve into the foundation prog rock band King Crimson. Sadly there is no video footage of Dyble with GG&F but here she is singing ‘I Talk to the Wind’ a GG&F song that would also appear on King Crimson’s first album, with scenes from the film ‘The Third Man’.
Dyble would go on to become one half of the duo Trader Horne, with ex-Them member Jackie McAuley. The group took its name from John Peel’s nanny Florence, called “Trader” Horne—a reference to explorer Trader Horn. She then had a career as a solo artist releasing several excellent and much sought after albums.
Dyble performed at Fairport’s Cropredy Convention Festival with her own Band of Perfect Strangers; and she also appeared with the surviving original members of Fairport Convention, celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the formation of the band in 2017. The songs sung by the “early years” line-up were “Time Will Show The Wiser”, “I Don’t Know Where I Stand” and “Reno Nevada”. All three songs were often performed in the first year of the band’s live performances in 1967–68.
Here she is with her band ‘The Band of Perfect Strangers’ remembering the early days with Fairport and singing what was to become their very first single. This recording was one of the last that she made before her death in July 2020 after a long illness.
