Listening for the first time to these tracks cut thirty years ago, I felt a few powerful old reflexes stirring. Ken's music has always had that effect on people. They either love it or hate it. For his musicians, or at least for those of us who understand what he was at, the relationship with the man and his music was ambivalent - frustration and euphoria went side by side. You loved it when things were going well, and you hated it when things went wrong for the same reason as before. Repeated defects could have been eliminated with a quick rehearsal, but Ken didn't believe in rehearsal. "It'll sort itself out on the stand," he'd growl at anyone bold enough to 'make a point.' Sometimes it did - in many ways it never did. One thing you could be sure of in those days: our performance was rarely mediocre, or 'competent', or 'polished.' It was either very good or just terrible. And this was a great deal more exciting than playing in a predictable band. After all, on any night serendipity could suddenly break through the anguish and make you perfectly happy. This was all part of the turbulence that was the essential Colyer make-up. The only possible comparison in the jazz canon that one can think of is Charles Mingus, with his determination to 'make it happen on the spot' and let his musicians find their own salvation.

And this was something you had to do. As Ken's first and last pianist (with a considerable gap in between), I soon discovered my own unique set of perks and frustrations with varying solutions. From the outset, with no 'easing-in' period, I had to learn a great deal of the repertoire on the job. Frequently I was out of hearing range of Ken's sotto voce comments; my only signals were the inaudible mutter, the foot-stomp and we were in. If it was something I knew, the automatic pilot would take over from bar two while I was still thinking "What the hell's it called?" If it was one I hadn't heard before (Ken was good at springing surprises) I'd flounder a bit at first. But Ken's melodic sense was so strong that the shape and the essence of the tune would be carried over from the ensemble into his solo, and, by God, you'd really know that number by the end and you never forgot it either. It was a good way to learn. Ken didn't know (or need to know) about chord changes: his concept of melody and harmony was infallible. He could see the number as a 'whole'- how to blow it, then distil it, then pick it up and shake it. Unerringly he pinpointed the heart of a melody, transforming a show-tune into a folk-song. Listen to 'Cheek to Cheek' on this record. (This was a 'head' arrangernent I did for Ken, which means I got the right chords going and suggested a rough working shape). His improvisations are straight-down-the- line New Orleans - "always keep the melody going some kind of way." This is not theme with variations in the decorative sense; the tune stays there all the way through, but Ken pulls it about like a comfortable old sweater until if fits him perfectly. I suppose you could liken him to a sculptor working in the public eye, and if a bit fell off occasionally nobody would notice it in the finished product. His harmonic sense was entirely instinctive and owed nothing to the rule books, but it was 'right', so that his variations grew out of the melody, sometimes just subtly remoulding the tune and often suddenly taking off into something startling and quite individual.

That was the music. What about the man? In the old days we never really knew much about Ken at all. Small talk was out. Conversation was limited to question and answer unless, late at night, Ken in his cups would decide to expound on his beloved New Orleans music and then you listened but never argued. So naturally we assumed that this was his one and only passion. It was only is his last years (and I renewed acquaintance less than two years before his death) that he became more outgoing and revealed a rare intelligence and a wide range of interests.

Until I joined the band I knew nothing of Ken and his ways, and my audition was a prime example of Ken's communication factor. I had been playing interval piano at the 51 Club for some time - not always 'conformist' piano as my allegiances were very wide at that time. However, Ken never complained, or even commented for that matter. The band itself was pianoless, although Ken used Bob Kelly in the skiffle group. Reading in the Melody Maker one morning that Bob was out of action due to an accident, I rang Ken on impulse and asked him if he fancied a pianist in the band. Long silence. "Never thought about it, man." Another silence. "Come round and see me tomorrow." So I went to 99 The Drive. A taciturn greeting and then he put on a Bunk record with Alton Purnell on piano. Then some Lewis. And more Bunk. I knew these records reasonably well, but listened patiently, wondering when we would get down to business. After about half an hour the recital ceased. "Reckon you can do that?" asked Ken. "I would think so," I replied. "Start on Friday," he said. That was my contract. As this was my first 'pro' job I went home with some elation and practised Purnell introductions, which were somewhat alien to my style. I never had to use them. Ken was a cunning old fox. He let me play it my way, work out my own salvation. He was canny enough to know that if I was given my head I would find out for myself, by trial and error, how I could best fit with the band. I'll always love him for that.

Ken was a man of great integrity. He was scrupulously fair in all his dealings, both financial and personal, and was fiercely loyal to his musicians in the face of criticism. His one great failure was lack of ability to communicate lucidly with his sidesmen. He knew exactly what he wanted from us and expected us to know too. If we didn't come up to scratch on a particular occasion, there was rarely a shout-up at the end, or indeed, any sort of inquest. Usually it was the grim silence, so we went off and got drunk, wondering what was wrong now. And the next night, when we felt the whole thing was a shambles, he'd end up by beaming approval all round. So, within this unsound and unpredictable framework the band existed and worked - by and large quite successfully, as the records show.

Here's one last illustration of Ken's capacity to surprise. We were due to make a ragtime record, and he decided that he'd like to add Joplin's 'Fig Leaf' to the ones we already knew well. He had only a vague idea of the number, so he said he'd come round to my house and we'd run through it together. The day before the recording we spent a long afternoon working on it - I'd play a phrase on the piano and Ken would slowly emulate it. It was an arduous and painstaking business. Fig Leaf is not an easy number, having four quite complex strains. Finally we managed to struggle through the entire thing once. "That'l do," Ken said. I was uneasy. How would he remember all that the next day? I needn't have worried. In the studio he sailed through it as though he'd been playing it for years and it took its place in 'They All Played Ragtime', which subsequently became a collector's item. Those were the bits that made it all worthwhile.

I left Ken's band in 1960 and returned in 1986. Nothing had changed.

1998 - I wrote those notes nine years ago for the issue of Ken's 1959 Dusseldorf concert with George Lewis. That was thirty years years after the eventand now, nearly a decade later, more material from that German tour has come to light.

The new tracks added to this re-issue are taken from a Bremen concert, a week after Dusseldorf and the last gig of the trip.

Despite the hectic touring schedule of the previous fortnight, the band and George were still going strong, as is evident from these spirited renditions. The gem of this session, though, is surely George's clarinet feature, a medley of blues and The Old Rugged Cross. Starting off meditatively, he gradually becomes quieter and more introspective, as though soliloquising in an empty room. With that magnificent woody tone, it's quite magical. The audience is absolutely still and the spell is only broken when George, as though waking from a dream, suddenly blows out at full strength, bringing in the band for the finale. Even so, the music is nearly drowned out by the rapturous applause of several thousand people.

'A Little Touch of Lewis in the Night' and a glorious swan song. I'm glad I was there.

It has been said that this period of the 1950's was Ken's 'finest hour'. The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz describes this particular line-up as 'the leading British revivalist band of the decade.... widely imitated'.

However, if we were riding high on that tour, jazz was as always the great leveller. Forty-eight hours later we were home and playing our first return U.K. gig - at Dagenham.

Ray Foxley