The decline in Hohner’s financial and marketing support for harmonicas and accordions in the UK came to a head with the breaking of links with the NAO, the National Accordion Organisation, and the halt to the production of the magazine “Accordion Times incorporating Harmonica News” in 1974. Since 1959, the NAO and the magazine had been the “home” for the National Harmonica League (NHL). It included a harmonica competition in its annual Accordion Day. Now there was no harmonica magazine to capture its history. In 1974, the Accordion Day was held in Brighton. The harmonica competition was mainly for chromatic players, and the winner was 16 year old Ivan Richards from West Heath, Birmingham, a pupil of Jim Hughes. In 1975, the event was held in Scarborough, and the Larry Adler Challenge Cup was again won by Ivan, only this time he was the only contestant. Interest was waning.
THE HISTORY OF HARMONICAUK Part 5 1975–1981 Roger Trobridge Chairman 2000-2012
Later that year, Hohner invited several blues harp players to take part in a competition sponsored by Hohner and “Sounds” magazine in the Kings Road Theatre, Chelsea which was judged by Steve Rye and Judd Proctor. Six were chosen and asked to travel as a team to the World Championships in Offenburg, Germany. They were the first blues harp players to take part in the World Championships. They included Steve Smith, Paul Lamb and Chris Turner, and they won the Group Contest. Chris also won the diatonic competition. The other member of the British team (and the 7th of “The Magnificent Seven”) was Ivan Richards, who won the Chromatic competition at the age of 17. He had been fourth in Ypres, Belgium in 1973. There is little information from 1976, but there was a chromatic championship in Weston-Super-Mare, which was won by Paul Templar. He had been a performer in the 1960s and was recovering from a serious lung disease. He released a four track EP, “Harmonica Magic”. At the end of 1976, Derek Kirk was the marketing manager at Hohner under their managing director, Dirk Kommer, and with their PR man, Les Stewart, he invited John Tyler, a headmaster from Essex, to become the director of a relaunched NHL organisation which would be supported by Hohner. John had been a prominent
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The magazine for HarmonicaUK
