From childhood days in the early 1950s post-war shadow of Brixton bomb sites and ration book austerity, and later at grammar school being forced to wear WW11 surplus army uniforms and march around with Lee Enfield 303 rifles every Friday for compulsory CCF (no kidding), the Ban the Bomb marches and the rise of CND resonated somewhat strongly with this writer.

The Aldermaston marches took place at Easter from 1958 until the mid-1960s, and attracted left, liberal-thinking protesters – from religious figures, intellectuals and arts students to young parents with prams, beatniks, pacifists and jazz revival fans – just as the Brit Trad jazz boom was gathering steam.

Committed marcher, folk singer/activist Peggy Seeger says of the marches, “Every 100 yards or so you had a different kind of band - jazz, blues, skiffle, West Indian.” And it was the trad jazz bands that made the most noise, notably the joyous New Orleans parade jazz stomp of Ken Colyer’s Omega Brass Band and the madcap Alberts (including Bruce Lacey and Jeff Nuttall) who regularly led the marches, their music beaming out a rousing ‘life over death’ message and sowing the seeds of the mid-1960s counter-culture to come.

Collected here on this well-researched, historically important and eminently listenable compilation and its accompanying booklet, are nine hot Colyer tracks including ‘Easter Parade and ‘Isle of Capri’, The Alberts chaotic ‘Morse Code Melody’, strong selections from Humphrey Lyttelton (a CND member), George Melly and Chris Barber’s Band, and early tracks from more mainstream Trad hawkers, Kenny Ball and His Jazzmen and Acker Bilk. The latter’s ‘Blaze Away,’ wrapping a spirited segment of Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger’s protest songs, Fred Dallas’ ‘Doomsday Blues’ and an eloquent but damning Bertrand Russell interview quote from the first march. With Putin currently dangling the nuclear threat for the first time in generations, this is a stark reminder of how concerned citizens, jazz musicians and folk singers first came together over 60 years ago to register their strong disapproval. As poet Christopher Logue says, quoted here from Lindsay Anderson’s March To Aldermaston film: “When politicians fail, people must give the lead.”