Ivor Cutler


Ivor Cutler was a Scottish poet, singer, musician, songwriter and humorist. He became known for his regular performances on BBC radio, and in particular his numerous sessions recorded for John Peel's influential eponymous late night radio programme, and later for Andy Kershaw's programme. He appeared in the Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour film in 1967 and on Neil Innes' television programmes. Cutler also wrote books for children and adults and was a teacher at A. S. Neill's Summerhill School and for 30 years in inner-city schools in London. He told Andy Kershaw on his radio show that he also gave private poetry lessons to individuals.
In live performances Cutler would often accompany himself on a harmonium. Phyllis King appears on several of his records, and for several years was a part of his concerts. She usually read small phrases but also read a few short stories. The two starred in a BBC radio series, King Cutler, in which they performed their material jointly and singly. Cutler also collaborated with pianist Neil Ardley and singer Robert Wyatt.

Early life

Ivor Cutler was born in Govan, Glasgow, into a middle-class Jewish family of Eastern European descent. His father Jack Moris Cutler was a wholesale jeweller and had premises at 85 Queen Street, Glasgow. He cited his childhood as the source of his artistic temperament, recalling a sense of displacement when his younger brother was born: "Without that I would not have been so screwed up as I am, and therefore not as creative." He was educated at the Shawlands Academy. In 1939 Cutler was evacuated to Annan. He joined the Royal Air Force as a navigator in 1942 but was soon grounded for "dreaminess" and worked as a storeman. He moved to London where he was employed by the Inner London Education Authority to teach music, dance, drama and poetry to 7- to 11-year-olds. Cutler's deeply held views on humanity meant he disliked corporal punishment and on leaving a teaching job he held in the 1950s he cut up his tawse and handed the pieces to the class.

Musical career

Cutler began writing songs and poetry in the late 1950s, making the first of many appearances on BBC radio on the Home Service, where he featured on the Monday Night at Home programme on 38 occasions between 1959 and 1963. He gained popularity playing songs where he would often accompany himself on either a piano or the harmonium, and this success led to the release of a series of records starting with 1959's Ivor Cutler of Y'Hup EP. Cutler continued to make appearances on the BBC's programmes during the 1960s, and as a result of an appearance on the television show Late Night Line-Up, he was noticed by Paul McCartney, who invited Cutler to appear in The Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour film. In the film, Cutler plays would-be courier Buster Bloodvessel who becomes passionately attracted to Ringo Starr's Aunt Jessie. Following this film role, Cutler recorded an LP, Ludo, produced by The Beatles' George Martin, and credited to the Ivor Cutler Trio, made up of Cutler with bassist Gill Lyons and percussionist Trevor Tomkins. The LP, taking inspiration from trad jazz and boogie-woogie, sees Cutler playing the piano as well as his usual harmonium, and is considered the most traditionally musical of all his records. After its release Cutler continued to perform for BBC radio, recording the first of his sessions for John Peel in 1969. Cutler's work on Peel's shows would introduce him to successive generations of fans, and in the early 1990s, Cutler said, "Thanks to Peel, I gained a whole new audience, to the amazement of my older fans, who find themselves among 16-to-35s in theatres, and wonder where they came from."
In the 1970s, Neil Ardley had Cutler sing on his album A Symphony of Amaranths, and former-Soft Machine drummer Robert Wyatt asked Cutler to play harmonium and sing on two of the tracks on his album Rock Bottom. The collaboration with Wyatt led to Cutler being signed to Wyatt's record label Virgin Records, for whom Cutler recorded three LPs in the mid-1970s: Dandruff, Velvet Donkey and Jammy Smears. Each of these discs intersperses Cutler's poems and songs with readings by his performing companion Phyllis King. Wyatt would later cover Cutler's song "Go and Sit upon the Grass".
During the decade Cutler used his sessions for John Peel to introduce numerous episodes of his Life in a Scotch Sitting Room series, culminating in the 1978 LP Life in a Scotch Sitting Room, Vol. 2, regarded as a particularly autobiographical work, on which Cutler recounts tales from his childhood amid an environment of exaggerated Scottishness. Cutler also produced the work as a book, which was published in 1984 with illustrations by Martin Honeysett.
Cutler contributed the track "Brooch Boat" to the cult 1980 album Miniatures, produced and edited by Morgan Fisher, which consisted entirely of one-minute-long recordings. In the 1980s, Rough Trade Records released three LPs—Privilege, Prince Ivor and Gruts. Cutler also released the single "Women of the World", recorded with Linda Hirst, through the label in 1983. In the 1990s, Creation Records released two new volumes of poems and spoken word work: A Wet Handle and A Flat Man.

Books and poetry

Poetry and books for children were an important part of Cutler's literary output. There were crossovers, where parts of the public performances, albums, and books had the same name – the most notable and regular favourite at performances was Life in a Scotch Sitting Room, Volume 2, combining the book with the album.

Reception and legacy

Cutler was a noted eccentric, dressing in a distinctive style including plus-fours and hats adorned with many badges, travelling mainly by bicycle and often communicating by means of sticky labels printed with "Cutlerisms", one of which, "never knowingly understood" came to be applied by supporters and detractors alike. Others included "Kindly disregard", reserved for official correspondence, and "to remove this label take it off". The reception room of his home contained some pieces of ivory cutlery, intended as a pun on his name.
The hallmarks of Cutler's work are surreal, bizarre juxtapositions and close attention to small details of existence, all described in seemingly naive language. In performance his delivery was frail, halting and minimally inflected. His writing sometimes edged into whimsy or the macabre. Many of his poems and songs are in the form of conversations delivered as a monologue. In these, one party is often Cutler as a child, a poetic voice which he adopted in order to bypass the intellect. Cutler describes the poverty of his early life and the neglect he experienced from his parents with great stoicism. He expresses acceptance of his lot and gratitude for the basic elements of life, for nature, and for parental love, even though that love might bear the marks of strain. In these works the humour arises from the child's curiosity and the playful or self-serving lies the parent tells him in instructing him to do a chore or in order to stop the incessant questions.
In October 2012 in Seattle, Washington, the Mark Morris Dance Group premiered a work entitled "Wooden Tree," featuring recordings of Cutler's renditions of his songs.
In 2014 a new play, The Beautiful Cosmos of Ivor Cutler, a co-production by Vanishing Point and National Theatre of Scotland, was performed.
Cutler earned a faithful cult following. John Peel once remarked that Cutler was probably the only performer whose work had been featured on Radio 1, 2, 3 and 4. Cutler was a member of the Noise Abatement Society and the Voluntary Euthanasia Society. He retired from performing in 2004, and died on 3 March 2006, in London.
Reflections upon his poetry, humour and legacy continue well after his death

Discography