Sailing By by Baked A La Ska

BAKED A LA SKA CHART NEW COURSE WITH “SAILING BY”  7 INCH SINGLE

In a small studio in north Manchester the eleven piece ska monster that is Baked A La Ska have been recording an eclectic mix of original tunes and cover versions , ‘BAKES’ , for the last ten years. Everything from Sinatra, Disney, Howard Blake’s mawkish Walking in the Air through to Kraft Werk, Iron Maiden and R. Dean Taylor's Ghost in my House have received a ‘Baking’ .

Now comes the turn of Ronald Binge's light classic Sailing By composed in 1963. A tune known affectionately by many radio listeners (Jarvis Cocker chose it as one of his Desert Island discs) which has been used as the theme for the late night shipping forecast on BBC Radio 4 for nearly sixty years.

Born in 1910 in a working class district of Derby, Binge studied organ at Derby School of Music and was a cinema organist in his early career. Before World War 2 he played organ in Montavani's first band the Tipica Orchestra. He went on to compose and arrange for Montavani after the war.

Sailing By is strangely not the first Binge original to receive a reggae rework. Boris Gardiner released a version of his Elizabethan Suite, Elizabethan Reggae in 1971 on Trojan records.

Baked baritone saxophonist Bulldog Morel first had the idea of putting the shipping forecast theme over the classic Lynn Taitt and the Jets' Batman rhythm after being hit on the head by a bottlenose dolphin in a light squall off Tortuga in the Caribbean

The trombone and harmonica carry the theme over the thumping groove while Kuntri Ranks delivers a nonsensical weather forecast.

The SS Baked Alaska went down with all hands shortly after this recording was made leaving this 7inch single as the only legacy.

Tracklist

1.	Sailing By	3:16

2.	Fisher Dub	3:17

Credits

released March 20, 2020

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