I’m not sure you can be an Australian music fan without feeling the loss of Glenn A. Baker today. A giant of the industry, he passed away at age 74 after a period of illness.
For me, Glenn A. Baker was the guy on the telly with a seemingly encyclopaedic knowledge of music. As a kid, I’d watch him on the Today Show, Mornings with Kerri-Anne, The Bert Newton Show, and countless others and marvel at his insight and enthusiasm. When I got a bit older, I attended several concerts where Glenn was in the audience. You would hear a hush as he passed, a kind of reverence as people whispered, “That’s Glenn A. Baker.”
Reading the tributes today taught me so much about all of the incredible things he did. I knew he championed artists, but I didn’t realise that he began managing the band that would become Ol’ 55 while he was working as a media adviser of the NSW Postmaster-General’s Department. I didn’t know he recruited Wilbur Wilde and Frankie J. Holden, or that he co-wrote some of their songs. That band might never have achieved their immense chart success without him. I didn’t know he co-established local record label Raven Records, or that he was a partner in Timewarp Records. I wasn’t aware that he served as the editor of Billboard magazine for more than 20 years. I think I’ll have to track down some of his more than 17 books.
Glenn A. Baker was a man who did so much for the local music industry, and he will be sorely missed.
Photo credit: Eva Rinaldi Photography @ Wikimedia Commons