Hey, Hey - it's the month of May - and with it comes the start of a new season of "growth" (this, of course, refers to "growth" in the fields of various agricultural cops). However, I would hope that we will also witness a great deal of "growth" within Square Dancing; more new dancers, more dances and festivals more clubs, more new callers - and with that - more sales of new music!

If you have read the subscriber e-mail for this month, you will have seen that I have had to "re-think" the section concerning the release of tunes on CD. There are several reasons for this, which I will try and explain - but first I need to explain a little about what we have done to make our music available to digital users and the important role that has been played by Hanhurst's Tape/CD/Internet Review Service:

We have been re-releasing all of our music, in digital formats, over the last eight years. In September 2002 we started to make all of our old tunes available in MP3 format; at that stage we released 5 "new" MP3s per month - two of which were taken from tunes released since I started releasing new music (in March 2001) , the other three were from tunes that had been released during the period 1986 to 2000 (by Stefan and Ingvar - the previous owners of Sting and Snow Records).

Although there were some months where less than 5 MP3s appeared on the tape (due to the space that was available), we achieved five-per-month more often than not. All of the old (pre-2000) tunes were released by July 2004 and - from that point on - we released two MP3s per month; these being the more recent releases, only; these being all that was left to release in MP3. In October 2005 we began releasing all of our new releases in Vinyl, MP3 AND on CD!

We still had 31 tunes to release on MP3 and we continued to release these at the rate of two-per-month, until February 2007 - by which time all the "more recent" tunes had been released on MP3; from January 2006 we also began offering CD versions of these "more recent" tunes, at the same time as the MP3 versions became available. In March 2007 - having "caught up" with the MP3 releases - we started to make available on CD all the tunes that had not been previously made available on CD; this was done at the rate of three-per-month and the release dates were listed on the FUTURE and LATEST pages of this web-site (you can access these on the RECORDS drop-down menu, shown above).

However, as Bob Dylan wrote: "the times they are a-changing…". Whilst it was always accepted by us that the number of MP3s and/or CDs on the release service Tape/CD had to depend on there being space available on the Hanhurst's Review Service Tape or CD, for the most part, the space was available - on the majority of occasions. However, as you may well have noticed, during the last few months we have had less-than-three CD releases on the release service Tape/CD on several occasions; the reason for this is that more and more labels are following our example and re-releasing their back-catalogues in CD and/or MP3. This is of course good news for callers everywhere but it has led to our release schedule becoming more and more erratic!

So in view of this situation, I have decided not to try and tell you, in advance, the precise month upon which the old tunes will be released on CD Instead I will advise in arrears of that titles that were released on the last month's release service Tape/CD and provide a list of the sequence in which future releases will be made available. I will then tell you, each month, which titles became available on the preceding month, as part of the general monthly e-mail. Of course, you can always check the Hanhurst's web-site to see which tracks are available on the present month's review, if you want (or need) to know earlier.

Having said all of that - I would like to remind you that, if there is a track that is not yet available on CD and you would like it's release "brought forward" , just let me know and - as always - I will move it to the top of the list!

So, in view of the above, here is the "other news":

BEST SELLER LISTING (positions on the March 2008 listing)
No.6 - Cup Of Tea / Piece Of Cake - SIR 523
No.8 - Valerie - SIR 907
No.10 - Home On The Range - SIR 312
NEW RELEASE (May 2009):
Crossfire - SNW 1008 - Vocal by Tommy P Larsen

NEW CD RELEASES - we are changing the way that we present this listing, please see the text above:

INDIVIDUAL RECORD HISTORIES including ALL THE ADDITIONAL LYRICS:
To find these, just click on the book symbol next to the title on the Catalogue, Future Releases or Latest Releases pages, this month's record history features our newest singing call release: Crossfire.

If you want to hear how these top-selling recordings sound, just click on the musical note symbol.

Well, with the sun in the sky I need to head out to the "village green" and join in with the May-time festivities! After the fanciful pursuits that fill the day, we shall "retire" to the local Public House and consume some of their - much-revered - best brew… Catch up with you all again, on next month's News-Letter!

Go Squareful! - Paul Bristow (Owner and Producer Sting and Snow Records)