15th January 1923 saw the birth of the wonderfully eccentric and very funny Ivor Cutler.
Born Isadore Cutler 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. 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." And creative he was!
Ivor was educated at the Shawlands Academy.[4] In 1939 Cutler was evacuated to Annan. He joined the Royal Air Force as a navigator in 1942 but was soon grounded for "dreaminess", apparently more interested in looking at the clouds from the cockpit window than locating a flight path, and worked as a storeman. After the war he studied at Glasgow School of Art and became a schoolteacher.
Working at a school in Paisley, however, did not agree with Cutler. He hated discipline that required the strap, having received it more than 200 times himself, and in a dramatic gesture took the instrument from his desk, cut it into pieces and dispensed them to the class.
Leaving Scotland was, he claimed, "the beginning of my life". He settled in London for a time teaching music, dance, drama and poetry to 7- to 11-year-olds. Oh how I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall in on of his classrooms.
His dour recordings bely his existence growing up in Glasgow and seeing his peers arriving at school with bare feet - a fact which, he later claimed, helped form his leftwing political views, aged five - appeared in his hilarious writings, Life in a Scotch Sitting Room Volume 2. With lines such as "Voiding bowels in those days was unheard of. People just kept it in," he used a string of fantastical untruths to expose the reality of his life and the Spartan - and sometimes sadistic - Scottish existence.
He also taught for a time at A S Neil's Summerhill school. Dubbed a hippy academy where a different approach to education was fostered, Summerhill was run with rules agreed between staff and pupils, and the premise was to educate the whole person. This alternative philosophy appealed to Cutler. He lived in the grounds of the school. Ivor married for a time, but his parenting skills did not go down too well with his then wife, they had two sons, he sent one, on his first day at school wearing a kilt, I can see that going down well in England! His son remembers his father once taking him fake fishing,taking him out in the street, with a stick and bit of string and a fork tied on the end dangling in a puddle, being his fishing line, he also says "I couldn't say I was pleased when he felt the need to walk down the street with a carpet sample in place of a tie."
During the late 50's and into the 60's he mixed his teaching with that of entertainment, managing to secure a slot on Acker Bilk Show and Late Night Line-Up. On one such appearance he was spotted by Paul McCartney, who invited Cutler to appear in the Beatles' film Magical Mystery Tour where he played the bus conductor Buster Bloodvessel, and yes the lead singer of Bad Manners took his name from this and was also a fan of Cutler.
Through music, poetry and children’s books the songwriter, poet and “unjoiner” of thoughts perfected a brand of eccentric mischief that made him a favourite of many.
His absurdist songs – sung in dour Glaswegian tones with a wheezing harmonium for company – were an ever-present on John Peel’s radio shows, second only in rotation to The Fall. His darkly whimsical eye can be seen in contemporary British artists like David Shrigley and Martin Creed. And yet Cutler remains something of a marginal figure, known only to a devoted few.
For the latter part of his career, Cutler lived on his own in a flat on Parliament Hill Fields, north London, which he found by placing an ad in the New Statesman saying "Ivor Cutler seeks room near Heath. Cheap!". There he would receive visitors, and his companion Phyllis King, in a reception room filled with clutter, pictures and curios, including his harmonium, some ivory cutlery (a pun, of course) and a wax ear stapled to the wall with six-inch nails - proof of his dedication to the Noise Abatement Society, because of which he forbade his audience ever to whistle in appreciation at his work. The bicycle was his preferred mode of transport, its cow-horn handlebars in the sit-up-and-beg position in line with his Alexander technique practice.
He could quote from Homer, taught himself Chinese and was in the habit of frequenting Soho's Chinatown, where he could display his knowledge - although, typically, he chose Chinese above Japanese because the textbooks were cheaper. With the onset of old age he was increasingly worried about losing his memory, given that his father and brother had both developed Alzheimer's disease. It was a fear that was to be tragically fulfilled. He retired from the stage at the age of 82.
His main champion in the late 70's and 80's John Peel once remarked that Cutler was probably the only performer whose work had been featured on Radio 1, 2, 3 and 4.
Ivor Cutler died after a massive stroke on March 3rd 2006 aged 83.
I could no doubt find many stories about Ivor online but will give you some of his own whimsical word instead, first up is
I Ate a Lady’s Bun
I got taken to gaol.
I ate a lady’s bun.
On her head.
She got a fright.
It was a surprise.
Do not worry I said.
I am eating your bun.
I am hungry for a bun.
Police she cried a good
neighbour heard her
and phoned the
police.
You must not eat a lady’s bun even
if you are hungry.
And I am in jail.
And some of his advice......
5 Wise Saws
1. Do not kick a grocer
on the leg.
2. If you kick a grocer
on the leg, make sure
it’s not a green grocer.
3. If you throw a ball,
it moves in the air.
4. You can not erase a
love letter with a
nipple, no matter how
rubbery.
5. If you empty your bowels
at night, a shepherd
will have a red face
in the morning. -*
