Bert Jansch - Early Years

Early Years

Herbert Jansch was born at Stobhill Hospital, Glasgow in 1943, the descendant of a family originally from Hamburg, Germany who settled in Scotland during the Victorian era. The family name is pronounced /ˈjænʃ/yansh by almost everyone except Jansch himself. He and some close members of his family pronounce it /ˈdʒænʃ/jansh.

Jansch was brought up in Edinburgh, where he attended Pennywell Primary School and Ainslie Park Secondary School. As a teenager, he acquired a guitar and started visiting a local folk club ("The Howff") run by Roy Guest. There, he met Archie Fisher and Jill Doyle (Davey Graham's half-sister), who introduced him to the music of Big Bill Broonzy, Pete Seeger, Brownie McGhee and Woody Guthrie. He also met and shared a flat with Robin Williamson, who remained a friend when Jansch later moved to London.

After leaving school, Jansch took a job as a nurseryman, then in August 1960, he gave this up, with the intention of being a full-time musician. He appointed himself as an unofficial caretaker at The Howff and, as well as sleeping there, he may have received some pay to supplement his income as a novice performer who did not own his own guitar. He spent the next two years playing one-night stands in British folk clubs. This was a musical apprenticeship that exposed him to a range of influences, including Martin Carthy and Ian Campbell, but especially Anne Briggs, from whom he learned some of the songs (such as "Blackwaterside" and "Reynardine") that would later feature strongly in his recording career.

Between 1963 and 1965, Jansch travelled around Europe and beyond, hitch-hiking from place to place and living on earnings from busking and casual musical performances in bars and cafes. Before leaving Glasgow, he married a 16-year-old girl, Lynda Campbell. It was a marriage of convenience which allowed her to travel with him as she was too young to have her own passport. They split up after a few months and Jansch was eventually repatriated to Britain after catching dysentery in Tangiers.