JUNE STANNARD Bird Songs of Amanzi LP '66 MEGA-RARE South Africa only HEAR

$

38

June Stannard Bird Songs of Amanzi 1966 Gallo ML-4411 12" LP Cover: Very Good (VG) edge wear, light foxing Record: Excellent (EX) AMANZIBIRDSONGLP
June Stannard

Bird Songs of Amanzi
1966 South Africa Gallo LP

Extra Clean South Africa Only press RARE!

Condition
Vinyl: Excellent (EX)
Sleeve: Very Good (VG) edge wear, light foxing

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Tracks:


JUNE STANNARD Bird Songs of Amanzi LP '66 MEGA-RARE South Africa only HEAR June Marjory Stannard, d. May 2011 Obituary Her contribution to natural sciences in South Africa and Africa was considerable. The early years of her married life were dedicated to recording bird sounds. She  painstakingly and meticulously made the first long-playing records of birds sounds. June produced a large body of work across a range of media formats, culminating in her final and recent book “Birds Sing for Us”, and her more personal, “Memoirs of an Octegenarian”. “Birds” was dedicated to John, her beloved and sociable companion who was by her side as they travelled through nature, closely observing wild creatures large and small in South Africa and African reserves and wilderness areas. The book traces African birds and animals, their sounds and behavior, as she experienced them throughout her life, bringing wildlife closer to human ears, eyes and hearts. After moving to the Eastern Cape in the 50s where John worked as the deputy manager of the Eastern Province Herald’s advertising department, she quickly became an expert amateur ornithologist, and then moved into solid research as a bird listener and tape recordist. She spent days and nights on the Niven’s Amanzi Estate and in  Eastern Cape forests with her recorder and primitive hand-held microphone, recording the songs that became her long-playing records of birds sounds, Bird Songs of Amanzi and Bird Songs of the Forest. She and John were keen supporters of the Port Elizabeth Museum. June went on to establish the first Library of Bird Sounds, Song & Calls in SA. The library was the third in the world – after Cornell University and the BBC. South African wildlife author June Marjory Stannard, 88, died peacefully in her home on the South Coast in the early hours of Mothers’ Day on 8 May, 2011. June was suffering from congestive heart failure, and her four children, Sheena, Keith, Ronnie and Marjorie, all managed to spend precious time at her side during her last days. A hospital bed was brought to the lounge of the home she and her late husband, John, bought and built close to indigenous forest in the Mbabala Lodge development at Munster on the Kwa-Zulu Natal South Coast. Her daughters nursed her to the end. She passed quietly, but amid a tremendous thunder and lightning storm. This could not have been more prophetic for the small, petite intellectual, who lived an extraordinary and eventful life. Her impact on society was subtle but resounding. She donated the use of a sizeable portion of pristine grass and wetland for inclusion into the commanding Umtamvuna Gorge Nature Reserve to Ezimvelo KZN, to be enjoyed by lovers of wildlife in perpetuity. An intense and quietly passionate person, June Stannard was a survivor of the 20th century, an early and uncompromising South African naturalist, researcher, educator and commentator in journals, magazines and newspapers. A daughter of pioneering Natal sugar farmer, William West Batchelor, June developed an abiding passion for the natural world as a little girl. Art and poetry were also in June, as was a deeply ingrained sense of order, propriety and dignity. She was schooled at Durban Girls College and served as a cartographer with the rank of staff sergeant in World War 2. She had three post-war poems published in the 1984 Anthology of SA Poetry, And yet, she was at heart a spiritual person whose living mantra was one of love for all life on earth. When not buying her children copies of “Mike and the Mechanics”, she would seek out Latin American-inspired pan pipe music to sooth troubled lives, though this appealed more to the adults than her teenaged grandchildren! June shared two great spheres in her life – her work as a naturalist and author – and her matriarchal love for her large family encompassing nine grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren. She poured her heart into her children and provided unwaivering emotional support. This was extended to a large network of friends in the South Coast community, where her wisdom and quiet counselling was sought out. She was a frugal woman, but loved the occasional artistic and cool item such as her bright takkies! This was also reflected in her artwork; in the 1940s she produced a large oil-painting of a voluptous nude curled up in the leaves and petals of the iconic indigenous arum lilly (Zantedeschia aethiopica). Her sister, Hazel, was the youthful model who inspired the work. June kept her counsel, did not drink alcohol nor did she pass righteous judgement on others. She was a tower of moral and emotional strength, but she was no hardened Praetorian. She had a wicked twinkle in her eye which spoke loudly of her zest for life, laughter, and her sense of enjoyment of all aspects of the human and natural condition. A good few of her social ideas were indeed drawn from nature, and in this respect, she was also no Victorian prude. She was, in fact, an open-minded and diverse personality, who could spend hours locked away in her research and studies, but would find great enjoyment in light entertainment, demanding to the end to be allowed to see her latest favourite TV show, “Deal or No Deal”!   Her contribution to natural sciences in South Africa and Africa was considerable. The early years of her married life were dedicated to recording bird sounds. She  painstakingly and meticulously made the first long-playing records of birds sounds. June produced a large body of work across a range of media formats, culminating in her final and recent book “Birds Sing for Us”, and her more personal, “Memoirs of an Octegenarian”.   “Birds” was dedicated to John, her beloved and sociable companion who was by her side as they travelled through nature, closely observing wild creatures large and small in South Africa and African reserves and wilderness areas. The book traces African birds and animals, their sounds and behavior, as she experienced them throughout her life, bringing wildlife closer to human ears, eyes and hearts. After moving to the Eastern Cape in the 50s where John worked as the deputy manager of the Eastern Province Herald’s advertising department, she quickly became an expert amateur ornithologist, and then moved into solid research as a bird listener and tape recordist. She spent days and nights on the Niven’s Amanzi Estate and in  Eastern Cape forests with her recorder and primitive hand-held microphone, recording the songs that became her long-playing records of birds sounds, Bird Songs of Amanzi and Bird Songs of the Forest. She and John were keen supporters of the Port Elizabeth Museum. June went on to establish the first Library of Bird Sounds, Song & Calls in SA. The library was the third in the world – after Cornell University and the BBC. Recognition also came quietly, but strongly. She was appointed Honorary Research Associate of the Percy Fitzpatrick Institute of Ornithology, and later honored with Life Membership of the Ornithological Society.   In 1982 she was admitted as Associate Member of the Transvaal Museum, where the bird library is now housed, and in 1985 was appointed Honorary Associate of The Natal Museum for her interest in invertebrate animals. In 1999 she received a Conservation Award from Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife. She spoke of how global weather patterns were changing and that natural habitats were being constricted, fragmented and plants and creatures were becoming extinct at an alarming rate. A critic wrote on the sleeve of her book that “work like hers – sculpted from pure passion carved by curiosity and driven by dogged personal commitment – could prove in time to be part of the historic canon of natural life on an earth keenly remembered, but not conserved”. But this is not her wish. June Stannard’s compassion and love – her own call  to humans to live in constructive and intelligent harmony with  nature comes through most strongly in her witty and informative “Wild Rhymes”, published by the Wildlife  Society, which she wrote and illustrated not just for her numerous grandchildren, but for all children – and adults, too. June built bridges of understanding between humans and the natural world. In her most recent book “Birds Sing for Us” we are taken under wing on one women’s historic flight over South Africa and Africa from the 1920s until today.” The metaphor in the title of her family history, “My Banyan Tree”, is her hope that her children’s children would be rooted and live long, strong lives, like the banyan tree itself. A memorial service was held for June Stannard at Mbabala on Saturday,14 May, 2011.   By Mike Loewe Sound Effects & Nature Natural Sounds,Natural Sounds,Natural Sounds Import 33 RPM South Africa  June Stannard Bird Songs of Amanzi 1966 Gallo ML-4411 12" LP Cover: Very Good (VG) edge wear, light foxing Record: Excellent (EX) AMANZIBIRDSONGLP

This exquisite slice of retro music history is a vinyl sound recording (not a CD). Please reference Item Specifics above for additional detail. Strict Goldmine grading -- Over 14 years on Ebay! Combine Items to Save $$$!

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