Well last Sunday morning the alarm went off at 4:30 as per usual and I got up had a shower, jumped in the car and headed for BBC Radio Manchester to present the Sunday Breakfast programme. As usual the car radio was on Radio 5Live and it was then that I learned of the death of Whitney Houston. To put it mildly I was shocked.

On April 2nd 1974, a new ILR station began broadcasting to Greater Manchester from Piccadilly Plaza. One of its original team of presenters was Londoner Andy Peebles, formerly of BBC Radio Manchester, whose weekly ‘Soul Train’ programme on a Sunday would quickly establish itself as essential listening for black music fans throughout the region. Over a quarter of a century later Stu Allan would play his final record on Piccadilly offshoot, Key 103, bringing the shutters down on an entire era, which started with Peebles, was nurtured by Mike Shaft, and saw Lee Browne take a bit part along the way. This is the story of how a Manchester radio station played a key role in shaping the city’s celebrated club culture.

On Saturday August 30th 2008, Manchester District Music Archive (www.mdmarchive.co.uk) present a very special event at Islington Mill in Salford, to celebrate Manchester’s Electro-Funk and B Boy heritage. Through a mixture of talks, Q and A’s, screenings, and, of course, dancing, this event will attempt to tell the story of the city’s early ‘80s Electro-Funk scene, explaining how it sowed the seeds for subsequent developments as the decade unfolded.

I think I should start off this piece with an apology. This is going to be a long story with many many people to thank so don't be surprised if this turns out to be just the first part of the Sunday Breakfast story.

Mike Shaft is back. Back to front BBC’s Commonwealth Games radio station BBC 2002 97.7FM... on air from Monday, March 4th 2002 onwards. Popular presenter Mike Shaft is back in town as the rise n’shine man on the the BBC’s dedicated Commonwealth Games radio station.

On Sunday the 10th of July 2012, the 'Manchester Day' parade took place once again and to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Commonwealth Games in Manchester over 100 members of the original games volunteer force joined in the celebrations.

If you were to link to my 'tributes' page you would see the name Julian Allitt very close to the top, but that is only because it begins with the letter A. If it was not an alphabetical list, his name would still be very close to the top.

This article is being reprinted as part of our celebrations first published when mikeshaft.com achieved 1 million hits. We were delighted to pass this milestone and other articles in the series will be added in coming months.