Les Cousins was a folk and blues club in the basement of a restaurant in Greek Street, in the Soho

Soho

Soho is an area of the City of Westminster and part of the West End of London. Long established as an entertainment district, for much of the 20th century Soho had a reputation for sex shops as well as night life and film industry. Since the early 1980s, the area has undergone considerable...

 district of London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

. It had its heyday during the British folk music revival of the mid-1960s and was notable as a venue in which musicians of that period met and learnt from each other. As such, it was influential in the careers of, for example, Al Stewart

Al Stewart

Al Stewart is a Scottish singer-songwriter and folk-rock musician.Stewart came to stardom as part of the British folk revival in the 1960s and 1970s, and developed his own unique style of combining folk-rock songs with delicately woven tales of the great characters and events from history.He is...

, Davey Graham

Davey Graham

David Michael Gordon "Davey" Graham, originally spelled Davy Graham, , was a British guitarist and one of the most influential figures in the 1960s British folk revival...

, Bert Jansch

Bert Jansch

Herbert "Bert" Jansch was a Scottish folk musician and founding member of the band Pentangle. He was born in Glasgow and came to prominence in London in the 1960s, as an acoustic guitarist, as well as a singer-songwriter...

, John Renbourn

John Renbourn

John Renbourn is an English guitarist and songwriter. He is possibly best known for his collaboration with guitarist Bert Jansch as well as his work with the folk group Pentangle, although he maintained a solo career before, during and after that band's existence .While most commonly labelled a...

, Sandy Denny

Sandy Denny

Sandy Denny , born Alexandra Elene Maclean Denny, was an English singer and songwriter, perhaps best known as the lead singer for the folk rock band Fairport Convention...

, John Martyn, Alexis Korner

Alexis Korner

Alexis Korner was a blues musician and radio broadcaster, who has sometimes been referred to as "a Founding Father of British Blues"...

, The Strawbs

The Strawbs

Strawbs are an English rock band founded in 1964. Although the band started out as a bluegrass group they eventually moved on to other styles such as folk rock, glam rock and progressive rock...

, Roy Harper

Roy Harper

Roy Harper is an English folk / rock singer-songwriter and guitarist who has been a professional musician since the mid 1960s...

 and Paul Simon

Paul Simon

Paul Frederic Simon is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist.Simon is best known for his success, beginning in 1965, as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, with musical partner Art Garfunkel. Simon wrote most of the pair's songs, including three that reached number one on the US singles...

. Several albums were recorded there.

Origins

Les Cousins was opened on Friday 16 April 1965 in a basement venue at 49, Greek Street, Soho (some sources give the address as 48 Greek Street) which had earlier served as a 1950s skiffle club. Upstairs was the Dionysus restaurant owned by a family called Matheou, whose son, Andy Matheou ran the basement club. The club was reputed to have taken its name from Claude Chabrol

Claude Chabrol

Claude Chabrol was a French film director, a member of the French New Wave group of filmmakers who first came to prominence at the end of the 1950s...

's 1959 film Les Cousins

Les Cousins (film)

Les Cousins is a 1959 French New Wave drama film directed by Claude Chabrol. It tells the story of two cousins, the decadent Paul and the naive Charles. Charles falls in love with Florence, one of Paul's friends...

, the story of a young man from the country who comes to the city to study law, but is distracted by the rowdy cousin with whom he shares lodgings. However, the name was usually pronounced with English pronunciation, rather than French. The decor included a huge wagon wheel and fishing nets. The club was noted for its all-night sessions and was favoured by the innovative musicians who were less welcome in more purist traditional folk clubs.

Noel Murphy

Noel Murphy (musician)

Noel Murphy is an Irish folk musician, actor and entertainer. His family moved to Dublin when he was seven years old. At school he was a keen actor and played drums....

 was the first resident musician and compere. Other residents included Alexis Korner

Alexis Korner

Alexis Korner was a blues musician and radio broadcaster, who has sometimes been referred to as "a Founding Father of British Blues"...

 and Roy Harper

Roy Harper

Roy Harper is an English folk / rock singer-songwriter and guitarist who has been a professional musician since the mid 1960s...

.

Influence

Les Cousins was described by Roy Harper as "a spawning ground" for musical talent. In similar vein, Ian Anderson

Ian A. Anderson

Ian A. Anderson is an English magazine editor, folk musician and broadcaster.-Country blues and The Village Thing:...

 (editor of fRoots) said "...the music got so exciting, 'cause everybody listened to everybody else. So although you might choose to just play one thing, at the same time, you had an open mind for something else."

Notable performers included Alexis Korner

Alexis Korner

Alexis Korner was a blues musician and radio broadcaster, who has sometimes been referred to as "a Founding Father of British Blues"...

, Ralph McTell

Ralph McTell

Ralph McTell is an English singer-songwriter and acoustic guitar player who has been an influential figure on the UK folk music scene since the 1960s....

, Sandy Denny

Sandy Denny

Sandy Denny , born Alexandra Elene Maclean Denny, was an English singer and songwriter, perhaps best known as the lead singer for the folk rock band Fairport Convention...

, Bert Jansch

Bert Jansch

Herbert "Bert" Jansch was a Scottish folk musician and founding member of the band Pentangle. He was born in Glasgow and came to prominence in London in the 1960s, as an acoustic guitarist, as well as a singer-songwriter...

, Alex Campbell

Alex Campbell (singer)

Alex Campbell was a Scottish folk singer. Described by Colin Harper as a "melancholic, hard-travelling Glaswegian", he was influential in the British folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s and was one of the first folk singers to tour the UK and Europe...

, Wizz Jones

Wizz Jones

Raymond Ronald Jones better-known as Wizz Jones is an English acoustic guitarist, singer and songwriter. He has been performing since the late 1950s and recording from 1965 to the present...

, Paul Simon

Paul Simon

Paul Frederic Simon is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist.Simon is best known for his success, beginning in 1965, as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, with musical partner Art Garfunkel. Simon wrote most of the pair's songs, including three that reached number one on the US singles...

, Joni Mitchell

Joni Mitchell

Joni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...

, Nick Drake

Nick Drake

Nicholas Rodney "Nick" Drake was an English singer-songwriter and musician. Though he is best known for his sombre guitar based songs, Drake was also proficient at piano, clarinet and saxophone...

, Al Stewart

Al Stewart

Al Stewart is a Scottish singer-songwriter and folk-rock musician.Stewart came to stardom as part of the British folk revival in the 1960s and 1970s, and developed his own unique style of combining folk-rock songs with delicately woven tales of the great characters and events from history.He is...

, Long John Baldry

Long John Baldry

John William "Long John" Baldry was an English and Canadian blues singer and a voice actor. He sang with many British musicians, with Rod Stewart and Elton John appearing in bands led by Baldry in the 1960s. He enjoyed pop success in the UK where Let the Heartaches Begin reached No...

, The Incredible String Band, John Martyn, Cat Stevens

Cat Stevens

Yusuf Islam , commonly known by his former stage name Cat Stevens, is an English singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, educator, philanthropist, and prominent convert to Islam....

, Jackson C. Frank

Jackson C. Frank

Jackson Carey Frank was an American folk musician.-Early life:When Jackson Frank was 11, a furnace exploded at his school, sending a ball of flames down corridors until it ended up in Frank's music classroom in the Cleveland Hill Elementary School in Cheektowaga, New York...

, Martin Carthy

Martin Carthy

Martin Carthy MBE is an English folk singer and guitarist who has remained one of the most influential figures in British traditional music, inspiring contemporaries such as Bob Dylan and Paul Simon and later artists such as Richard Thompson since he emerged as a young musician in the early days...

, Linda Thompson

Linda Thompson (singer)

Linda Thompson is a British singer. Born Linda Pettifer in Hackney, Thompson became one of the most recognised names—and voices—in the British folk rock movement of the 1970s and 1980s, in collaboration with her former husband and fellow British folk rock musician, guitarist Richard...

, Julie Felix

Julie Felix

Julie Ann Felix is a folk rock recording artist, who was notably produced by Mickie Most on his RAK Records label.-Career:...

, Bridget St John

Bridget St John

Bridget St John is a British singer and songwriter, best known for the three albums she recorded between 1969 and 1972 for John Peel's Dandelion label. Peel produced her debut album Ask Me No Questions. She also recorded a large number of BBC Radio and Peel sessions and toured regularly on the UK...

, Donovan

Donovan

Donovan Donovan Donovan (born Donovan Philips Leitch (born 10 May 1946) is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist. Emerging from the British folk scene, he developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelia, and world music...

, Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...

, The Watersons

The Watersons

The Watersons were an English folk group from Hull, Yorkshire. They performed mainly traditional songs with little or no accompaniment. Their distinctive sound came from their closely woven harmonies.-Career:...

, Arlo Guthrie

Arlo Guthrie

Arlo Davy Guthrie is an American folk singer. Like his father, Woody Guthrie, Arlo often sings songs of protest against social injustice...

, Stephane Grappelli

Stéphane Grappelli

Stéphane Grappelli was a French jazz violinist who founded the Quintette du Hot Club de France with guitarist Django Reinhardt in 1934. It was one of the first all-string jazz bands....

 & Diz Disley

Diz Disley

Diz Disley was an Anglo-Canadian jazz guitarist and graphic designer. He is best known for his jazz guitar playing, strongly influenced by Django Reinhardt, and for his collaborations with the violinist Stéphane Grappelli....

, Davey Graham

Davey Graham

David Michael Gordon "Davey" Graham, originally spelled Davy Graham, , was a British guitarist and one of the most influential figures in the 1960s British folk revival...

, Spider John Koerner

Spider John Koerner

"Spider" John Koerner is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He is best known as a guitarist and vocalist for the blues trio Koerner, Ray & Glover, which included Dave Ray and Tony Glover...

, Tom Rush

Tom Rush

Tom Rush is an American folk and blues singer, songwriter, musician and recording artist.- Life and career :Rush was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. His father was a teacher at St. Paul's School, in Concord, New Hampshire. Tom began performing in 1961 while studying at Harvard University after...

, among others.

On 24 November 2004, "Les Cousins" was reopened for a special Nick Drake

Nick Drake

Nicholas Rodney "Nick" Drake was an English singer-songwriter and musician. Though he is best known for his sombre guitar based songs, Drake was also proficient at piano, clarinet and saxophone...

 tribute, to celebrate his brief but influential career.

As of 2007, a club in Oxford, at the Holywell Music Room, calls itself "Les Cousins".

Recordings associated with Les Cousins

Roy Harper recorded his album Live At Les Cousins there, 30 August 1969 and The "Spontaneous Music Ensemble" (John Stevens and Evan Parker plus Peter Koward) also recorded there in 1967.

In 1970 a compilation LP 49 Greek Street was released, featuring various artists associated with the club such as Synanthesia, Keith Christmas

Keith Christmas

Keith Christmas is an English singer and songwriter. In 1969 his first album Stimulus was released...

, Andy Roberts

Andy Roberts (musician)

Andrew "Andy" Roberts is an English musician.He gained a violin scholarship to Felsted School. He then attended Liverpool University. He has played with The Liverpool Scene, Plainsong, The Scaffold, Roy Harper, Chris Spedding, Pink Floyd, Hank Wangford, Kevin Ayers, Vivian Stanshall and Grimms...

, Robin Scott, Tin Angel, Al Jones

Al Jones

Alun Ashworth-Jones , known as Al Jones, was an influential English folk and blues songwriter, guitarist and singer, noted for his distinctive and original folk-rock guitar style and his often darkly humorous lyrics.-Early career:He first came to prominence in the Bristol folk scene in the...

, Mike Hart and Nadia Cattouse

Nadia Cattouse

Nadia Cattouse is an actress, singer and songwriter....

, though most of the tracks were studio recordings. Ironically, according to Emma Matheou whose father ran the club, the door depicted on the cover is from another address in Greek Street!. Long sought after by collectors, the album was reissued on CD in Japan (JASKCD193) in 2007.