Ian Levine
| Ian Levine | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Ian Geoffrey Levine 22 June 1953 Blackpool, Lancashire, England |
| Education | Arnold House School |
| Occupation | Disc jockey, Record producer, Songwriter |
| Years active | 1971-present |
| Known for | Blackpool Mecca, Heaven, Record Shack Records, Motorcity Records |
| Notable work | Miquel Brown, Evelyn Thomas, Take That |
Ian Geoffrey Levine (born 22 June 1953), is an English songwriter, producer, and DJ. A noted moderniser of Northern soul music in the UK, and a developer of the style of Hi-NRG, he has written and produced records with sales totalling over 40 million. Levine is also a noted fan of the long-running television show Doctor Who.
Born into a Jewish family, his parents owned and ran the "Lemon Tree" complex in Blackpool, including its casino and nightclub. Levine is openly gay. He suffered a major stroke in July 2014, leaving him with severely limited movement on the left side of his body.
Levine began collecting Motown records from the age of 13, building a collection sourced from both UK record shops and those that his visited on family holidays to Miami and New Orleans. This later extended to him becoming an avid collector of soul, R&B, and Northern soul. After his parents emigrated to the Caribbean in 1979, Levine sold the bulk of his record collection to fund the purchase of a home in London.
Having attended some of the early Northern soul all-nighters at "The Twisted Wheel" nightclub in Manchester with DJ Stuart Bremner, on leaving school in 1971 he became a disc jockey at the Blackpool Mecca. Levine joined other DJ's in travelling to Stoke on Trent to join the Northern soul all-nighter "Torch", which was quickly shut down but was the fore runner of the Wigan Casino events, which Levine opened. Working with fellow DJ Colin Curtis, the pair was responsible for guiding the Northern Soul scene away from its oldies-only policy and towards modern soul and disco. This resulted in BBC Radio 1's DJ John Peel travelling to Blackpool to interview Levine.
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