In 1972, my friend Ken Vail, who has died of cancer aged 74, set up his own graphic design business and in the next 30 years created many bookjackets and corporate identities.
But he always had a consuming interest in jazz and in 1993 he published his first book on the subject, Jazz Milestones: A Pictorial Chronicle of Jazz 1900-1990. He was commissioned to produce more: a series of jazz diaries. So, at their suggestion, Ken's family took over his design business to allow him to write about jazz on a full-time basis. Over the following years he wrote a further 10 books, including Duke's Diary (2002) and Dizzy Gillespie: the Bebop Years 1937-1952 (2004).
I met Ken at Cambridge School of Art in the mid-1950s, where we studied under Paul Hogarth, among others, and with my future Spitting Image partner Roger Law and John Holder, now a well-known illustrator. John says that "while we were messing about with guitars, Ken was a cool jazz drummer".
Feeling he would not succeed as an illustrator, Ken specialised in graphic design and typography. After art school, he served a printworks apprenticeship, and worked for two years as a designer to Clive Sinclair, then producing the first pocket calculator.
Ken helped run a jazz club in Cambridge, where he met the jazz guitarist Marty Grosz, who said: "Ken's books helped to dispel myths about jazz. And his book Swing Era Scrapbook is worth its weight in 24 carat gold-encrusted saxophone reeds." Ken's great friend Brian Peerless, the jazz writer and promoter, says that his willingness to help projects along, with artwork and advice, will be sorely missed.
Another friend, Rodney Shackell, remembers Ken "being instrumental in my getting a job as a graphic designer and typographer, and then encouraging me to be an illustrator. We have spent many happy hours reminiscing over pub lunches."
When Ken was first diagnosed with cancer, he decided to complete a drawing a day to produce Risby Sketchbook, about the village in Suffolk where he lived. The finished book was delivered on the eve of his funeral. These drawings are so good, not done with artifice or mannerism, just good straight drawing, like Ken himself in his self-portrait.
He is survived by his wife Marian, son Sam, daughter Emily, and five grandchildren.
