The history of fingerpoppin soul

The Fingerpoppin Soul Story

"Hey now,hey now ,it's Fingerpoppin time"

It's the 1972 version of Hank Ballard's song "Fingerpoppin time" that opens every episode of Fingerpoppin Soul.
Hans Diepstraten had been a radio DJ for years already when in June 1993 Harry van Vliet joined him to present a show that reflected their taste in Soul Music.
Up to the present there are no program directors or computers that dictate what is played on the show. A lot of music played in the weekly two hour show is still played from good old Vinyl. Besides the "old school" Soul Hans and Harry keep up to date with all the latest releases.
Fingerpoppin Soul gives an alternative to people who are sick and tired of DJ's who think they are stars in their own right when all they do is push the "play" button on the CD player and to people who want to hear something different and surprising as opposed to mainstream Pop/RnB radiostations with their regulated playlists.
From these early days in 1993 the show has grown into much more than Hans and Harry ever hoped for ! Extensive flyering and poster campaigns contributed slowly but surely to an increasing audience.
Now in their 17th year Hans and Harry intend to keep on doing what they do best:
Play great Soul Music !

A short year by year account of Fingerpoppin Soul highlights.

1993
June 13th Harry joins Hans on his already existing "Teenbeat" show .The name "Teenbeat" was permanently changed to Fingerpoppin Soul on Sep 10th 1995.
In November we're visiting the already long existing Blues Estafette in Utrecht.
This annual event was ( up to 2004) organised by the very knowledgeable Jaap Hindriks. He brought over artists to the Netherlands that you couldn't have imagined to ever see in Europe. On our first visit to the Blues Estafette we saw and met: Little Milton, Art Neville and Irma Thomas.

1994
Interviews with the wonderful Carleen Anderson and Percy Sledge. Another visit to the Blues Estafette where we saw Johnny Adams, Bobby Rush, Earl King and Rosco Gordon.

1995
A couple of highlights; our 100th show on June 4th with a lot of guests !
The weekend of 14-16 July when we visited both the North Sea Jazz Festival and the Peer RnB Festival in Belgium !
In September we founded Groove FM of which Fingerpoppin Soul is just one of the many great radioshows.
Another fantastic Blues Estafette with Tyrone Davis as stunning climax ! During this Estafette we met MC Ready Teddy from New Orleans who also guested on Fingerpoppin Soul no 125.

1996
Lots of highlights: meeting up with Memphis Soul legend Rufus Thomas, interview with new Soul Star Maxwell and seeing him perform in the Netherlands for the first time at the North Sea Jazz festival. Also another great Peer RnB Festival with Solomon Burke and Bo Diddley.

1997
In February we were contracted by Jazz Radio to present Fingerpoppin Soul on this national Radio station. This meant we had to do Fingerpoppin Soul twice every sundaynight !!! ( with a different playlist as well !) .First show from 19-20h presented from the studio in Hilversum. Second show from 22-24h presented from our studio on the Rembrandtplein in Amsterdam.
This Jazz Radio adventure didn't last long though…already on July 6th we presented our last show for them (the Station was taken over by another Radiostation, and this guy didn't like us as much as he should have!) . Of course our regular Fingerpoppin Soul show continued !
Also this year great gigs by: Mavis Staples, Rahsaan Patterson, Eric Benet, Swamp Dogg, Willie Clayton and Syl Johnson. In the autumn of 1997 we also started with our first website !

1998
Our first two music related trips abroad both to the UK . On Oct 4th we saw Sam Dees perform at the Jazz Café in London and two weeks later we went to the Soul Essence weekender in Great Yarmouth. At this weekender we met a lot of like-minded Soul music lovers ! In the autumn another visit to the Blues Estafette where we saw Rosco Robinson, Earl Gaines and a stunning performance by Betty Lavette.

1999
In February our first Vinyl Spotlight article was published in In the Basement magazine ( issue 13). The album spotlight was an album by Phil Flowers "Our man in Washington". We consequently interviewed Phil ( by telephone) and this article was published in In the Basement magazine issue 14.
In June we interviewed Arthur Conley who lived in the Netherlands for quite some time. We were invited by Arthur to come to his house in Ruurlo where we received a warm welcome and a home cooked meal !
In July another trip to the UK to see The Dells in concert, this gig is still in our Top 10 of best gigs of all time !
Plus this year great gigs from: Screaming Jay Hawkins, Charles Walker and Macy Gray. We ended this year on a sad note on Dec 26th 1999 our Main Man : Curtis Mayfield died…..

2000
On Jan 23th we were invited by Richard Searling to do a two hour guestspot on his radioshow in Manchester . On March 12th we had Leon Ware in our Fingerpoppin Soul radio show no 348 , he stayed for the full two hours and we did a great show together with Leon.
In the May issue of In The Basement magazine we published an article on Mike James Kirkland who has released some fantastic music not just as a solo artist but even more with his vocal group The Censations !
In July we went to New York City to be a guest on another legendary radioshow ; Felix Hernandez on Jammin 105 FM. We also met Phil Flowers in person in Washington DC and saw Bobby "Blue" Bland perform live at BB King's Blues club. Stephen Nicholas introduced us to Timothy Wilson who we interviewed for In the Basement Magazine.
In the autumn another visit to the Soul Essence weekender ( also to spin records again in the Downbeat lounge!) and a visit to the Blues Estafette.
On Nov 5th we started with our own gigs at the Casablanca on the Zeedijk in Amsterdam. These "Sundays are Soulful" gigs continued for two years !

2001
Another trip to the UK in April . We guested on the first internet Soul Radio station; Soul 24-7.com plus we visited a couple of Soul do's .
In October we made our first visit to the Togetherness weekender in Fleetwood,UK. We saw great performances by Jimmy Conwell and Gene Chandler ! In November the annual Blues Estafette with ; Kip Anderson, Latimore and The Calvanes. Top Soul journalist and compiler/writer of the great Soul blog: In dangerous Rhythm; Colin Dilnot made his first of many appearances on Fingerpoppin Soul no 437.

2002
On March 3rd we organised our (temporary) last "Sundays are Soulful" session at the Casablanca. Our special guest for Fingerpoppin Soul no 466 was Gwen McCrae, we did a great two hour show with her ! . Another special guest visited our studio on Sep 30th ; Prince Phillip Mitchell !!

2003
On March 3rd we celebrated our 500th show with a big party in the studio !!
Very memorable gigs by Dionne Warwick, the Isley Brothers, Madeline Bell, Alicia Keys, Freddie Jackson and another splendid edition of the Blues Estafette.
But THE major event of this year was the wedding on Sep 12th of Hans with the lovely Sherry ! The first record to be played for the couple was The Impressions "I'm so proud"!!!

2004
The year started off excellent with a guestspot on Fingerpoppin Soul no 545 ( Jan 8th) from Sundra Manning and Ledisi !
Harry made a trip to Manchester in May to see and meet one of his all time favourite artists : Bobby Womack.
In November we travelled to Belgium for our visit to the TMclub in Houdeng-Goegnies. We witnessed a totally stunning performance by Maxine Brown and Tommy Hunt ! On nov 13th we went to the last ever Blues Estafette. In our opinion organiser Jaap Hindriks could go on forever; the audience was still out there in strong numbers, the artists were very eager to perform at this prestigious festival but sadly he didn't get the support from the Vredenburg venue management ; A big shame !!!

2005
On Feb 17th we witnessed the first gig from John Legend in the Netherlands ( in the small room of the Paradiso) .It was very clear to us he was indeed gonna be a legend !
In April we made our second visit to the TMClub in Belgium this time to see Baby Washington and Don Gardner !. Also in April Harry flew over to London to see and meet Candi Staton. It was her official return to RnB after years over doing gospel shows . It was very successful so many European tours followed the next years !
More great gigs this year by : The Neville Brothers, BB King, Maya Azucena, Teddy Riley, Leela James, The Four Tops and The Temptations with G.C.Cameron.

2006
In the first week of January we flew over to the USA to meet and interview Larry Sanders AKA The Prophet of Soul in Mobile , Alabama.
The interview was published in In the Basement Magazine no 42.
Memorable gigs by; Lee Fields, Ken Boothe and James Brown ( his last ever gig in Holland…). In July we made our first visit to the Porretta Soul festival in Italy.
This year was already their 19th edition ! Highlights were Irma Thomas, The Neville Brothers and Howard Tate.
Our last Fingerpoppin Soul in the Rembrandtplein studio on Aug 31st . From September we present our show from the new studio at The Piet Heinkade near Amsterdam Central station.
More great gigs from Joy Denalane, Barbara Lewis ( at the TMClub) and Allen Toussaint. Allen sang a very special "Happy Birthday" to Harry during this gig on nov 2nd at De Melkweg ( earlier that day Harry presented Allen with a collection of singles written or produced by him !).

2007
Legendary artists visited Holland in early 2007: Candi Staton, Percy Sledge, Solomon Burke, Ashford and Simpson.
In June Hans and Harry made a trip to Manchester to see Candi Staton ( yep once again !),Al Green and Smokey Robinson. We met Smokey at the Bridgewater Hall and even shared the same flight with him back to Amsterdam !
The next day Smokey gave one of the best gigs we ever saw , what a guy !!!

2008
On January 17th 2008 we did our 750th show and we hope to continue Fingerpoppin Soul for a long time !!!

The biggest event in 2008 was of course seeing the best Soul group ever ; The Impressions ! Consisting of Sam Gooden, Fred Cash and Reggie Torian they just blew us away at The Northampton Soul Weekender . ( see our review of this gig in In the Basement
magazine issue 51).
Another big live event was the STAX revue in The Hague. The Soul Children (including a stunning J.Blackfoot) and William Bell gave us a show we didn't expect to see anymore !

2009

On Feb 4th 2009 Marlena Shaw performed at a packed Paradiso. She gave a stunning performance with a great backing band ( UK's PUSH). The legendary Booker T and the MG's did a short sell out tour in March. Big Jay McNeely ( a regular visitor to Holland) honked his sax at Maloe Melo also in March ( Jay had his first NO 1 R'nB hit in 1949 !!!). More great gigs in April from Cameo and Candi Staton. In July Hans and Harry travelled to Italy again for the Porretta Soul festival. Absolute highlight was Spencer Wiggins....what a voice ! Not just old skool for H & H though because in August we saw Chrisette Michele in Amsterdam. This girl has a bright future ahead of her....

In december 2008 Hans and his wife Sherry went to NYC and saw a promising new Soul singer ; Tre Williams. We expect an album by him and his band The Revelations early in 2009 !

2009, 2010,2011……