Jim McLeod Retires from ABC after 48 Years

The ABC’s longest serving presenter, Jim McLeod, retires today after 48 years.

Australia’s leading jazz broadcaster has fronted Classic FM’s ‘Jazztrack’ for the past 28 years.

Jazztrack is heard at 5pm on Saturdays and Sundays, and today is the last day with McLeod at the microphone.

Described by one journalist as ‘Australia’s high priest of jazz broadcasting’, Jim was awarded an OAM in 2000 ‘for service to the promotion of jazz music through media broadcasts and encouraging Australian music composition and performance’.

Many Jazztrack performances have been released on CD and a number of these have won ARIA awards. The book, Jim McLeod’s Jazztrack, features his interviews with some of the great jazz musicians.

McLeod is also well known on the international jazz scene. He has compered jazz festivals in Bombay and Monterey and, each year, leads a tour to the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.

Since 1995, he has been a guest of the prestigious Umbria Jazz Festival in Perugia. He has also broadcast on KJAZ across the US, Danish Radio and BBC Scotland.

Looking back at his years with the ABC, McLeod says: “It’s been an amazing privilege, and also great fun, to mix with the remarkable jazz musicians. I’ve just been having a good time.”

Jazztrack will continue on Classic FM, presented by Mal Stanley.