TO those of a certain age Jake Thackray is probably just a dim memory, the dour folk singer on the TV show That’s Life who popped up between features on skateboarding dogs and unscrupulous conmen.

To his fans he remains a genius, a master songwriter capable of surreal wit and biting comment.

Now a new show which comes to Barnoldswick Music and Arts Centre next week aims to give an overview of the man.

John Watterson will be presenting The Lost Will and Testament of Jake Thackray which will include a number of songs which have never been performed before.

“I would call the show a celebration,” said John. “I do get people who come along and say I sound like Jake but I really don’t. Because I’ve sung along to his recordings so many times you are bound to pick up some of the intonation.

“What I do is not intended to be a tribute act, I don’t dress like Jake. It’s all about the songs and the words.

“I generally get two sorts of people who come along - the Jake Thackray fans, people who really remember Jake - and then those who are brought along, very often friends or children of the fans who get dragged along. My job is to remind or convince them of what a great songwriter this man was.”

For the last three years John, a successful singer and songwriter in his own right, has been researching a biography of Jake Thackray and as a result he has been granted access to all Jake’s notes and papers by his family. Jake died in 2002 aged just 64.

It was during the course of his research that John unearthed 15 ‘unknown’ songs.

“Some of them were just in manuscript form and I have had to put tunes to them,” he said. “With some of them I found the words in the BBC archives on microfiche and some in his own papers, Of the 15, half a dozen were in Jake’s live set but were never released on an album.”

The new songs demonstrate the diversity of Jake’s songwriting.

“They are a real mixture,” said John. “Some are silly about things that were going on at the time. Part of his job with That’s Life was to be topical.

“But there are a couple of really interesting, serious songs. There is one called Side by Side which is about people who live on either side of borders - it’s Trumps wall, Brexit, Scottish independence, all in one song.

“Another called God Bless America takes the ridiculous premise that America has been taken over by a right wing bigot. These songs are probably more relevant now than when Jake wrote them.”

John first became aware of Jake Thackray when the singer played at the folk club on the Isle of Man where he grew up.

“Like many people, I first saw Jake on TV first with Braden’s Week and then That’s Life,” said John.

“I can’t claim at that stage I got him at all.

“But then in the mid 70s, he came across to the Isle of Man. We’d had the cream of British ‘funny’ folk if you like including Mike Harding and Jasper Carrott but Jake was in a class of his own. Not just in terms of being funny - there are lots of people who can be funny - but with the acrobatics he could perform with the English language.

“Nobody I have known before or since could do what he did with language. That’s when I first became hooked.”

The Lost Will and Testament of Jake Thackray, Barnoldswick Music and Arts Centre, Thursday, May 18. Details from 01282 813374