This is the one you really mustn't miss — the 1986 British Music Fair, held once again at London's Olympia 2 Exhibition Centre and destined to be the most exciting event for musicians of all kinds ever held in the UK!

We've advanced this issue of IN TUNE specially to give you a run-down of who's going to be showing what and, perhaps more importantly, to cover as many of the most important new products that will be displayed as possible. In this way we're trying to do two things — to tempt as many of our readers as possible to visit the show, and to inform those of you who can't make it about what's happening. It's our job to keep you up to date, and that's what we're doing with this special edition.

We've also pulled out the stops by organising two amazing competitions, the first giving you the chance to win some fabulous Shure mikes, the second an unbelievable opportunity to walk away from London's No. 1 Pro Sound store, the Turnkey Shop, with armfuls of incredible prizes! As in every issue of IT, entry to both these competitions is absolutely free, so get on in there — if you don't enter, we'll nick the prizes ourselves!

Talking of free prizes, don't forget the offer we've made for those of you who have sufficient disregard for your appearance to wear the IT Cat's ugly mug on your chests! Yes, in a display of totally uncharacteristic generosity, our Publisher has offered to give a free IT pen to every reader who visits our stand wearing an IT Cat T-Shirt. Don't forget — IT Cat shirt or not — you're invited to visit us on our stand, which will be no. G-19, on the ground floor, just to the right of the main entrance. See you there, I hope!

Of course, one thing that will inevitably happen as a result of our attendance at the British Music Fair is that we'll be making a lot of new friends among musicians who've never discovered IN TUNE before. For those of you who haven't previously experienced our unique blend of detailed information, reliable, unbiased reviews of all kinds of musical equipment, and absolute madness — welcome aboard! As any of our 10,000+ regular readers will tell you, there's no catch — IT really is posted absolutely free of charge to your homes. So, if this is the first copy you've seen, don't hesitate. Post your free subscription form and/or competition entries today. After all, as the IT Cat says — 'Why buy it when you can get IT free?!'

Moving on to other topics, I promised you last month that, in addition to our change over to a higher quality print process on gloss paper, we had some fine new features lined up for the near future. Among these is going to be a new series on guitar making. Old lags among our readers may recall that we originally attempted to cover this essential subject back in our first few issues, with Chris May's Making It series. Unfortunately (for us), Chris' Overwater guitar and bass range began to do so well for him that he was unable to continue it. Since then, I've been looking around for a suitable way of replacing Making It, and now I'm delighted to be able to tell you that a completely new series on guitar making is on the way for this Autumn. Ill be telling you more about this soon.

Another subject that really does need covering in some detail is the dreaded MIDI standard. Despite the fact that most manufacturers (and most magazine writers, for that matter!) assume that everyone learns about MIDI when they learn their two times table, many of our keyboard playing readers' letters tell us a very different story. And what about all the guitarists who are finding themselves having to cope with MIDI, now that the Shadow, Ibanez and other MIDI guitar systems are on the way? Well, because you've asked us for it, we've got the ideal answer on the way. Again, watch this space!

Another request that we're regularly receiving from readers is to print a guide as to what features are contained in our back issues. We made a point when starting IT to try and print as many copies of each issue as we could afford. Previous experience told us that back issues are always in demand, and that readers often need to be able to refer back to useful series, reviews of gear that they're thinking of buying — or even just want the satisfaction of owning a complete set. Well, even though we're getting a little short of some issues now, we still can offer copies of every IN TUNE to date. We've gone one stage further and have compiled a list of which features appeared where. We'll be running that list in an upcoming issue, too.

So, welcome to this special edition of IN TUNE, and welcome to the British Music Fair. Read the one, visit the other. When the gig season starts again this Autumn you'll find a whole new armoury of equipment at your disposal — and it's our aim to keep you up to date. Stay with IT!.