How a Notting Hill Free School Gave Pink Floyd Their First Real Stage

The London Free School wasn’t a school in any traditional sense—it was an alternative education project in Notting Hill, run by activists like John Hopkins, that hosted lectures, happenings, and music nights. In late 1966, Pink Floyd (still billed as The Pink Floyd Sound) played a couple of fund-raising gigs for the school, including a “Sound/Light Workshop” on September 30. Those shows caught the attention of the organisers, who needed a regular band for a new venture: a Monday night residency at the nearby All Saints Hall, a church hall on Powis Gardens.

That residency, which started in October 1966, was a turning point. All Saints Hall wasn’t glamorous—it was a drafty hall with a low ceiling—but it gave Floyd a weekly slot to experiment. They could stretch their extended improvisations, try out new songs like “Interstellar Overdrive,” and, crucially, pair their music with the liquid light shows that would become their trademark. The free-form atmosphere of the Free School had encouraged that blend of music and visuals, and the residency let them refine it into something genuinely new.

Without the London Free