The Blue of the Night

On 14 October 1977 Bing Crosby had just completed a round of golf. Par for the course, if you'll pardon the pun, as most days the old crooner could be found hitting it 'straight down the middle'.  After all this was the man that had invested in early tape recoding technology to allow his hugely popular radio shows to be pre-recorded so he could spend more time out on the course. 

Having played the 18th hole at Spain's La Morajela course Bing was heading back to the clubhouse when he was felled by a massive heart attack. It was a shocking, if fitting, end to the life of one of the century's most popular singers whose career had spanned the jazz age to the arrival of rock 'n' roll and beyond.

Just four days earlier he'd sung in what was to be his last public performance in concert at the Brighton Centre at the end of a short UK tour. The following day, Tuesday 11 October 1977, he was at the BBC's studios in Maida Vale to record some songs with the Gordon Rose Orchestra for a programme introduced by Alan Dell. That session was Bing's last recording.

The songs committed to tape that October were finally broadcast on Tuesday 27 December on BBC Radio 2 in an hour long special that also included songs, recorded at a separate session, by Rosemary Clooney who'd accompanied Bing on the UK tour.

Here's the full broadcast of Bing's radio swansong as heard on Radio 2 that holiday Tuesday complete with continuity announcer David Bellan. This isn't my recording and I don't recall how I came to be in possession of it, so I can't pass on the usual thanks. I've prefaced the show with the voice of Gordon Rose explaining how the BBC recording session came about, this extract is taken from the recent Bing Crosby in The Road to Rock and Roll broadcast earlier this year.

Billy May's Big Fat Brass

Billy May - he of the Big Fat Brass - was born 100 years ago this month.  Best known for his work with Frank Sinatra and his theme for the Naked City tv series, Billy was one of the elite of American arrangers and composers in the big band idiom.   

My copy of George Simon's The Big Bands provides this potted biography:

Billy May never had a band until well after the Big Band Era had gone. But the happy-sounding, highly danceable and almost always swinging outfit, which this former Charlie Barnett and Glen Miller arranger headed, became one of the few remaining joys for those of us who in the fifties were looking for good, new, big band sounds. May, a huge man with a dry wit that was reflected in much of what he wrote, featured slyly slurping saxes, voiced in thirds, which gave his music its distinctive style. Later he wrote mainly for others (made some great side with Sinatra), was musical director of many TV shows and of Time-Life's Swing Era recreation series.

I was first introduced to Billy May through listening to Alan Dell's Big Band Sounds shows.  So who better to interview Billy than Alan when he was visiting the UK in early 1991. The Radio Times billing for this programme reads: "During his recent visit to London, Billy May spoke to Alan Dell about his career. He recalls his early days as a trumpet player and arranger with the top American bands of the 40s, and his musical arrangements, that provided definitive settings of America's most popular songs, for Frank Sinatra".

This is an edited version of that interview that was broadcast on BBC Radio 2 on 1 April 1991.

Eight years earlier Billy May had again been on a visit to the UK, this time to conduct the BBC Radio Orchestra in a concert from the Royal Festival Hall. Alan Dell compered the show that featured some fine musicians such as Kenny Baker, Danny Moss, Henry MacKenzie, Roy Williams and Barry Forgie. The guest singer was Tony Christie. This live concert was broadcast on BBC Radio 2 on 2 April 1983. 

Billy May died in January 2004 but his music lives on. In this centenary year he was remembered in last Sunday's Clare Teal show on Radio 2.

Date with Dell

Just over a year I wrote about Alan Dell and was pleasantly surprised by the comments and interest I had in the blog as a result. So I’m taking the opportunity to once again dip into the Dell archive.

Alan was already an established radio voice when this illustration appeared in the Radio Times in 1956, in the week that he was the compere on Housewives’ Choice. In the next couple of years he would present Pick of the Pops, the daily magazine show Roundabout and the weekly Date with a Disc – billed as “a choice of gramophone records for the family circle”.

By 1959 Date with a Disc had become a Saturday lunchtime fixture, sandwiched between Sports Parade and Movie Matinee and now billed as “music for moderns”. It was these shows that Chris Wray recalled when we wrote to me earlier this year saying he’d stumbled across an old home recording of one of Alan’s shows. Though the reel was undated Chris believed it was recorded in 1959.  Anyone who remembers Big Band Sound and Sounds Easy will find the presenting style and playlist somewhat familiar. Date with a Disc continued its run intermittently until the mid-60s.

And speaking of Big Band Sound I was also contacted by Glenn Harvey who had rediscovered an old cassette recording of Alan’s 100^th show, possibly from early 1972. If anyone can accurately date this show please contact me.

You can read Glen’s blog Lysander Days which he describes as a “canalised version of a Diary of a Nobody”.

This edition of Sounds Easy from my own collection was broadcast on Sunday 14 December 1980, what a wonderful way to spend Sunday afternoon. This was just a couple of days after Frank Sinatra’s 65^th birthday so the playlist has a heavy slant to ‘Ole Blue Eyes’.  

And a big thank you to Paul Langford who sent me a whole slew of Sounds Easy recordings. From those shows I’ve selected this excerpt for two reasons: first it contains a show favourite Henry Mancini and secondly Alan plays Mancini’s “sonorously beguiling” Dreamsville that he used as his theme tune when hosting Music Through Midnight.

Finally a correction to my earlier post. Sounds Easy’s closing theme That’s All was, in fact played by Henry Mancini & his Orchestra. The opening theme was by Andre Previn & his Orchestra entitled Blame It On My Youth. Both are commercially available.

For the record

The first series of Big Band Sound was actually presented by David Gell on Radio 2 in late 1967 and early 1968. This was succeeded by a Radio 1 series (back in the days when Radio 1 was home to not just pop but folk, country and big band music too) called Swing Session. This was hosted by Hector Stewart, Ken Sykora and Alan Dell and ran in 1968/69. The first Big Band Sound with Alan Dell was broadcast on Radio 2 in late 1969 on a Saturday afternoon. It moved to a regular Thursday night slot in April 1970 and it’s from then that Alan dates the show’s main run in the 100^th show above. Over the years it was either billed as Big Band Sound or Big Band Era.

The series Dance Band Days started life as a short series called The Golden Age of Dance Band in October 1972 at the time of the BBC’s 50^th anniversary. The main series itself was first broadcast from October 1973 and was either scheduled as a separate programme or preceding Big Band Sound. For many years both shows went out on a Monday night. 

Radio 2 - A Day in 12 Minutes

Inspired by Radio 2's 2DAY event on the 22nd of this month - which promises a taste of the full schedule over a 12 hour period - here's 24 hours of Radio 2 from Thursday 3 April 1980 compressed into just 12 minutes*.

In this montage you'll hear: Bill Rennells, Ray Moore, Terry Wogan, Jimmy Young, David Hamilton, Ed Stewart, David Symonds (who gets the date wrong), John Dunn, Wally Whyton, Colin Berry, Alan Dell, David Bellan, Brian Matthew and Sheila Tracy.

* In January 2020: I' added a clip from You and the Night and the Music with Sheila Tracy to this sequence so that it now runs at nearly 15 minutes, admittedly making a nonsense of the blog post title.    

Alan Dell

Alan Dell was associated with three long running series on BBC Radio 2.

Starting in 1972 was Dance Band Days:


Starting in 1969 Big Band Sound:


And on Sunday afternoons from 1980 Sounds Easy:

Alan Dell’s broadcasting career started in the 1940s when he worked for the South African Broadcasting Corporation as an announcer and then producer and presenter. “I hadn’t been there five minutes” he said, “when I saw some 78s of Count Basie. I asked if they had ever done a programme with them and they said ‘Jazz, we don’t do jazz’ ! So, I wrote a programme and asked the Programme Manager if I could broadcast it and he said ‘Yes’.

In 1952 Alan left for the States to study acoustics at Capital Records. On his way back to South Africa he came to Britain and decided to stay. Joining the BBC he was soon working with the Ted Heath Band and introducing Late Night Swing Session. He was an early presenter of Pick of the Pops in 1956 and 1957 and also hosted other Light Programme shows such as Jazz Club, Roundabout, Morning Call, LP Parade, Music Through Midnight, Session at 6 and Date with a Disc.

On Radio 2 Alan’s relaxed style was also suited to late night broadcasting and he was a regular on Music to Midnight, Music Through Midnight and The Late Show. He would also present concerts when the likes of his friend Billy May was in the UK.


Alan worked on a number of recording sessions and compiled LPs, most notably those for Frank Sinatra. I have in my collection The Rare Sinatra album released in August 1978 with sleeve notes by Alan that includes some tracks getting their first world release. Alan continued to champion Frank and played one of his records in every edition of Sounds Easy.

Although I used to record loads of big band music from Alan’s shows regrettably I kept very little in the way of complete programmes. From 30 December 1991 he’s part of Dance Band Days. The announcer is Tim Gudgin.

Alan continued to host his Monday night shows until he became ill in late 1994. Malcolm Laycock, who would eventually take over Alan’s shows permanently, Campbell Burnap and Bob Holness all deputised until he was well enough to return in early 1995. Alan died in August of that year.

Here’s an edition of Big Band Sound featuring Alan’s favourite Ted Heath. This was broadcast 19 November 1984. The announcer after the programme is Steve Madden.

This edition of Sounds Easy from 23 March 1980 was the last in the series, well not quite! The end of the series seemed to come as a surprise to Alan and he announces this as “the last Sounds Easy until…who’s know when”. The following week Benny Green took over the slot. However, after protests from listeners, Sounds Easy did return to the airwaves that winter. Both Alan’s and Benny’s shows became Sunday afternoon regulars until late 1994 when David Jacobs took over from Alan when he became unwell.

On this recording you’ll also hear newsreader Paddy O’ Byrne and announcer Chris Aldred as well an a chance to hear rather more than usual of the theme tune That’s All by, I think, Andre Previn & his Orchestra.