Newsbeat

 

Fifty years ago the UK had joined the EEC, the IRA was bombing London, a Cod War with raging with Iceland and mortgage rates were running at 10%. In the midst of this, on 10 September 1973, BBC Radio 1 launched its extended news programme, Newsbeat.   

Newsbeat was, according to network controller Douglas Muggeridge "something I wanted to bring in for some time. We shall not flinch from covering any sort of news story." A cynic will also spot that the BBC’s timing may have also been influenced by other events, the start of independent local radio just a month later.

Airing for 15 minutes twice a day on weekdays at 12.30 pm, during Johnnie Walker’s show, and at 5.30 pm during Radio 1 Club (Rosko’s Round Table on Fridays) Newsbeat extended Radio 1’s news coverage beyond the existing 1 or 2 minute bulletins on the half-hour.      

Mike Chaney, who’d been with the Corporation for 14 years, was drafted in as the programme’s first editor. (1)  He told the press that Newsbeat “will be a new sound on Radio 1 - and, we hope, a fresh approach to radio journalism. Newsbeat will be direct, outspoken, un-solemn and always ready for a laugh!" Mike’s deputy was Colin Adams who’d been at Radio Sheffield and then news editor at Radio Humberside. Both would go onto work on Radio 4’s Today programme, Mike as editor and Colin as deputy editor. (2)  

Newsbeat’s first presenters were Ed Stewart and Laurie Mayer (ex. Radio London) with Ed initially doing four days a week and Laurie one day. Although Ed didn’t have a journalism background he was chosen to make the programme seem part of the network and less of an intrusion.  

Drafted in as news producers were Karolyn Shindler and Roger Gale. Gale had also been at Radio London with Laurie Mayer and had spent some time in the mid sixties bobbing up and down in the Irish Sea working for Radio Caroline North and then Radio Scotland. Was it coincidence that Radio Caroline had also billed its news bulletins as ‘Caroline Newsbeat’?    

Ed continued on Newsbeat until January 1974 by which time Richard Skinner had joined from Radio Solent. Together with John Walmsley (from Radio Brighton) who joined in February 1974, Laurie and Richard presented Newsbeat for the most of the remainder of the decade.

The Newsbeat format remained unchanged for six years by still using Radio 2 announcer/newsreaders to do a straight read of the headlines. That ended in November 1978 just before the wavelength changes and a planned extension to Radio 1’s hours. (3) In the event, due to industrial action, the schedule didn’t change until late January 1979 when an extra 10 minute Newsbeat was added at 9.50 pm. (4) By this time, though still mostly reliant on Radio 2 newsreaders, Newsbeat was providing some Radio 1 bulletins throughout the day and the early evening. (5)  It wasn’t until September 1980 that Radio 1 had totally separate news bulletins read by the Newsbeat team on weekdays. (6) They still shared on weekends until 1984 (anyone have an idea of the exact date?).  

Other voices you’ll have heard presenting Newsbeat or reading bulletins during its first decade include Peter Mayne (from 1978), Stephen Cape (1979),Neil Bennett (1979), John Andrew (1980), Bill Bingham (1980), Andrew Turner (1980),Ian Parkinson (1981), Janet Trewin (1981) and Frank Partridge (1981).

So back to the start on 10 September 1973. The first edition came during Johnnie Walker’s lunchtime show so he, for one, wasn’t happy with having to stop the music for 15 minutes. “Just as I got the rhythm and atmosphere going, it would all stop”. The schedule at that time had Johnnie start at 12 noon, then Newsbeat at 12. 30 followed by another hour and fifteen minutes of Johnnie. At 2 pm it was over to David Hamilton. The BBC seemingly didn’t retain the first edition in their archives. Fortunately the teatime edition on day two, during Radio 1 Club with Alan Freeman did make it into Sound Archives.   

This edition shows the light and shade, the mix of serious and lighter items, that the team was aiming for. So we get the financial pressures on mortgages, the aftermath of the Pisces mini submarine rescue mixed with a lad who got into trouble for having a David Bowie haircut and a champion butty maker. The reporters include Steve Bradshaw (another ex-Radio London recruit), Nick Ross (at the time also reporting for The World at One) and Mike McKay. Newsbeat also relied on reports from BBC local stations so there are contributions by Tony Cartledge (Newcastle), Ernie Brown (Cleveland) and Dennis McCarthy (Nottingham). The newsreader is Peter Latham.

From Radio 1 Vintage here the story of Newsbeat. 

(1) BBC publicity of the time of his appointment to Newsbeat seemed obsessed with Mike Chaney’s offspring stating “he is married with 12 children whose ages range between 20 and 4”. Similarly when he joined Today in 1976 the press release read: “Mike Chaney is married and lives in Dulwich. They have 12 children, 3 from his previous marriage, four by his wife and another 5 by his wife’s previous marriage”.

(2) Another Radio Humberside staff member, Paul Heiney, would also move down to join Newsbeat as a reporter. He too moved onto Today when Mike Chaney left.  

(3) Sheila Tracy was the last Radio 2 newsreader to read the headlines on Newsbeat on Friday 10 November 1978.

(4) The first 9.50 pm edition was Monday 29 January 1979 read by Peter Mayne.

(5) The Newsbeat bulletins at 11.30 am and 4.30 pm allowed whoever was presenting that day to plug the main programme the following hour.

(6) The first separate news bulletin was at 7.30 am on Monday 1 September 1980 read by Andrew Turner. 

BBC 100

On Monday the BBC celebrates 100 years since its first radio broadcast on 14 November 1922.

Making the opening announcement on station 2LO was Director of Programmes Arthur Burrows who wrote: “November 14, 1922, was the day chosen to commence British broadcasting in the official sense. It was the day of the declaration of polls in connection with the General Election, and the news for that evening consisted in the main of election results. The next day the Birmingham station, 5IT, began to operate, and within a week 2ZY had also joined in the work. The London station continued in my charge (Mr Jeffries arranging the musical programmes and sharing in the pleasures of the children’s hour). Birmingham fortunately secured the direction of Mr Percy Edgar, already well known in the Midlands, and Metropolitan Vickers appointed to the Manchester station Mr K.A. Wright, a young graduate of Sheffield, who, since his earliest days with the firm, had shown a keen interest in music and its propagation by wireless. One cannot look back upon those early days without a smile.”

To mark the BBC’s centenary I’ve produced this sound montage 100 Years of BBC Radio in 100 History. Roughly chronological in order it’s my selection of some memorable voices and programmes designed to show something of the breadth of the radio services. I hope you enjoy it.

You’ll hear some broadcasters who make more than one appearance but see if you can spot who appears most often, on seven different clips throughout the sequence.

Here’s the version with accompanying pictures.

The selection of early clips was, of course, limited by what’s survived from that period. Most of my audio for the first half century comes from compilation records issued by the BBC (for their 50^th and 75^th), documentary programmes about BBC history I’ve recorded over the last 40+ years and repeats, often on Radio 4 Extra. Those 1920s clips you here were all recreated for the May 1932 programme The End of Savoy Hill produced by Lance Sieveking. Much of what you hear from the mid-70s onwards was recorded by me at the time or may come from recordings kindly donated since starting this blog.  

Inevitably as soon as I’d edited the ‘final’ final version I remembered all the stuff I’d missed out. No “I’m rather worried about Jim” or “Give ‘em the money Barney”, no Noel’s funny phone calls, no reports from foreign correspondents (other than wartime), the role of the  European Service during the Cold War. I could go on. Summarising local radio or what the BBC calls ‘the Nations’ was impossible; they all just get seven minutes. The wonderful World Service has been reduced to two minutes.

I first started work on this project after completing my BBC90 montage, saving clips away in a separate folder. Most made the cut, some just didn’t fit or no longer felt appropriate or interesting. Serious editing, sequence by sequence, started in February and altogether I’ve used nearly 700 different bits of audio (including jingles). I reckon about 20% of material was also in the BBC90 celebration. Thanks go again to Andy Howells who helped with some BBC90 material in 2012 and to Aircheck Downloads who tracked down a couple of DJ jingles for me that appear in one of the Radio 1 sequences.

Here’s the audio only version.   

 

Steve Wright in the Afternoon

The standing joke is that his last name is Afternoon such is his long tenure on national radio in the mid-afternoon. A large percentage of listeners won’t be able to recall a time when Steve Wright wasn’t on in the afternoon as he’s made that his radio home for 35 of the last 40 years.

But all that is about to come to end this coming week as Wrighty steps down (or is gently pushed depending on how you read it) from BBC Radio 2’s afternoon show and Scott Mills finally makes a permanent move over to Wogan House.

In this blog post I’m posting a selection of Steve’s shows on Radio 1 and Radio 2 from the last four decades.   

Steve Wright's biog in 1988

Steve’s radio career is well documented so I won’t go into too much detail. After a number of jobs from telephone engineer, insurance agent and club singer he moved into journalism on a local paper and then at LBC. His first broadcasts were on the Belgium-based pirate station Radio Atlantis (do any recordings exist?). In 1976 Steve joined Radio 210 at its launch with some pun-laden programme titles such as Wright On and, in partnership with Mike Read, The Read and Wright Show. See the Radio 210 website for more on this.

In 1979 it was off to Luxembourg for a brief spell on 208. Some audio of his time is on this Luxy website.

By January 1980 Steve had been signed up by the BBC and took over the Saturday night slot from Peter Powell. He presented his first Top of the Pops a month later. Moving to Saturday mornings later that year he picked numerous holiday cover shifts, including the breakfast show, before berthing in the afternoon show slot, then 1530-1700, on 5 October 1981 where he stayed for the next 12 years.This was the era of ‘The Afternoon Boys’(later ‘the posse’), “I’m all right, you all right?”, “Get some therapy”, True Stories and the Celebrity Trivia Quiz. Characters such as Damian the Social Worker, Sid the Manager (“hello boy!), Gervais the Hairdresser and Mr Angry from Purley (the voice of TO Dave Wernham who also played Dave Doubledecks) would pop into the studio or be on the phone. Steve was instrumental in bringing the zoo format to British radio. Frequent visits to the States provided much of the inspiration with the likes of Scott Shannon and the Morning Zoo on Z100 and The Greaseman on WWDC.

Putting the record Wright (Radio Times 1 October 1983)

From the summer of 1982 Steve was part of the Radio 1 Roadshow and this is the first 25 minutes of his show from Morecambe on 5 August. There’s chance for you to have a go at Bits ‘n’ Pieces.

Here’s part of the afternoon show from Monday 2 May 1983. It’s a Bank Holiday so we get the show in super stereo on VHF (Radio 1 ‘borrowing’ Radio 2 FM frequencies for the afternoon) but we don’t get many of the regular features. There’s some Showbiz Gossip, a stupidly simple Celebrity Trivia Quiz and Tommy Vance advertising the virtues of Stench. And if you thought that Steve’s habit of  singing over the end of a record is a recent trait you’ll realise he’s been doing it for decades.   

Although this next recording from 18 February 1985 lasts only 16 minutes we get bags of characters and catchphrases plus an extra dose of Mezzoforte’s Surprise into the Showbiz Gossip.

Another Bank Holiday show on FM, this time Easter Monday 8 April 1985 as Gary Davies hands over to Wrighty. It’s  a heavily edited recording but listen out for Mr Angry, Laura’s Second Love, Where in the World?, a non PC The Boss (“yes Sir, Mr Wright”), loads of Ruth McCrum (“You’re listening to Steve Wright, the guy who has the perfect body for radio”) and Andy Peebles trailing the charity football match of Radio 1 vs BBC Radio Sheffield. By now the show template and the production values that made the show sound ‘big’ and that would endure for the next four decades is set. Canned applause, themes and music beds, custom jingles (by AJ Productions), interruptions from characters, portentous announcements (here voiced by Simon Bates), lots of teasers, bags of features and repeating the news headlines even though they’ve been on the last bulletin. The music is almost secondary, Steve hardly ever introduces or back annos a track.

Early on in this sequence of recordings from Radio 1’s big FM switch-on on 1 September 1988 is about 20 minutes of Wright. Listen out for Sid the Manager, Adam West and John Bole (voiced by Peter Dickson, part of the Steve Wright repertory company at that time along with Phil Cornwell and Gavin MCoy) sounding not unlike political correspondent John Cole.

Forward on to 1991 for this recording from 1 July of another afternoon show “extending the boundaries of radio”. We hear the end of Gary Davies’s lunchtime show before Steve. Keep an ear out for the Hopeless the Weather Girl and guest posse member Chris Eubank. The newsreader is Alistair Sandford.

For Radio 1’s 25^th anniversary Steve was in a reflective mood so there are loads of old comedy bits including the shooting of Mr Angry plus guests Smashey and Nicey, Dame Edna Everage, Spike Milligan, Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan, Bruce Forsyth, Steven Wright, Danny Baker, John Major, John Smith, Mel Gibson, Clive Anderson and Sylvester Stallone.

Steve's Kind of Day (Radio Times 8 January 1994)

The last Radio 1 afternoon show aired on 24 December 1993. In January 1994 he was at the helm of the breakfast show with some of the old posse who were now Richard Easter, Julie De Rohan, producer Mic Wilkoyc, production assistant Nicky Hack and Ione Brown “the new dynamic breakfast posse”. Regular characters included Voiceover Man Peter Dickson and The Newsagent (“scuse me”). In this recording from 25 March 1994 the features include Star Trek sketches and Amazing But True (that would become Factoids on Radio 2). On news reading duty is Peter Bowes.   

Steve’s spell on Radio 1’s breakfast show was brief, just 15 months. He was unhappy with the changes at the station as part of Matthew Bannister’s new broom  and it seems that he was also not happy with the breakfast slot as it allowed him little show prep time during the day; the afternoon show gave him the time to prepare and do any pre-records etc. Plus there was a Saturday morning show on Talk Radio in the offing and he also acted as a consultant for the GWR Group, visiting the stations and offering encouragement and support to their staff.

Here’s Steve on Talk Radio on 6 January 1996 with Richard Easter and Georgey Spanswick. His guests are Jon Culshaw, Les Dennis, rugby union player Brian Moore and John Carter.

In March 1996 Steve was recruited back into the BBC fold by the new Radio 2 controller Jim Moir. He presented three shows: Sunday Love Songs (modelled on Gerald Harper’s old show Sunday Affair on Capital) , still running, of course, a Saturday morning show between 10 and 1 bearing a striking resemblance to his Talk Radio stuff and, at intervals in 1996, 1997 and 1998 Steve Wright at the Movies (later re-titled The Steve Wright Picture Show).     

With Steve on the Saturday shows were the Talk Radio team of Richard and Georgey. There’s less mucking about on these shows, the main focus is on the guests. This recording dates from 4 April 1998 and in the studio with Steve is novelist Jackie Collins. By now Georgey has gone back up to Yorkshire TV and its Liza Tarbuck in the studio.

From later in 1998 the guests are Griff Rhys Jones, Dick Francis, Robin Gibb and on the phone Noel Edmonds, though sadly he gets cut off in his prime as my tape ran out.  Liza is off on her holidays. The newsreader is Colin Berry. Recorded on 5 September. 

It was back to weekday afternoons from 5 July 1999 when Steve was moved to replace Ed Stewart. And he’s been there ever since. This is the era of the Big Quiz, the Non-Stop Oldies, the Old Woman, Factoids, Ask Elvis (my favourite feature) and Serious Jockin’ (with no g). Steve’s sidekicks are, no surprise here, Richard Easter and Janey Lee Grace, newly signed to the station from Virgin Radio. Before long Richard was off to Celador to write scripts for Who Want’s to Be a Millionaire? and in came Tim Smith. In this recording of the Big Show from 26 October 1999 the guests are journalist Matthew Parris and Shania Twain. Reading the news is Fran Godfrey, with the travel Pippa Sparkes and the sport Bob Ballard. As it did for many years the show ends with last chords of Wichita Lineman.

In January 1999 Steve was signed up to host a weekly show on the BBC World Service titled Wright Around the World. It replaced long-running popular shows A Jolly Good Show and Anything Goes. A mix of music, comedy, letters and dedications, a mystery voice, an entertainment quiz and a Pen Pal feature it ran until October 2003. This recording dates from around the 22 August 2002.

The final piece of audio, for the time being, is the afternoon show from 23 May 2008. With Steve is Tim Smith and his guests are Jack Bruce, Piers Morgan (sorry!) and Terry Wogan who previews the Eurovision Song Contest taking place the following day in Belgrade. You’ll also hear Sally Traffic, sports guy Jonny Saunders and Ricky Salmon reading the news.

Steve Wright in the Afternoon 1981-93, 1999-2022

“Love the Show”

Postscript:

Before the final afternoon show Steve issued a statement (full text here) which tantalisingly dangles the carrot that this is "our last SWITA for a while." Will he be back? Here's that final Radio 2 show.

Easy Night

Cast your mind back a quarter of a century. Dominating the charts and the music press was Britpop, that catch-all for the resurgence in guitar-based pop from the like of Oasis, Blur, Pulp, Elastica, The Boo Radleys, Ash etc. But there was another musical movement sweeping the nation. Easy listening.     

It’s hard to pin down how this all started, though this Radio 1 programme points the finger at the inclusion of Burt Bacharach on the cover of Definitely Maybe. It certainly sent all the record companies scurrying off to their archives and re-releasing   tracks they thought would never see the light of day again. Anything was fair game under the easy listening banner including tv theme tunes, library music, exotica, space age pop and the acts that your parents had enjoyed like Andy Williams and The Carpenters. Collections of CDs labelled as Sound Gallery, Cult Fiction, Loungecore, Cocktail Classics and Music to Watch Girls By filled the shelves at HMV.

In May 1996 BBC Radio 1 devoted the whole of the Bank Holiday evening to the world of easy listening in Easy Night. Presenting were Kevin Greening and Jo Whiley. It’s only right that Kevin was there as he’d been instrumental in championing the easy revival on his weekend shows. On the cover of the CD single of Wonderwall by The Mike Flowers Pops there’s a sticker that reads “as first heard on the Kevin Greening show” and the sleeve thanks Will Saunders (Kevin’s then producer and in charge of Easy Night), Kevin and Chris Evans who played the record on his weekday breakfast show. Chris regularly dipped into the easy listening/library music archives using Alan Hawkshaw’s Girl in a Sports Car (known as Tina’s traffic news bed) and Sam Fonteyn’s theme from Please Sir!

In Easy Night we hear a mix of easy listening pop classics, new versions of old hits and a mix from The Karminsky Experience, the guys behind the In Flight Entertainment albums “mining a groove that seemed to be beamed in from another dimension.”

Kevin speaks to Burt Bacharach, whose PRS royalty cheques must have come flooding in as a result of this easy listening boom, and Tony Bennett, “God’s own crooner” in Kevin’s book.

For no real apparent reason the programme is interspersed with Challenge Graham in which easy listening aficionado Graham Farrar is sent off round London to locate a fondue set, cocktail umbrellas and blue jeans belonging to Neil Diamond, a bit like one of those Apprentice shopping tasks. Graham Farrar is quite evidently Graham Norton in his pre-chat show days. Graham had first worked with producer Will Saunders on Radio 5’s Sunday Brunch and Radio 4’s Loose Ends.    

Giving us the benefit of his wisdom is Professor Keith Haringey, Ronco Chair of Popular Musicology at De Montford University. No idea who the voice of the Professor is, and producer Will can’t recall either.

Choosing their favourite tracks in Celebrity Flashback are Paul Whitehouse who picks Dean Friedman’s Lucky Stars (“well slide over here”). Bjork’s unusual choice is the vocal dexterity of Yma Sumac with Tumpa. Ice T goes for Hey! Love by The Delfonics. Paul Hartnoll, one half of Orbital, selects Nancy Sinatra’s You Only Live Twice.   

Count Indigo is in the studio with a unique rendition of Smells Like Teen Spirit. There’s Bacharach to the Future – The Definitive History of Easy Listening  which is far from definitive and a Top 10 of Easy Listening. That top 10 features (spoiler alert) Dana, Acker Bilk, Peggy Lee, Mantovani, Dusty Springfield, The Carpenters, Dionne Warwick, Morrissey and Andy Williams with their versions of Moon River, Petula Clark’s Downtown and taking the top spot Herb Alpert with This Guy’s in Love With You.   

Providing all the links and announcements is the purring voice of Honor Blackman.

So once again wallow in the nostalgia of four hours of Easy Night. The recordings, in three parts, include news bulletins read by Jane Bolger and the start of Wendy Lloyd’s show at midnight. If records fade out that’s where I had to turn over the C90 tapes. Some records with a wide stereo spectrum appear to be missing part of one channel.

With thanks to Will Saunders. 

The End of the Ride

By any stretch of the imagination this blog post is niche. It concerns a drum ending that lasts just one second. Yes, zip up your radio anorak for this one.

As you'll no doubt know, back in the days when virtually every show had a theme tune, Radio 1's Junior Choice used a version of Morningtown Ride played by Stan Butcher's Birds 'n' Brass. That theme was first used on day one of Radio 1 when Junior Choice, the replacement to the Light Programme's Children's Favourites, was introduced by Leslie Crowther. Crowther was followed by Paddy Feeney and then, from February 1968, by Ed Stewart. Stewpot used the theme for the next 11 years. Here's Leslie Crowther introducing that first edition followed by the theme in full:   

A brief diversion here on Stan Butcher. Butcher, a pianist, composer and arranger, was born in London in 1920. His first job was for music publishers Boosey & Hawkes. He taught himself harmony and arranging and before he was twenty was providing orchestrations for the likes of Bert Ambrose and Harry Roy. During the war he served in the army and before the end of hostilities he'd been asked to form a dance band that included amongst its personnel trombonist Don Lusher and guitarist Jack Toogood. On demob he played and arranged for bands run by Joe Daniels and Freddy Randall before joining publishers Campbell Connelly & Co. He wrote and arranged for the likes of Ted Heath, Cyril Stapleton and Eric Winstone and with Syd Cordell composed the 1959 Eurovison song entry for Pearl Carr and Teddy Johnson, Sing, Little Birdie. In the late 1960s and early 70s he recorded a number of LPs. Some of these were credited to Stan Butcher's Birds 'n 'Brass. The 'birds' were singers Barbara Moore and Daphne Bonney. Barbara would herself carve out a successful musical career as a singer (she was for a time one of The Ladybirds), composer and arranger. It was she that provided the new arrangement of Fluff's Pick of the Pops theme At the Sign of the Swinging Cymbal and wrote Just Like That for Terry Wogan's Radio 1 afternoon show. Continuing the radio theme connection it was Barbara's husband Pete that arranged and recorded the version of I Love You Samantha that was used by David Jacobs. Stan Butcher continued recording in the 1970s and worked with Stan Reynolds and Barbara Thompson. He died in 1987.

Back to Morningtown Ride. This was a hugely popular tune when Radio 1 started, it had been the number two song at the start of 1967, just pipped to the top spot by the Green, Green Grass of Home. The lyrics telling of children on a night time ride safely delivered to the morning under the watchful eye of the Sandman had great family appeal. So when Stan Butcher and producer Monty Babson put together their 1967 album of covers from the recent 'Hit Parade' called Sayin' Somethin' Stupid and Other Things, they included Morningtown Ride. Other tracks included I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman, Mellow Yellow, This is My Song and Green, Green Grass of Home. Some extra tracks composed by Butcher were added such as Pearls for Patricia and, most importantly for this story, a jaunty little tune called Pig Latin. That track went like this:                  

When Junior Choice came along in September 1967 they ditched the old Children's Favourite theme of Puffing Billy in favour of something more contemporary, and that was Morningtown Ride. However, the  problem with this recording is that it faded rather than ended. Junior Choice was heard on both Radio 1 and Radio 2 so a definite end would give a neat junction for the two networks to split. On Saturday's the programme ended at 9.55 am with Crack the Clue following on Radio 1 and the religious slot Five to Ten on Radio 2. On Sunday mornings there was a split following at 10.00 am time signal.     

So someone at the BBC, perhaps producer Harry Walters, came up with the neat idea of borrowing the drum ending from Pig Latin, probably played by session drummer Barry Morgan (he was credited on Butcher's previous LP) and splicing it onto Morningtown Ride. Neat. Here it is in use by Stewpot in 1979 by which time the show was on Radio 1 only so there are no pips and it's just a handover to Tony Blackburn. I've added my own version of how the track was edited.

But the story doesn't end there as Pig Latin happens to have done double duty as a theme ending, this time for Alan Freeman.

In April 1972 Terry Wogan left his afternoon Radio 1 show to start his reign as Radio 2's breakfast supremo. That afternoon show was then given to Fluff alongside his existing Pick of the Pops chart rundown. Of course it also needed a theme tune and this time it was back to 1962 for a superb orchestral jazz piece from Quincy Jones, Soul Bossa Nova. Freeman's producer was Bryan Marriott who had been a regular producer of Jazz Club in the early sixties so it's likely he'd dug this one out. The track also had the pauses and changes of instrumentation that allowed Fluff to deliver his introductions and goodbyes in his distinctive staccato style.

The trouble with Soul Bossa Nova was, yes you've guessed it, it faded rather than having a definite end. So out comes Pig Latin again and hey presto they have an ending, though it has to be said its a rather more obvious edit. Here's Alan using the theme and  handing over to Rosko in 1973 followed by my own edit to show how they did it.

With thanks to Tony Worrall who first alerted me to this.

Album covers from discogs.com    

Broadcasting in the Seventies

From today's perspective the furore over Broadcasting in the Seventies seems like a storm in a teacup. But at the time it threatened the corporation with industrial action,  the withdrawal of labour by the Musician's Union and letters from the great and good describing it as a threat to "the unique role the BBC has played in the cultural and intellectual life of the country".

It was fifty years ago this week that a number of BBC national radio programme changes came occurred brought about by the implementation of the policy document Broadcasting in the Seventies. Essentially the plan was to redefine the characteristics of each of the four radio networks: Radios 1, 2, 3 and 4 and move away from the existing mixed programming - a style of programming that had existed since Reith's day. We're now used to tightly formatted radio output but at the time this was both novel and controversial. But, if listeners expected an overnight shift in the sound of the favourite station this didn't really happen and it took years for it to pan out - the result of insufficient funds and insufficient wavelengths.

There were several factors that convinced the BBC to act and shake-up its radio services. Financially the Government was tightening the purse strings and refusing any licence fee increases, whilst at the time the BBC had ambitions to expand their services and to adopt  new technology (the roll-out of colour TV and VHF stereo for instance).  Radio listening figures, particularly those in the evening, had started to fall. There was also a notion to hive off the new Open University programmes, as well as existing schools programmes, onto a separate VHF network paid for by government - something which never happened and continued to lead to AM/FM splits and headaches for schedulers for another couple of decades. The BBC had been forced to start a new pop service in 1967 with the launch of the pirate-replacement Radio 1. And finally, with a view to what might happen, and did arrive four years later, there was the threat of commercial radio competition.

The document, published in July 1969, was part of a process that had started over a year before with a wealth of consultation and working parties during which the Corporation had, for the first time but by no means the last, used independent management consultants, in this case McKinsey and Co.

On streamlining network radio the report had this to say:

"Traditionally, broadcasting has been based on the principle of mixed programming. On a single channel, the public is offered the whole range: news, documentaries, plays, music, light entertainment, serials, sport - all types of programmes, covering all interests and all 'brow' levels.

But experience, both in this country and abroad, suggests that many listeners now expect radio to be based more on a different principle - that of the specialised network, offering a continuous stream of one particular type of programme, meeting one particular interest. One channel might offer pop, another serious music, another talk programmes, and so on". 

When the document was released on Thursday 10 July 1969 the Corporation held staff briefings, press conferences and published a special edition of the staff magazine Ariel. The proposals were discussed on air including an hour long Q&A session on the Third Programme the following Tuesday. This is how that evening's Radio Newsreel covered the news with the summary: "Radio 1 strictly pop. Radio 2 carrying light music from Sinatra to Lehar. Radio 3, perhaps only on VHF, with more classical music and Radio 4 with mostly talk".  The newsreader is Peter Barker and the reports from Brian Curtois and Jim Biddulph.

In 1969 Radio 1 and Radio 2 shared a great deal of programming but, to quote the report, "to their respective fans, Emperor Rosko and Eric Robinson barely inhabit the same planet let alone the same air waves". So Radio 1 was to be an "all-pop network". No surprises here but at the time it still carried some jazz shows. Radio 2 was to play "light music" and to shed some of its speech elements. So Any Questions? and Midweek Theatre moved over to Radio 4, and Woman's Hour would follow two years later. News Time with Derek Cooper was dropped and Your Hundred Best Tunes transferred over to Radio 2 from Radio 4. Another programme, still running to this day as part of the Radio 2 breakfast show, also started with the religious slot Pause for Thought replacing Five to Ten.       

It was the changes to the Third Programme that caused the most uproar, not unlike the protests over the 1957 cut in hours and the introduction of Network Three. Now it was such luminaries as Sir Adrian Boult, James Cameron, George Melly, Jonathan Miller and Henry Moore who supported the Campaign for Better Broadcasting and fired off letters to The Times.

Since the network shake-up in September 1967 the Third Programme title had been retained for the evening schedule of music, drama, arts and talks - the same highbrow mix that had defined the station since its launch in 1946. In addition the wavelengths carried a daytime schedule of classical music as the Music Programme, on weekday evenings there was a Study hour of further education programmes and on Saturday afternoons the Sports Service.

Under Broadcasting in the Seventies the proposal was to re-badge the whole lot as Radio 3 and to continue the music programming into the evening. The Sports Service was dropped and moved over to Radio 2 to become Sport on 2. Sport wasn't totally lost on Radio 3 however as it still carried Test Match Special.  Meanwhile some speech programming would move over to Radio 4. In addition the idea of having Radio 3 as a VHF only service was floated, with the medium wave frequencies used to supplement local radio expansion. (Radio 3 did finally become FM only in February 1992).    

What also caused upset was the decision to axe the Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the London Studio Players, the BBC Chorus, the BBC Training Orchestra and, heard only on Radio 2, the Northern Dance Orchestra. Earlier proposals from the internal Policy Study group had also put the Concert and the Northern Ireland Orchestras in the frame. In the event there was a reprieve, at least in the short-term. Writing in The Listener Director-General Charles Curran admitted that the Government basically said "You have too many orchestras but we want you to continue to employ them because somebody has to. They are needed nationally".

The Scottish SO continues to this day, the London Studio Players stayed playing until 1984, the BBC Chorus went back to its original name of the BBC Singers in 1972, the Training Orchestra was finally wound up in 1977, the Northern Ireland Orchestra was subsumed into the Ulster Orchestra in 1981 and the NDO became the Northern Radio Orchestra in 1975 but was disbanded in 1980.  

The longer lasting changes were seen on Radio 4 this week in 1970. As well as inheriting some speech programmes from Radios 2 and 3 the proposals saw an increase in news and current affairs coverage and plans to "develop the four main news and magazine periods - breakfast time, lunch time, early evening, and late evening". Today with Jack de Manio and The World at One with William Hardcastle already existed but new to the schedules were the teatime PM "the news magazine that sums up your day and starts off your evening." Replacing Home This Afternoon (a magazine show aimed a older listeners)  and produced by the WATO team, PM was presented by William Hardcastle to cover the hard news and either Derek Cooper or Steve Race (who also regularly hosted Home This Afternoon), who would look after the lighter elements.

There was another half-hour news programme at 7 pm, News Desk with former US correspondent Gerald Priestland and newsreader Meryl O'Keeffe. Priestland describing the programme as "news with a human voice". Finally, taking a more serious tone and a more international outlook was The World Tonight with Douglas Stuart, which replaced Ten O'Clock. Though News Desk was dropped in 1976 - replaced by The World in Focus which itself ended in July 1977 when the Six O'Clock News was extended from 15 to 30 minutes - PM and The World Tonight remain key programmes.

Elsewhere on Radio 4 some other equally long-lasting programmes were launched: Week Ending (1970-98), Start the Week with Richard Baker and Analysis with Ian McIntyre who said of the programme that "our business was to get behind the news and dig and illuminate and go a bit further." You and Yours would follow in October 1970. Music shows didn't completely disappear, there was Steve Race's daily Invitation to Music for instance and occasional classical concerts. 

The report also covered local radio and expected the network to expand to 40 stations, though financial restrictions saw this stall at 20 until 1980. On regional production the idea was the phase out the opt-outs from Radio 4, apart from Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales and to restructure the BBC English regional map around eight production centres rather than the old Regional and Home Service ones determined by transmitter range.

In the lead-up to the on-air changes for the week commencing 4 April 1970 the Radio Times printed a series of Q&As with BBC management. Here's the final set with Ian Trethowan, MD Radio and Gerard Mansell, Director of Programmes, Radio.

The magazine also published this example weekday schedule to summarise to give listeners an idea of what to expect. 

So did Broadcasting in the Seventies make a difference. It's an unequivocal yes. Station controllers had inherited  mishmash schedules from the old Home, Light and Third. Listening habits had changed; there was TV to divert you, particularly in the evening, more folk listened in the car and on their transistor radios. No longer would the family sit round the wireless to enjoy an evening of mixed entertainment. In the era of increasing consumer choice radio schedulers had to make it easier for listeners to find what they wanted. Having said that the sound of the networks didn't totally change overnight, it was more of a gradual shift. As Trethowan admitted " the changes were not nearly as dramatic as we made out in public." There was still music on Radio 4, drama serials on Radio2 and current affairs on Radio 3.

But the real issue was financial. Although the final report put such considerations well down the list it still talked of predicted annual deficit in the radio budget of £4.5 million by 1974. The figure in the earlier McKinsey report was worse with an £8m deficit forecast by 1972. The Corporation had been frustrated in its attempts to get an increase in the licence fee by Wilson's government which was too embroiled in devaluation issues and cabinet in-fighting. At a Downing Street meeting in 1966 the PM had told the BBC  "drastically to prune its expenditure".    

Typically the BBC fudged and delayed any economies but by the time of the 3-day week and the oil crisis it was squeezed even further and broadcasting hours were trimmed back and programme sharing invoked between Radios 1 and 2 and between Radios 3 and 4.    

I'll leave the final word on this to listener Frederick Chamberlain who sent in his A Listeners Prayer to the BBC in 1968:

Were I in charge of the BBC,

The Radio Programmes - they would be-

Channel 1 - Pop all day; low brow sounds, to some quite gay.

Channel 2- that would go-harmonic music for the medium brow.

Channel 3-Symphonic noise, for the high brow girls and boys, Prose and Poetry, Opera too, not for the many but just for the few.

Channel 4-Would surely be -talks-religion-plays and views-odds and ends and of course the News.

And so-all-would be satisfied-

Not one listener ere denied.

The full document and an article on the evolution of BBC radio post 1967 by Dr Alban Webb is on the History of the BBC website.

In Concert

For nearly thirty years Radio 1's weekly In Concert provided listeners with the opportunity to hear their favourite bands and singers perform live in front of an audience. They ranged from the famous - Queen, Bowie and Pink Floyd - to the not-so-famous - Splinter, Bell 'n' Arc and Trapeze.

Producing these concerts were Pete Ritzema and Chris Lycett, but by far the greater share of the production duties fell to Jeff Griffin who worked on about 800 programmes. Griffin had been a BBC engineer before turning to music production, on the old Light Programme, in 1964. His first credit, incongruously, was for Mrs Mills and her Mates but he later produced shows such as Swingalong, Ed Stewart's first series for Radio 1 Happening Sunday, David Symonds, Scene and Heard, Savile's Speak-Easy, Sounds of the Seventies, Alexis Korner, Rock on Saturday, Andy Peebles, My Top Ten,  Roger Scott  and The Rankin' Miss P.

In 1991, when In Concert was celebrating 21 years on air, Jeff Griffin spoke to Lloyd Bradley of The Independent about some of the more memorable gigs. Here's part of that article, illustrated with clips from the show.

Led Zeppelin

My main aim was to do a Jazz Club-type rock programme with acts playing in front of an audience, but the BBC thought of rock groups in terms of singles. Live In Concert didn't get off the ground until 1969 when I was talking to Jimmy Page after Led Zeppelin had done a Peel Session. He was moaning that the session format didn't give them a chance to show what they were about, so I explained my idea and asked if they would do the pilot. They agreed. It went very well and after a lot of umming and ahhing my bosses agreed to do a series - but only if John Peel compered. (This clip comes from a 1971 performance that is introduced by Peel).

T. Rex

For the first show in January 1970 I'd booked Family, and Roger Chapman lost his voice that day. After five years telling my bosses the show was a good idea, this was a disaster. Then Peel wandered in and said he'd 'give Marc a ring' - Marc Bolan, who lived up the road from the theatre. Bolan said he and Steve Peregrine had no plans that evening, so we told them to get in a cab! They did 35 minutes, then Family did three instrumentals and Roger croaked his way through a couple of songs. This was pre-Ride a White Swan and Bolan seemed grateful for the exposure.

David Bowie

He was on the sixth show, and it was the only opposition I got from my elders and betters. I was called up to see the Assistant Head of Popular Music and asked why I'd booked him. Rock acts were still greatly mistrusted at the BBC, and their train of thought was that this guy who'd had one hit couldn't possibly play a whole show. I had to convince him that David Bowie was capable of keeping people interested for an hour! they left me alone after that. (This clip comes from a 1971 concert).

Pink Floyd

Despite what's been said elsewhere, this was where Atom Heart Mother got its title. This was the first time they performed it in public and when John Peel asked Roger Waters what the piece was called, so he could introduce it, Waters said he had no idea. Later on Peelie came in with an evening paper with a front page story of a heart transplant patient - the caption was 'Atom heart Mother' and Waters, reading over his shoulder, said 'That's it! That's what we'll call it!' Peelie said 'What's it got to do with music?' and Waters replied 'Nothing, but who cares?' (This clip comes from a 1971 concert broadcast in Sounds of the 70s).

The Faces

In 1973, during the three day week, we knew we were going to have a power cut at nine o'clock and had to put them on an hour early to get done. They agreed, but getting The Faces out of the pub was a different matter. Rod especially, as he had drinks that people had bought him lined up on the bar (he never, to my knowledge, put his hand in his pocket). They went on stage dead on eight, played straight through and after 59 minutes and 50 seconds, during their last number, the electricity went. The weird groaning noise is still on the tape, as every piece of electrical equipment lost power.

Queen

The first recording we did of them is proof that Freddie Mercury used to get stage fright. It was in 1973, before they broke big. They'd had very little live experience and the environment of the BBC theatre was a strange one; it was the size of a club - 300 capacity - yet it was like a concert hall. It wasn't a brilliant show as I'm sure Queen were intimidated. 

Ian Dury

When I had him on, Live In Concert had developed into Sight and Sound, and Ian gave me my first censorship problem. We always felt that people bothering to tune in to the radio show weren't going to be troubled by a bit of risqué language or dodgy lyrics, but television had the 9 o'clock watershed and the TV people were very concerned about a couple of songs on New Boots and Panties, particularly Wake Up and Make Love to Me. I didn't want TV taking over what was designed as a radio show, and Ian didn't want to alter his set. he went ahead and played the songs, and there were only a few complaints. (This clip comes from a 1979 concert).

Off the Record was published in The Independent on 17 October 1991.

In Concert - The Timeline

In Concert ran on Radio 1 from 1970 to 1998. It first appeared on Sunday afternoons from 4 January 1970 but was billed as The Sunday Show - this title was dropped from April. In October 1970 it moved to a Sunday evening timeslot, and a year later was part of Tuesday night's Sounds of the 70s.

From January 1972 In Concert moved to Saturday's at 6.30 pm, where it remained for the next sixteen years. Presenters in the early 70s included Mike Harding, Andy Dunkley and Bob Harris, but staying with the programme the longest were Alan Black and Pete Drummond. There were simulcasts with BBC2, Sight and Sound In Concert, between October 1977 and April 1978 and again in early 1983. In Concert was part of Rock on Saturday in 1980/1 and the Stereo Sequence in 1987/8.

From October 1988, and for the next decade, In Concert started to move around the schedule. Firstly off to Friday nights and then Saturday night from January 1990. By November 1993 it was part of Johnnie Walker's Saturday Sequence, initially on Saturday night but shifting to the afternoon from November 1994. When Johnnie left Radio 1 in October 1995 it was back as a stand-alone show on Saturday afternoon, moving to Monday nights from January 1996 and finally Sunday nights from March 1997.

The final regular In Concert programmes on Radio 1 were in the summer of 1998 featuring Shed Seven and then a couple of Glastonbury highlights. From that October weekly concert performances became part of Radio 2's schedule, though in recent years the number of live concerts has been reduced to a handful at a time. They are, at least, back as 'sight and sound' with coverage on the Red Button and TV repeats on either BBC Two or BBC Four.   

Radio 1's New Broom

The summer of 1993 and outgoing Radio 1 controller Johnny Beerling is trying to keep his in-tray clear ahead of his departure that coming autumn.  Beerling is a BBC-man to the core, starting with the Corporation in the late 50s as a TO and later studio manager. He'd produced music shows for the Light Programme and Radio 1 - there on day one producing Tony Blackburn's opening show - moving up the executive ladder to become the station boss in 1985. In June 1993 it was announced that Johnny would be stepping down later that giving the incoming controller time to set his or her own schedule for the autumn.

The following month it was announced that Matthew Bannister had bagged the top job. Bannister brought experience from both the BBC and commercial sector with time at Radio Nottingham, Radio 1's Newsbeat, Capital Radio and the transformation of Radio London into GLR. Director-General John Birt had then hired Matthew to co-ordinate the internal task forces that were considering the charter renewal and it was probably that involvement the triggered alarm bells amongst some of the time-served veteran DJs. As a sign of things to come during his interview for the Radio 1 controllership BBC chairman Marmaduke Hussey had asked Bannister: "How do you feel about being Mr Nasty in the national newspapers".  

Under John Birt's stewardship the BBC was wrestling with that charter renewal, the introduction of internal markets and for radio, increased competition from commercial radio. There was talk, in the corporate blueprint  Extending Choice, of Radio 1 being "more informed and intelligent" and that any speech content should be "more demanding"  whilst at the same time ensuring that it stayed relevant to a younger audience. The issue was that people who'd been listening to Radio 1 since the late 60s and early 70s were still listening, myself included, and some of the DJs were voices from that period too. The problem for Radio 1 and the listeners that had grown up with the station was summed up in a July 1993 article by Giles Smith of The Independent: "Honouring them while keeping the kiddies happy, Radio 1 is forced to chase from side to side, and you can hardly blame if for occasionally looking slightly giddy".

In the same article Simon Mayo addressed the dilemma of Radio 1 distinctiveness: "We have to able to argue that a presenter, a friendly voice behind the microphone like Johnny Walker (sic) playing two hours of music, with minimum intrusion, satisfies the criteria of difference and distinctiveness, because of the variety of music being played. Now some of the BBC governors perhaps do not recognise that there are different types of pop music. To some of them it all sounds thump thump thump. But that is the message Bannister has to get across".  

Sunday Times 26 September 1993

Matthew Bannister talked about wanting Radio 1 to be "more appropriate for a generation of younger people" but, as he recalls, "we never discussed any names". Speaking to The Guardian he expounded on his plans: "The only way I will judge who presents shows is on ability, not on age. I do not intend to define audience by age , nor do I intend to define presenters by age. Everyone pays the licence fee - and I am not going to say this is not a radio station for you. It is for anybody open to ideas, popular music and entertainment."

Nonetheless, the reaction was swift and by August Dave Lee Travis made his now famous  "changes are being made here" speech and set off a domino effect as one by one DJs left the station. It was Johnny Beerling that had to deal with DLT's departure (Bannister was on holiday in Minorca) and dismiss the Hairy Cornflake after he had given an interview to The Sun, despite a request not to speak to the press.

Radio 1's new Autumn schedule was announced in September. To clear the decks some big name departures were mentioned. Simon Bates had already tendered his resignation knowing that he wouldn't be offered a new contract. "Frankly, I'd been there two or three years too long" he said  later. "I was old even then, and could hardly be considered a hip, groovy thing, so there was a great deal of work to be done to make up for that."

Bob Harris remembers being let go when Bannister told him that they were repositioning the network. "What from 16 hours to nothing?. Although I was expecting drastic news, this still came as a jolt."       

The Independent 25 September 1993

The other big name casualties were Alan Freeman who been asked back to Radio 1 by Johnny Beerling in 1989, though he didn't disappear from Radio 1 completely as he was heard in 1994 in the 52-part revamp of The Story of Pop. Also on the way out were Gary Davies, who by now was just on at the weekend and Adrian Juste whose one hour Saturday lunchtime shows melding comedy and music were works of art. A not unnaturally annoyed Adrian was quoted as saying "Anybody above the age of puberty is being pushed out." Others dropped were The Man Ezeke and Paul Gambaccini who was doing the odd special for the station. 

Both Johnny Beerling and Matthew Bannister had floated the idea of moving some of the outgoing Radio 1 DJs over to Radio 2, an idea that was rejected by Frances Line, after all what would happen to the existing Radio 2 stalwarts? Mind you in time some did eventually make it over the Radio 2 with Fluff and Whispering Bob enjoying regular shows on the network from 1997 and even Gary Davies taking up residence, though  that was some 20-odd years later. 

Aside from that is was a case of shuffling the deck. John Peel got a Saturday afternoon slot, Simon Mayo got the weekday mid-morning show, Mark Goodier looked after the breakfast show, albeit temporarily.  In came Danny Baker, Mark Tonderai and, replacing Jakki Brambles in January 1994, Emma Freud. There was a new late-night show for Mark Radcliffe.  As for the rest of the DJ team most stayed put or were subject to minor changes in time slots. That team consisted of Steve Wright, Bruno Brookes, Pete Tong, Jo Whiley, Steve Lamacq, Lynn Parsons, Andy Kershaw, Annie Nightingale, Claire Sturgess, Steve Edwards, Neale James and Johnnie Walker. 

Matthew Bannister interviewed for the Radio Times w/c 23 October 1993

Radio listeners are creatures of habit. As the controllers of the BBC's other national networks knew to their cost, any tinkering with the schedule didn't tend to go down well. Bannister's one regret was that too many changes were foist upon the listener in a short space of time. "Sometimes when you're up against the wire you can cause some distress, and I'm sorry if that's happened", he told the Sunday Times a year later. "And I see that the speed of the changes is something that our audience has been concerned about. But since change was overdue and certain people were leaving anyway, I thought it was better to get on with it and send out a clear signal that Radio 1 was on the move."

Now, of course the age of those on-air itself is largely irrelevant if they continue to be enthusiastic about the music they play and their style appeals to the audience. The problem for Radio 1 was the dramatic change of gear and the purge of some much-loved names hit the audience figures. In June 1993 the station had 19.23 million listeners. By January 1994 they had haemorrhaged just over 4 million of them, down to 14.84. By the end of 1994 just 11 million adult listeners (15 plus) tuned in although as Matthew Bannister later admitted "the biggest turn-off was the departure of Dave Lee Travis" an event that predated his arrival. The figures never again reached their summer 1993 height and bubbled around 11 or 12 million for the next 20 years or so (the latest RAJARs show 9.6 million), though they did receive a fillip when Chris Evans was signed up in 1995 to host the breakfast show.   

1993 did indeed mark the watershed for Radio 1 and, after 25 years on air,  many long-time listeners seemed to switch off and go elsewhere. And that's certainly the admittedly skewed consensus you glean from reading messages on some Facebook groups where folk often lament that Radio 1 was never the same after that. But perhaps these are the very listeners that the station needed to shed. In fact there was still much to enjoy on Radio 1 and in the mid-90s the station benefitted musically from Britpop and a thriving dance music scene, more comedy including Chris Morris, an increased number of independent productions, shows from Mark and Lard, Kevin Greening and the first year of Chris Evans's brekkie shows. There was even a glossy new marketing campaign in 1995 called As It Is to highlight what was on offer.

Daily Telegraph  28 September 1993

Time to listen to what was going on in October 1993. This collection of archive audio comes from my own tapes.

Late night changes were scheduled with Nicky Campbell's Into the Night show ending after five years. Nicky took a couple of months off to look after his sick wife and returned to the station in January 1994 on the drivetime show. Into the Night would feature an eclectic mix of music and guests from the world of music, film, literature, comedy and politics. A regular guest was Frankie Howerd, hence his brief appearance at the start of this show which gets off to a false start. This is part of the final show broadcast from 10 pm to midnight on Thursday 21 October 1993.

Bob Harris had rejoined Radio 1 in 1989 and took over the post-midnight show the following year. Bob would champion many new bands and singer-songwriters, often in live sessions, that most other shows and stations overlooked,all mixed with a dash of rock 'n' roll. Although forced off Radio 1 he would return in 1997 on Radio 2 with a Saturday late night show. This is just half of Bob's Radio 1 swansong that was broadcast from midnight to 4 am on Friday 22 October 1993. Bob's final record choice may surprise you.  

The Independent 23 October 1993

The biggest departure was Simon Bates who'd ruled the mid-morning slot since 1977 with The Golden Hour (inherited from Tony Blackburn) and Our Tune becoming features that listeners would specifically tune in for. (In the words of John Peel: "At eleven in the morning every layby on every major road in the country was full of weeping truckdrivers.") For his final show the BBC splashed out on an OB from the Carnegie Deli on New York's Seventh Avenue. "I wanted a weekend in New York it's an excuse to be with people I like."  This is most of that final show as broadcast on Friday 22 October 1993. Note the Tommy Vance intro at the start presumably resurrected from his 1987 Bates in the States week. "I've suddenly realised he works for another radio station as well"     

Johnnie Walker survived the initial clear out of the old guard, for a while at least. Johnnie had worked for Matthew Bannister at GLR until he was sacked for breaching BBC protocol and putting live phone calls on air. He'd returned to Radio 1 in 1991 with an independently produced Saturday afternoon show, not dissimilar to The Stereo Sequence that he'd presented in 1987 and 1988. His show continued under the new schedule but shifted to a 7 pm start. However, it too came to end, with just two weeks notice for Johnnie's Wizard Radio production company that he'd set up with Phil Ward-Large, in October 1995. This is Johnnie's show from Saturday 23 October 1993.   

Of all the Radio 1 DJs it was the legendary Alan Freeman that had been with the Beeb the longest, starting on the Light Programme in 1960. He'd left in 1978 to work for Capital Radio but was enticed back in 1989 to present Pick of the Pops as a retro chart show and to resurrect the much-loved rock show. Fluff's final Saturday rock show was broadcast on 23 October, this is how it sounded.

Ezekiel Gray, aka Man Ezeke, had been broadcasting his Sunshine Show on BBC Radio Bedfordshire when he joined Radio 1 in 1990. That show ended in December 1992 and the following month he was given the Sunday lunchtime replacement for Pick of the Pops - Alan Freeman having stepped down from that show - another retro charts show called Number Ones on 1FM.  He seemed ill-suited to that format and his contract was not extended beyond October 1993. This is an hour of his last show from Sunday 24 October.

In March 1992 Gary Davies left the weekday lunchtime show - Jakki Brambles took over - for weekend breakfast and a Sunday late-night show. His contract was not renewed beyond Beerling's tenure and he left to join Virgin 1215 and later set up his music publishing company Good Groove. Davies supposedly told Bannister that "mine is the most popular night-time show you have on radio" to be told that he preferred "shows that lead". Davies had "no idea what that means."

This is the last half hour of Gary's Sunday night/Monday morning show from the early hours of 25 October. Like Nicky Campbell and Alan Freeman he plays out with The End from Abbey Road.  

Matthew Bannister took over as Radio 1 controller from 1 November but the re-vamped schedule kicked in from 25 October. On the breakfast show was Mark Goodier, billed as his "first official day in charge". Mark had been standing in for Simon Mayo for a couple of months whilst he'd taken some paternity leave. Matthew's plan had been to move Steve Wright into the breakfast show but he couldn't persuade him to start until the following January giving Mark the shortest stint as a Radio 1 breakfast show presenter. Here's 48 minutes of Mark from 7 am on Monday 25th. The newsreader is  Peter Bowes and Steve Mann provides the sports news.

Taking over from Bates was Simon Mayo, a timeslot he would occupy until early 2001. "It's still The Golden Hour. It's still Simes. It's just a different Simes that's all". This is the early part of Simon's first show. Missing from this recording is the return of Confessions, a guest appearance from Phil Collins, a new feature called God of the Day but we do get to hear Simon answering the calls to his private line 071 636 1111.   

With Mark Goodier covering for Simon Mayo earlier in 1993, the Evening Session was handed to Jo Whiley and Steve Lamacq. They became the permanent presenters of a "remixed and extended" Evening  Session from Monday 25 October. This is the first 30 minutes.

Mark Radcliffe had been working for Radio 1 as a producer since 1983 but had been in front of the microphone since 1991 with the weekly Out on Blue Six and on Radio 5 with Hit the North from 1990. From 25 October Mark finally got a four nights a week late show live from Manchester, that would be nicknamed The Graveyard Shift. "Greetings space cadets and welcome to the new bright young sound of night-time 1FM presented by a bloke who's older than the last one." With Mark was his co-host Marc 'The Boy Lard' Riley. Regular contributors would be Simon Armitage, Harry Hill, Mark Kermode, Mark Lamarr, (just to add to the Mark quota) and John Hegley. On this recording of the first 30 minutes The Tindersticks are in session.

Lynn Parsons joined Radio 1 in late 1991 from Capital Radio. For the next four years she mainly presented overnight shows as well as providing holiday cover. This is the first half-hour of Lynn's show from just after midnight on Tuesday 26 October 1993.

The newest name in the line-up was Mark Tonderai, the station's trainee presenter (did anyone else ever have this role?) with a late night show billed as The Jam. He told The Daily Telegraph "I'm from Harare and have lived here since 1989 working as everything from a fishmonger to a cycle courier as well as doing a degree in architecture at Kingston University. I started as a trainee presenter and only heard last Thursday that they had given me this job." Mark stayed with Radio 1 until February 1996 before moving into radio production elsewhere in the BBC and later as a TV and film writer and director. Viewers of the current series of Doctor Who will have spotted his name in the credits of a couple of episodes. This recording is of the first 30 minutes of Mark's first show at 1 am on Saturday 30 October. By the way I make that opening announcement six words and not five.

Bannister's big name signing was Danny Baker, an mate from his days at GLR. who'd recently been on Radio 5 looking after Morning Edition. The new Radio 1 show carried on in much the same way interspersing the often obscure musical choices with intelligent chat, live 'stunts' over the phone from listeners and discussions about the minutiae of popular culture.

Danny was with Radio 1 for 3 years. He was, he wrote in his autobiography, "never a really good fit and came to a two-pronged tipping point when the new boss of the station, a beleaguered Matthew Bannister once more, was attempting to haul the network out of its ageing complacency at the precise moment the British public began to feel that I was popping up a bit too much in their lives..."     

This is the first 40-odd minutes or so of Danny's first show on Saturday 30 October. With him is Allis Moss and Danny Kelly. Note the reference to Chris Evans "but my goons intimidated his supporters in the north".

Andy Kershaw had been heard regularly on Radio 1 since 1985 most often in evening time slots playing world music or covering for John Peel. So it was perhaps surprising when he was moved to a Saturday afternoon show, though it was relatively short-lived, by November 1994 he was back on the night shift. Kershaw remains pretty scathing about the changes during this period. "It was the arrival of these Birtists, following the loss of our protector, Walters, to retirement in 1991, that we can pinpoint the marginalisation of Peel and Kershaw on Radio 1, in my case eventually into exile as a refugee on Radio 3, and in John's, devalued into a dead of night slot, and having much of his enthusiasm purged in the process". This is the first 45 minutes of Andy's show at 2 pm on Saturday 30 October.

One of the other major schedule changes was a Saturday afternoon show for John Peel, the first time he'd had a regular daytime show since the days of Top Gear coming to an end in the mid-70s. Initially Peel was supportive of the changes at the station. "The new 1FM... has contrived to sound different without sounding as though it is being different for the sake of being different, if you see what I mean." But a couple of years later when his broadcasting hours were chipped away at he expressed concern that "there does seem to be a new orthodoxy in the air which supports narrowly-focussed programmes rather than broadly based ones built on the if-you-don't-like-this-record-wait-until-you-hear-the-next-one principle."

With a Friday night show now being followed by a Saturday afternoon one John Peel rather than drive back to Suffolk he takes to staying in overnight at a small hotel in Paddington. As the BBC baulk at paying his £80 hotel expenses he's forced to pay it out of his own pocket.

This is the first part of John's show from 4.30 pm on Saturday 30 October. "As you may have noticed nearly everyone of the new everyday value 1FM is called Mark. So welcome to the Mark Peel programme."  (A longer recording of this show exists - see the John Peel wiki site).

On Sunday afternoons Rockline with Neale James is moved to an earlier and this was followed at 4 pm by the Rockshow with Claire Sturgess. The rock show dates back to 1978 following Tommy Vance's return to the station. He then left Radio 1 in April 1993 to join Virgin 1215 and all of a sudden The Sturge had a regular show, after having  worked as a production assistant on Simon Bates's show and getting her first stab at presenting when covering the Evening Session in March. This is the first 30  minutes of Claire's show on 31 October 1993.

Steve Edwards had joined Radio 1 in January 1993 to present a show of soul and new jack swing. Initially for an hour each Wednesday, under the new schedule Steve was shifted to Sunday night and given an extra hour. Steve left the station in early 1996 and would later broadcast for a US jazz station. Other than that I know nothing about Steve's career either before joining the BBC or after it, so if you know m ore please contact me. This is how The Steve Edwards Soul Show started on 31 October 1993.    

One veteran broadcaster that survived the cull was Anne Nightingale. Her request show, a radio institution, had been running on Sunday evenings since 1982 (an earlier Sunday afternoon request show ran from 1975 to 1979). From 31 October the show's start time shifted from 8 pm to 10 pm and was a Halloween special. This is the first 30 minutes.