BBC Northern Dance Orchestra | |
---|---|
Orchestra | |
Short name | NDO |
Former name | BBC Northern Variety Orchestra (1951) |
Founded | 1956 |
Disbanded | 1985 |
Later name | BBC Northern Radio Orchestra (1975) |
Location | Manchester, United Kingdom |
Concert hall | Playhouse Theatre |
Principal conductor | Alyn Ainsworth Bernard Joseph Herrmann |
The BBC Northern Dance Orchestra was a big band run by the BBC and formed in 1956 [1] as the successor to the BBC's Northern Variety Orchestra, which had been formed on 1 April 1951. Known to listeners as the NDO, it broadcast on the radio daily, usually from recordings made at the Playhouse Theatre in Hulme, Manchester, and on many trips to halls throughout the UK. Through BBC Transcription Services it gained loyal listeners overseas.
Many well-known musicians played with the orchestra over the years, including trumpeter Syd Lawrence, who left the NDO and formed his own very successful big band in 1967, [2] and saxophonist Johnny Roadhouse, one of the band's founding members.
The NDO's first conductor was Alyn Ainsworth, who had conducted the BBC's Northern Variety Orchestra. Ainsworth also wrote some of the band's arrangements together with Pat Nash and Alan Roper, using a standard big band line-up of five saxophones, a flute, four trombones, four trumpets, occasional solo violin, and a rhythm section of piano, double bass, guitar, drums and percussion.
The original NVO owed its roots to Ray Martin and his orchestra, who were playing for variety and other programmes long before the BBC decided to form its own band based in Manchester, and who did, on occasion, conduct the orchestra.
As well as its national radio broadcasts and contributions to musical links for variety shows in Manchester, the orchestra also appeared regularly on BBC television in shows such as Six-Five Special , All Systems Freeman and Make Way for Music. On the radio, it featured in Pop North, and Here We Go with the NDO. It was occasionally augmented by a string section, leader Norman George, almost bringing it back to its Northern Variety Orchestra roots, becoming the Augmented Northern Dance Orchestra.
Some members of the NDO played in the pit orchestra for TV programme The Good Old Days , conducted by flautist Bernard Joseph Herrmann, who succeeded Ainsworth as conductor of the NDO.
The band was threatened with closure in 1969, as much of its work was by then being carried out by the London-based BBC Big Band, the successor to the BBC Dance Orchestra and BBC Showband, which functioned as part of the larger BBC Radio Orchestra. A public outcry about the closure of the NDO followed, and the band was retained. However, under a shake-up of musical policy, the orchestra was reorganised by the BBC in 1975 as the BBC Northern Radio Orchestra. [1] Under the leadership of Neil Richardson, it continued, until the BBC closed many of its in-house orchestras in 1985. [3]
The NDO made a number of recordings, including, in 1972, a vinyl LP (BBC Records REC 133s), and a CD, A Legend Reborn (NDO CD 101); neither of these are still available.
In 2012, a double CD, DIAMONDS: The Best of the BBC Northern Dance Orchestra, was produced by three ex-BBC staff to celebrate 60 years of music by the orchestra. [4]
In 2013 another double CD album PURE GOLD 1, was issued with music from the band's beginnings up to around 1966.
In November 2013 a double album called RUBY was issued, containing some rare experimental stereo recordings and some of the last stereo recordings the band made in the 1970s.
In April 2014 another limited edition double album, PURE GOLD 2, was released. As with all the preceding CD's this is being sold at cost, and for this double album donations are encouraged to benefit the Musicians Union Benevolent Fund.
September 2014 saw the issue of a 61 track double album, PURE GOLD 3. This contains earlier tracks and more of the last stereo recordings the band made in 1974.
Quadraphonic sound – equivalent to what is now called 4.0 surround sound – uses four audio channels in which speakers are positioned at the four corners of a listening space. The system allows for the reproduction of sound signals that are independent of one another.
Antal Doráti was a Hungarian-born conductor and composer who became a naturalized American citizen in 1943.
Edward II are an English band which play a fusion of world music, English folk and reggae. Active from 1980, the band broke up after losing several key members in 1999, relaunching as "e2K" in 2000. In 2003, the band dissolved once more, but have since reformed for a one-year reunion tour in 2009 under the "Edward II" name, celebrating the tenth anniversary of the breakup of the original band. They reformed in 2015 specifically to produce the Manchester's Improving Daily project, which includes the release of new recorded material and a book. The project is designed to celebrate a collection of tunes written in Manchester during the Industrial Revolution, published as Broadsides and currently held in Manchester Central Library. In 2021 Edward II released the album "Dancing Tunes", bringing their own unique style to a collection of traditional and historic Jamaican calypso and mento songs that pre-date reggae as we know it today.
Cara Elizabeth Dillon is a Northern Irish folk singer. In 1995, she joined the folk supergroup Equation and signed a record deal with Warners Music Group. After leaving the group, she collaborated with Sam Lakeman under the name Polar Star. In 2001, she released her first solo album, Cara Dillon, which featured traditional songs and two original Dillon/Lakeman compositions. The album was an unexpected hit in the folk world, with Dillon receiving four nominations at the 2002 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards.
Edmundo Ros OBE, FRAM, born Edmund William Ross, was a Trinidadian-Venezuelan musician, vocalist, arranger and bandleader who made his career in Britain. He directed a highly popular Latin American orchestra, had an extensive recording career and owned one of London's leading nightclubs.
Annunzio Paolo Mantovani was an Italian British conductor, composer and light orchestra-styled entertainer with a cascading strings musical signature.
"Sailing By" is a short piece of light music composed by Ronald Binge in 1963, which is used before the late Shipping Forecast on BBC Radio 4. A slow waltz, the piece uses a repetitive ABCAB structure and a distinctive rising and falling woodwind arpeggio.
Enoch Henry Light was an American classically trained violinist, danceband leader, and recording engineer. As the leader of various dance bands that recorded as early as March 1927 and continuing through at least 1940, Light and his band primarily worked in various hotels in New York. For a time in 1928 he also led a band in Paris. In the 1930s Light also studied conducting with the French conductor Maurice Frigara in Paris.
The BBC Big Band, originally known as the BBC Radio Big Band is a British big band, previously run under the auspices of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). The band broadcasts exclusively on BBC Radio, particularly on BBC Radio 2's long-running series Big Band Special. It consists of professional musicians and is directed by a number of conductors. These include arranger and composer Barry Forgie, who has been the band's Musical Director since 1977, American jazz trombonist Jiggs Whigham, and guest musical directors.
The Pasadena Roof Orchestra (PRO) is a contemporary band from England that specialises in the jazz and swing genres of music of the 1920s and 1930s, although their full repertoire is considerably wider. The orchestra has existed since 1969, although the line-up has frequently changed. It has achieved success outside the United Kingdom, most notably in Germany.
Neil Yates is a British jazz and folk musician.
Syd Lawrence was a British bandleader, who became famous in the UK for his orchestra's Big Band sound, which drew on the 1940s style of music of Glenn Miller and Count Basie amongst others.
Alyn Ainsworth was a British musician, singer and conductor of light entertainment music.
The BBC Radio Orchestra was a broadcasting orchestra based in London, maintained by the British Broadcasting Corporation from 1964 until 1991.
Maurice Winnick was an English musician and dance band leader of the British dance band era.
The BBC Scottish Radio Orchestra (SRO) was a light music broadcasting orchestra based in Glasgow, Scotland, maintained by the British Broadcasting Corporation from 1940 until disbandment in 1981.
Bells Across the Meadows is a piece of light classical music by Albert Ketèlbey. It was published in 1921 for both orchestra and piano, and first recorded by the composer a year later. Ketèlbey called the piece a "characteristic intermezzo". In 2003 it was selected in the final poll by the BBC radio programme Your Hundred Best Tunes and voted the 36th most popular classical tune of all time.
The four operas of Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen together take about 15 hours, which makes for several records, tapes, or CDs, and much studio time. For this reason, many full Ring recordings are the result of "unofficial" recording of live performances, particularly from the Bayreuth Festival where new productions are often broadcast by German radio. Live recordings, especially those in monaural, may have very variable sound but often preserve the excitement of a performance better than a studio recording.
Symphony No. 4, subtitled Sinfonía romántica is an orchestral composition by Carlos Chávez, composed in 1953.
Cavaliers: An Anthology 1973–1974 is a remastered four-disc box-set anthology by Cockney Rebel, released in 2012. The set chronicles the recording career of the original line-up of Cockney Rebel, between 1973 and 1974. It includes both of the band's albums The Human Menagerie (1973) and The Psychomodo (1974), as well as all the singles and non-album B-Sides. It also features early alternative versions and mixes of tracks from both albums, as well as live sessions for the BBC, including a John Peel session and on the Old Grey Whistle Test.