Brian Matthew


 * Brian Matthew is the presenter of Radio Two's Saturday morning programme Sounds of the Sixties. The show and its music look back to the time when Matthew was a household name, histing the BBC Light Programme's popular and influential Saturday Club, introducing the ITV pop show Thank Your Lucky Stars and broadcasting regularly on Radio Luxembourg, but like many broadcasters of his generation he began his career during National Service, working for the British Forces Network in 1948-49. He trained as an actor at RADA, worked in rep and for the international service of Radio Netherlands before joining the BBC as an announcer in 1955. He began to present Saturday Skiffle Club for the Light Programme in 1957; in the following year the show changed its name to Satuday Club and became the BBC's leading pop show until the rise of pirate radio in the mid-'60s and the start of Radio One in 1967. Guests included the Beatles, with whom Brian Matthew established a friendly relationship, and the programme's mixture of new records and live sessions made it the most forward-looking show of its day.
 * Pirate radio produced many new DJs, some of whom were to become familiar voices of the new Radio One. Brian Matthew and other established BBC figures tended to be sidelined in favour of the newcomers and after Saturday Club he moved to Radio Two to present a variety of regular programmes. Yet unlike many of his peers he retained an interest in contemporary pop, presenting a radio version of Top Of The Pops and an album show for the BBC World Service, as well as The Beatles Story for Radio One. His interviewing skills made him a suitable presenter for My Top 12, in which artists selected and introduced their favourite tracks. In 1977 he began Round Midnight, a magazine programme which covered a wide range of topics from music, the arts and show business and featured many studio guests, sometimes seeming quite adventurous for a Radio Two show. It was axed, controversially, by a new Radio Two controller in 1990. But Matthew soon became the regular host of Sounds Of The Sixties and, with the help of his producers Roger "The Vocalist" Bowman and Phil "The Collector" Swern, made it into a highly popular show with - unlike most "golden oldies" radio - a wide-ranging and varied selection of Sixties music, covering LP tracks, B-sides and obscurities alongside familiar hits.
 * Links to Peel (no more than two paragraphs, please)
 * (TBC......).

Sessions

 * Number of sessions? Any commercial release of sessions?

1. Recorded: YYYY-MM-DD. First broadcast: DD Month YYYY. Repeated: DD Month YYY 2. Recorded: YYYY-MM-DD. First broadcast: DD Month YYYY. Repeated: DD Month YYY etc
 * Song title / Song Title / Song Title / Song Title
 * Song title / Song Title / Song Title / Song Title

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Other Shows Played
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 * DD Month YYYY: Song (single/album) Label