TV Pop Diaries
Pop Music on British Television 1955 - 1999

Cliff Richard and The Shadows

Established 1958

After Ten Fellas - Ten! Rediffusion 11th June 1968
Cliff At The Movies London Weekend 21st September 1968

August 1958 saw the debut release by Cliff Richard & The Drifters, Schoolboy Crush backed with Move It, although the group used on the record seems to have been a mix of actual band members and session players. A few weeks' later Cliff and The Drifters made their TV debut on the first networked edition of Oh Boy on 13th September 1958, probably playing the intended B side, Move It.

After a year or so The Drifters would evolve into The Shadows and would rightly take their place at the top of the charts both in their own right and as a back up to singer Cliff. The next ten years saw success built on solid talent, especially the considerable writing skills of The Shadows' Hank Marvin and Bruce Welch.

Cliff's tenth anniversary year 1968 began with him as the chosen singer to represent the UK in the Eurovision Song Contest, and making sure they didn't mess up the public once again chose a song from the successful writing team of Bill Martin and Phil Coulter. Their song Congratulations is (in Britain at least) as familiar as Happy Birthday To You was even covered by George Harrison on All Things Must Pass (as It's Johnny's Birthday). To help celebrate the tenth anniversary two specials were broadcast, but not by the usual suspect, ATV.

Tuesday 11th June 1968

Rediffusion Cliff Richard and The Shadows: ‘After Ten Fellas - Ten!’ 7.30 - 8.20 pm

A light-hearted look at their first ten years in showbiz. The show was set in the future with an elderly Cliff waddling on stage looking back on his golden years along with The Shadows, now sporting ear trumpets and walking canes. Archive clips from the NME Pollwinners and The Shadows' short film Rhythm and Greens were played together with some new footage of the band playing to a club audience and in concert. Drummer Brian Bennett fell ill during rehearsals (an appendix operation was referred to), so ex-Shadow Tony Meehan, now a successful record producer, re-joined the band for one night. A selection of hits and newer material were on show, along with a token gospel number by Cliff. Record producer Norrie Paramour was gifted the musical director gig, while comedy writer Barry Cryer provided the between songs banter. A TV Times article at the time predicted that he would be Sir Cliff, but it also predicted he would be married with four to six kids.

Saturday 21st September 1968

LWT Saturday Special: Cliff At The Movies 9.30 - 10.30 pm

Despite Cliff getting solo credit The Shadows were co-stars of this comical look at the history of cinema with Cliff as Tarzan and Hank as Carmen Miranda, taking in westerns, historical epics and a World War 1 dogfight. Eric Merriman wrote the script this time around, while Harry Rabinowitz was the musical director. It was probably meant to be broadcast Saturday 31st August 1968, but delayed by industrial action and replaced by a Dave Clark Five special.

After his Eurovision success Cliff would be the next in line for his own Saturday night series on the BBC, more often than not with guest Hank Marvin.

Cliff and the Shad's had by this time become as much a familiar double act as any of the comedy duos we were used to seeing on TV, but we were suddenly about to see less of them. Hank Marvin had started a solo career in January 1968 with the release of the sublime London's Not Too Far, followed by Goodnight Dick a couple of months later. A few more Shadows singles, some actually B sides to Hank's singles, would follow, but nothing that would trouble the charts, and by 1970 they were gone. Cliff's chart career also took a tumble in the first half of the seventies, despite his constant presence on BBC1 on Saturday nights, barely touching the top ten, until Devil Woman in 1976.