TV Pop Diaries
Pop Music on British Television 1955 - 1999

Disc Weekly ran a report about a new Rediffusion quiz show which required that the contestants have "an above average knowledge of lyrics of standard ballads." Potential contestants were also asked to suggest the names of celebrities, but not from the pop world, that could also participate.

It was a song lyric identification contest where celebrities team up with members of the public, hosted by Ronan O' Casey and co-hosted by journalist and later co-host of Ready Steady Go, Anne Nightingale. The contestant would put sixpence into a computer-looking device which then randomly chooses one of five hundred songs which the contestant then has to sing the first two lines of to win a prize. So basically Spot The Tune, but backwards. The music was provided by pianist Ronnie Cass and his band The Six Penn'orth. Talking to TV Times about the sheer amount of tunes that they would have to learn Ronnie said: "We can do it so quickly now that I'm half afraid the public will say that it's faked! Well, it isn't. These boys can play about 3,000 songs, more or less straight off. When we first got the selected 500, we did a 12-hour band call. Straight through. Played the lot."

According to Daily Mirror "Prize for each correct line sung is £5 — and it's possible, say Rediffusion, for one contestant to win more than £150."

The show was scheduled to debut on Thursday 13th May 1965, but was replaced by the Dickie Henderson Show, but it finally got underway on Friday 18th June 1965 from 7.00 – 7.30 pm, but proved in the long term to be just another summer filler show and it didn't return.

If you think you fit the bill then contact "Sing A Song Of Sixpence," Rediffusion TV, Wembley Park, Middlesex.

SING A SONG OF SIXPENCE

Rediffusion

18th June 1965 - 10th September 1965