Having developed to accompany social dancing, British dance bands frequently topped the bills of variety theatres between the Wars as successful acts in their own right – performances that were extremely demanding of the musicians involved. These extended ‘band acts’ influenced the presentation of dance bands in the ballroom and especially on radio and television. This talk is illustrated with examples from a range of bands, and makes special reference to Billy Cotton, who continued to present his band in variety-derived formats until 1968.
About Catherine Tackley
Professor Catherine Tackley is a musicologist at the University of Liverpool specializing in jazz and popular music. She has written two books – The Evolution of Jazz in Britain: c. 1880-1935 (Ashgate, 2005) and Benny Goodman’s Famous 1938 Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert (OUP, 2012) – and co-edited Black British Jazz: Routes, Ownership and Performance (Ashgate, 2014). In 2022-2024 she held a Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship for a project on British Dance Bands.
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