Annie Nightingale
Anne Avril Nightingale CBE (1 April 1940 – 11 January 2024) was an English radio and television broadcaster. She was the first female presenter on BBC Radio 1 in 1970 and the first female presenter for BBC Television's The Old Grey Whistle Test where she stayed for four years.
Not to be confused with Anna Nightingale.
Annie Nightingale
11 January 2024 (aged 83)
1963–2023
2
Disc jockey
Nightingale specialised in championing new and underground music, she also led the movement and encouraged other women to become DJs and broadcasters. She was the longest serving broadcaster in BBC Radio 1's history and held the Guinness World Record for the longest career as a female radio presenter.[1]
Early life and education[edit]
Anne Avril Nightingale was born in Osterley, Middlesex, England, on 1 April 1940,[2][3][4] the daughter and only child of Celia and Basil Nightingale.[5][6] Her father ran a family wallpaper business.[7] She attended St Catherine's School, Twickenham[8] beginning at age five, although her family was not Catholic.[6] She became a fan of blues music as a teenager.[9] She later attended Lady Eleanor Holles School, Hampton, Middlesex (by scholarship), and the School of Journalism at the Polytechnic of Central London (now the University of Westminster).[6][9]
Journalism and television career[edit]
Nightingale began her career as a journalist in Brighton, East Sussex. She spent a short time at the Brighton and Hove Gazette as a general reporter, and then moved to become the only woman in the newsroom at The Argus in Brighton.[9][10] There, she wrote a pop music column called Spin With Me[6][9] and also worked as a general reporter, court reporter,[7] feature writer, and diarist. The latter involved interviews with Sean Connery in his first James Bond role, and Peter Sellers on location. She later recalled facing little overt sexism at the paper, and that she was allowed to publish feminist pieces.[7]
During the early to mid-1960s, Nightingale worked in television, both as a reporter for BBC's Southampton- and Bristol-based news programme South Today, and light entertainment and music programmes for the ITV Network Southern TV (now ITV Meridian).[11]
In the early 1960s, As a result of meeting Dusty Springfield and her manager Vicki Wickham, editor of the new ground-breaking pop TV show Ready Steady Go!, Nightingale was invited to host a new sister TV show. She joined Associated-Rediffusion TV and hosted her own show in the 1960s, That's For Me.[6][9] Nightingale presented the pop culture show, booked guest musicians who had not previously been seen on television such as the Yardbirds, and introduced the Who's first promotion film. At this time, she also hosted other specials for Associated-Rediffusion, including The Glad Rag Ball at Wembley, starring the Rolling Stones, and the British Song Festival in Brighton. She also covered the Sanremo Music Festival in Italy. Nightingale made numerous appearances on Ready Steady Go! and was a guest on their New Year's Eve Specials, which included some of the biggest pop, soul and rock stars of the era.
The following year, Nightingale co-hosted the music series, Sing A Song Of Sixpence, with host Ronan O'Casey. Later she appeared in the BBC TV series A Whole Scene Going, and made appearances on Juke Box Jury with such artists as Marianne Faithfull.
In the mid-1960s, inspired by her friend Pauline Boty, a pop art painter, she launched a chain of fashion boutiques, as a 'front' person and publicist. This swiftly became a chain called Snob. Nightingale put on fashion shows and took part in them, notably a charity show for Bernard Fitzalan-Howard, 16th Duke of Norfolk, at Arundel Castle, West Sussex. She also became a well-known fashion model at the time, with sessions with photographers including Philip Townsend and Dezo Hoffmann. At this time Nightingale wrote regular columns and was both featured in, and a feature writer for, leading youth magazines such as Town, Fabulous, Honey 19, and Petticoat. She specialised in writing about teen issues, burgeoning feminist perspectives and social issues. Nightingale also wrote for the music magazine Disc and Music Echo. Nightingale was the pop music columnist and feature writer for Cosmopolitan when it launched in the UK in 1970.[9] Later and until the mid-1980s, she wrote regularly for the Sunday Mirror, and penned music columns for the Daily Sketch and the Daily Express.[12]
Early in the 1970s, Nightingale hosted a documentary film series for BBC One entitled Before The Event. The series was filmed all over the UK in locations such as The Lake District and Derbyshire. The series recorded the build-up to major events in the British sporting calendar, such as the Hennessy Gold Cup steeplechase and the Formula 1 British Grand Prix motor race at Silverstone. A little later, she appeared in her first feature film, Home Before Midnight, starring James Aubrey and Chris Jagger. Nightingale played a talk show TV host and was billed as playing the part of herself.
Nightingale worked with BBC TV on The Old Grey Whistle Test for four years. In 1978, she became the show's main presenter, as a replacement for long-time host Bob Harris.[6][9] During her tenure, the show moved away from its traditional bias under Harris towards country music, blues rock and progressive rock and embraced popular modern styles such as punk rock and new wave.[6] She left the series in 1982.[9] During her tenure on the show, Nightingale introduced and championed artists including The Ramones, The Adverts, Talking Heads, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Ian Dury and The Blockheads, Public Image Ltd, Gang of Four, Linton Kwesi Johnson, The Au Pairs, Patti Smith, Iggy Pop, Blondie, Robert Fripp, John Cooper Clarke, U2, The Clash, Wreckless Eric, Nina Hagen, Elvis Costello and The Attractions, X-Ray Spex, Spandau Ballet, Duran Duran, Adam and The Ants, The Teardrop Explodes, The Damned, Madness, The Specials, The Selecter, The Undertones. Nightingale interviewed artists for the show, including Mick Jagger, Mick Taylor, Jeff Beck, Frank Zappa, Dusty Springfield and Paul Simon.
In December 1980 Nightingale presented a special edition immediately after the murder of John Lennon (who had appeared on the show in 1975). This particular episode consisted almost entirely of interviews with various people about Lennon's life and career.[13]
She worked further with the BBC team, presenting long-running shows such as Late Night In Concert in addition to her weekly The Old Grey Whistle Test slot and Christmas specials.
In 1980, Nightingale accompanied The Police on their first world tour,[14] which included places that had seldom hosted foreign performers—including Mexico, India, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Greece and Egypt, with the tour filmed for a documentary.[15]
For Live Aid in 1985, Nightingale was commissioned by the Live Aid team to be the BBC's sole presenter at the Philadelphia US special. She commentated and presented, introducing artists including Duran Duran, Madonna, the Pretenders, Eric Clapton, Led Zeppelin, and Crosby Stills and Nash.[16]
Between 1989 and 1990, Nightingale hosted an interview TV series for ITV entitled One To One. She conducted in-depth interviews with Debbie Harry, Paul McCartney, Stevie Nicks, Peter Gabriel, John Taylor of Duran Duran, and Status Quo.
In her later years, Nightingale wrote for The Guardian, The Times, Daily Telegraph, and The Spectator.
Recognition and honours[edit]
In 2001, Muzik named Nightingale "Caner of the Year" for her appearances as a DJ in Ibiza.[9][33]
In 2002 Nightingale was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire for her services to radio broadcasting.[14] In 2004 she was the first female DJ from Radio 1 to be inducted into the Radio Academy Hall of Fame.[9] In both 2006 and 2007 she won The International Breakspoll Award for Best Radio Show.[14]
On 20 May 2011, Nightingale was featured in the BBC Four documentary Annie Nightingale: Bird on the Wireless, documenting her life and passion for music.[34] The film has been shown three times on BBC Four and features tributes from Paul Weller and Tinie Tempah and interviews with Paul McCartney, Mani from The Stone Roses and Primal Scream, DJ Starscream and The Clash’s Mick Jones. Also in 2011, Nightingale won the Best Special Radio Award for the sixth year running at the International Breakbeat Awards, and the BBC A&M award for the mammoth A Night With Annie Nightingale on BBC Radio 1, and the BBC launched its new BBC Archive Centre and named one of its vaults after Annie Nightingale, where she is in the company of Michael Palin and Sir David Frost.[35]
Nightingale was made an honorary Doctor of Letters at the University of Westminster in December 2012.[9] She was an ambassador at Prince Charles' The Prince's Trust and a patron of Sound Women, an organisation to promote women in broadcasting.[36]
Already Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE), Nightingale was also appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2020 New Year Honours for services to radio broadcasting.[2] She is the only BBC Radio 1 broadcaster ever to receive this honour. In 2020, Nightingale was nominated for an Aria Award. She was awarded a lifetime achievement award by the Audio Production Awards.
In 2022, Nightingale was included in 100 Voices that represented significant BBC figures to celebrate the corporation's centenary. An extended video interview conducted and produced by the University of Sussex History department has now been lodged within its archive.[37][38]
Personal life and death[edit]
Nightingale was married twice. At age 19, she eloped to Brighton with writer Gordon Thomas, with whom she had two children, Alex and Lucy.[6][19] They divorced in 1968.[19] In 1978, she married actor Anthony "Binky" Baker, who later appeared in Gangster No. 1 (2000),[9] whom she also later divorced.[5][9]
Nightingale died on 11 January 2024, aged 83, following a brief illness.[25]