Monday 9 January 2023

1964, Television: "Top of the Pops"

The first episode of "Top of the Pops" was broadcast on Wednesday, 1 January 1964 at 6:35 pm. It was produced in the BBC Studio A at Dickenson Road Studios in Rusholme, Manchester. The first show was presented by Jimmy Savile. It featured Dusty Springfield with "I Only Want to Be with You", The Rolling Stones with "I Wanna Be Your Man", The Dave Clark Five with "Glad All Over", The Hollies with "Stay", The Swinging Blue Jeans with "Hippy Hippy Shake" and The Beatles with "I Want to Hold Your Hand", that week's number one.

Dusty Springfield featured with "I Only Want to Be with You"
The Rolling Stones featured with "I Wanna Be Your Man"
The Dave Clark Five featured with "Glad All Over"
The Hollies featured with "Stay"
The Swinging Blue Jeans featured with "Hippy Hippy Shake"
The Beatles featured with "I Want to Hold Your Hand"

"Top of the Pops" was made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly between 1 January 1964 and 30 July 2006 with a total of 2,272 episodes produced. It’s the world's longest-running weekly music show. Each episode consisted of performances of some of the week's best-selling singles. "I Only Want to Be with You" by Dusty Springfield was the first song featured on the show. The "Top of the Pops" format was adopted by several other European broadcasters, such as AVRO with "TopPop" in the Netherlands.


Opening Credits from 1964

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