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Burlington Bertie
"Burlington Bertie" is a music hall song composed by Harry B. Norris in 1900 and notably sung by Vesta Tilley. It concerns an aristocratic young idler who pursues a life of leisure in the West End of London. Burlington is an upmarket London shopping arcade associated with luxury goods. This song was parodied in the now-much-better-known "Burlington Bertie from Bow" (1915) credited to William Hargreaves and sung by his wife, Ella Shields, who performed the song whilst dressed in male attire as the sort of character known as a "broken down swell". Unlike the original song, Bertie's pretensions to gentility are belied by his residence in Bow, in the poverty-stricken East End of London, though his status as an idler ironically links him to the leisured aristocratic class, who reside in the West End. Later renditions Betty Grable in the part of vaudevillian Myrtle McKinley Burt performed the song in the musical film ''Mother Wore Tights'' (1947). Julie Andrews, also dresse ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Music Hall
Music hall is a type of British theatrical entertainment that was popular from the early Victorian era, beginning around 1850. It faded away after 1918 as the halls rebranded their entertainment as variety. Perceptions of a distinction in Britain between bold and scandalous ''Music Hall'' and subsequent, more respectable ''Variety'' differ. Music hall involved a mixture of popular songs, comedy, speciality acts, and variety entertainment. The term is derived from a type of theatre or venue in which such entertainment took place. In North America vaudeville was in some ways analogous to British music hall, featuring rousing songs and comic acts. Originating in saloon bars within public houses during the 1830s, music hall entertainment became increasingly popular with audiences. So much so, that during the 1850s some public houses were demolished, and specialised music hall theatres developed in their place. These theatres were designed chiefly so that people could consume food ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Star! (film)
''Star!'' (re-titled ''Those Were the Happy Times'' for its 1969 re-release) is a 1968 American biographical musical film directed by Robert Wise and starring Julie Andrews. The screenplay by William Fairchild is based on the life and career of British performer Gertrude Lawrence. Plot The film opens in 1940, with Lawrence in a screening room watching a documentary film chronicling her life, then flashes back to Clapham in 1915, when she leaves home to join her vaudevillian father in a dilapidated Brixton music hall. Eventually she joins the chorus in André Charlot's West End revue. She reunites with close childhood friend Noël Coward, who provides witty commentary on Gertie's actions. Charlot becomes annoyed with Gertie's efforts to stand out, literally, from the chorus. He threatens to fire her, but stage manager Jack Roper intercedes and gets her hired as a general understudy to the leads. She marries Jack, but it becomes clear she is more inclined to perform onstage than ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tic-tac
Tic-tac (also tick-tack and non-hyphenated variants) is a traditional method of signs used by bookmakers to communicate the odds of certain horses. Until the turn of the 21st century it was a very common sight on racecourses in the UK, but with the advent of mobile technology it is now seldom seen. In 1999, only three practitioners were noted to be still working on the southern UK tracks – Micky 'Hokey' Stuart, Billie Brown and Rocky Roberts. A tic-tac man will usually wear bright white gloves to make his hand movements easily seen. In a newspaper interview in March 1937 Charles Adamson, a retired bookmaker of Ashford, Middlesex, said he and his brother Jack (John Thomas Adamson) had invented the tic-tac system and first began to use it in 1888. A few simple examples of signals: *Odds of 9/4 ("top of the head") – both hands touching the top of the head *Odds of 2/1 ("bottle") – right hand touches nose. *Odds of 10/1 ("cockle" or "net") – fists together with the right-han ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Couple Of Swells
"We're a Couple of Swells" is an American comedy duet song performed by Judy Garland and Fred Astaire in the film '' Easter Parade'' (1948). It was written by Irving Berlin. Berlin originally wrote the song "Let's Take an Old-Fashioned Walk" for the scene, but the film's producer, Arthur Freed, persuaded Berlin to change this for a song that would highlight Garland's comedic talent. Berlin wrote the song in about an hour drawing on his experience as a Tin Pan Alley popular songwriter. Description The film is set in 1912 in the New York Broadway Vaudeville business in which hobo acts depicting down and outs were popular with audiences. Astaire and Garland appear as tramps in worn out clothing cast off by the very rich. A ''swell'' is slang for a wealthy, elegant person. The song and dance explores the fantasy that they really are wealthy and have been invited for tea with the extremely wealthy Vanderbilt family. They have the invitation but no means of getting to the appointment. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Irving Berlin
Irving Berlin (born Israel Beilin; yi, ישראל ביילין; May 11, 1888 – September 22, 1989) was a Russian-American composer, songwriter and lyricist. His music forms a large part of the Great American Songbook. Born in Imperial Russia, Berlin arrived in the United States at the age of five. He published his first song, "Marie from Sunny Italy", in 1907, receiving 33 cents for the publishing rights,Starr, Larry and Waterman, Christopher, American Popular Music: From Minstrelsy to MP3, Oxford University Press, 2009, pg. 64 and had his first major international hit, "Alexander's Ragtime Band", in 1911. He also was an owner of the Music Box Theatre on Broadway. For much of his career Berlin could not read sheet music, and was such a limited piano player that he could only play in the key of F-sharp; he used his custom piano equipped with a transposing lever when he needed to play in keys other than F-sharp. "Alexander's Ragtime Band" sparked an international dance craze ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lady Diana Spencer
Diana, Princess of Wales (born Diana Frances Spencer; 1 July 1961 – 31 August 1997) was a member of the British royal family. She was the first wife of King Charles III (then Prince of Wales) and mother of Princes William and Harry. Her activism and glamour made her an international icon, and earned her enduring popularity, as well as almost unprecedented public scrutiny. Diana was born into the British nobility, and grew up close to the royal family on their Sandringham estate. In 1981, while working as a nursery teacher's assistant, she became engaged to the Prince of Wales, the eldest son of Queen Elizabeth II. Their wedding took place at St Paul's Cathedral in 1981 and made her Princess of Wales, a role in which she was enthusiastically received by the public. The couple had two sons, William and Harry, who were then second and third in the line of succession to the British throne. Diana's marriage to Charles suffered due to their incompatibility and extramarital af ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Prince Charles
Charles III (Charles Philip Arthur George; born 14 November 1948) is King of the United Kingdom and the 14 other Commonwealth realms. He was the longest-serving heir apparent and Prince of Wales and, at age 73, became the oldest person to accede to the British throne following the death of his mother, Elizabeth II, on 8 September 2022. Charles was born in Buckingham Palace during the reign of his maternal grandfather, King George VI, and was three when his mother ascended the throne in 1952, making him the heir apparent. He was made Prince of Wales in 1958 and his investiture was held in 1969. He was educated at Cheam and Gordonstoun schools, as was his father, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. Charles later spent six months at the Timbertop campus of Geelong Grammar School in Victoria, Australia. After earning a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Cambridge, Charles served in the Air Force and Navy from 1971 to 1976. In 1981, he married Lady Diana Spencer, wi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lady Diana Cooper
Diana, Viscountess Norwich (née Lady Diana Olivia Winifred Maud Manners; 29 August 1892 – 16 June 1986) was an English actress and aristocrat who was a well-known social figure in London and Paris. As a young woman, she moved in a celebrated group of intellectuals known as the Coterie, most of whom were killed in the First World War. She married one of the few survivors, Duff Cooper, later British ambassador to France. After his death, she wrote three volumes of memoirs which reveal much about early 20th-century upper-class life. Birth and youth Lady Diana Olivia Winifred Maud Manners was born at 23A Bruton Street in Mayfair, London, on 29 August 1892. Her mother, who was a devotee of the author George Meredith, named her daughter after the titular character in Meredith's novel ''Diana of the Crossways''. Officially the youngest daughter of the 8th Duke of Rutland and his wife, the Duchess of Rutland, Lady Diana's biological father was the writer Harry Cust. As early as ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Buckingham Palace
Buckingham Palace () is a London royal residence and the administrative headquarters of the monarch of the United Kingdom. Located in the City of Westminster, the palace is often at the centre of state occasions and royal hospitality. It has been a focal point for the British people at times of national rejoicing and mourning. Originally known as ''Buckingham House'', the building at the core of today's palace was a large townhouse built for the Duke of Buckingham in 1703 on a site that had been in private ownership for at least 150 years. It was acquired by King George III in 1761 as a private residence for Queen Charlotte and became known as The Queen's House. During the 19th century it was enlarged by architects John Nash and Edward Blore, who constructed three wings around a central courtyard. Buckingham Palace became the London residence of the British monarch on the accession of Queen Victoria in 1837. The last major structural additions were made in the late 19th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anita Harris
Anita Madeleine Harris (born 3 June 1942) is an English actress, singer and entertainer. Harris sang with the Cliff Adams Singers for three years from 1961 and had a number of chart hits during the 1960s. She appeared in the ''Carry On'' films ''Follow That Camel'' (1967) and ''Carry On Doctor'' (1967). Early life and career Harris was born in Somerset; her family moved from Midsomer Norton to Bournemouth when she was seven. She won a talent contest at the age of three. However, it was her penchant for figure skating which led to her performing career, she began skating at the neighbourhood rink, eventually becoming a regular at the Queens Ice Rink in London. Seen by a talent scout shortly before her sixteenth birthday, she was offered a chance to skate in Paris or to travel to Las Vegas where she would be a dancer in a chorus line. She accepted the latter, danced at the El Rancho Hotel in Las Vegas. "We did three shows a night and on the 12th night, we had the night off", s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal Variety Performance
The ''Royal Variety Performance'' is a televised variety show held annually in the United Kingdom to raise money for the Royal Variety Charity (of which King Charles III is life-patron). It is attended by senior members of the British royal family. The evening's performance is presented as a live variety show, usually from a theatre in London and consists of family entertainment that includes comedy, music, dance, magic and other speciality acts. The ''Royal Variety Performance'' traditionally begins with the entrance of the members of the royal family followed by singing of the national anthem, God Save the King, which was also performed by the participating acts as a traditional end to Royal Variety Performances; with the exception of 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, as a result of which, As If We Never Said Goodbye opened that year's show instead, sung by that year's host, Jason Manford. Background and founding The first performance, on 1 July 1912, was called the Roy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Glass Tiger
Glass Tiger is a Grammy Award-nominated Canadian rock band from Newmarket, Ontario that formed in 1983. The band has released five studio albums. Its 1986 debut album, '' The Thin Red Line'', went quadruple platinum in Canada and gold in the United States. Two singles from that album, "Don't Forget Me (When I'm Gone)" and " Someday", reached the U.S. Top 10. History In Newmarket, Ontario, vocalist Alan Frew and bassist Wayne Parker (both from local band Onyx), along with keyboardist Sam Reid (from River Drive Park band The End), were recruited by drummer Mike Hanson with the intention of forming a new band. At the time, Hanson was the lead singer and drummer of The End. After The End disbanded the new partnership from the ashes of both bands successfully formed the band Tokyo; that band later developed into Glass Tiger in 1983. Guitarist Al Connelly joined the band in 1983. In 1986, Glass Tiger released its first album, '' The Thin Red Line''; it was produced by Jim Vallance ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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