Alan Dell, born Alan Creighton Mandell (20 March 1924 – 18 August 1995), was a

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radio broadcaster, associated in particular with dance band music of the 1920s, 1930s and early 1940s.

Formative years

Dell was born in

Cape Town Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second largest ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

, son of Creighton Mandell, of Johannesburg, and graduated from

Kearsney College Kearsney College is a private boarding, English medium high school for boys in Botha's Hill, a small town between the provincial capital of Pietermaritzburg and Durban, in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa. History Kearsney College ...

in Natal. He joined the South African Broadcasting Corporation in 1943, introducing for several years a programme called ''Rhythm Club''. Moving to England in the 1950s, Dell worked on Radio Luxembourg (which then had recording studios in London), the BBC Light Programme and its successor Radio 2, until shortly before his death, aged 71.

''The Dance Band Days''

Dell's most celebrated programme, '' The Dance Band Days'', ran from 1969 (initially on

Radio 1 Radio 1 or Radio One most commonly refers to: *BBC Radio 1, a music radio station from the BBC ** BBC Radio 1Xtra, a digital radio station broadcasting black music *CBC Radio One, a talk radio station operated by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporatio ...

) until 1995 and, in later years, did so in a sequence on Monday evenings with Dell's "other side", ''The Big Band Sound''. The former included recordings by the likes of Jack Hylton,

Ambrose Ambrose of Milan ( la, Aurelius Ambrosius; ), venerated as Saint Ambrose, ; lmo, Sant Ambroeus . was a theologian and statesman who served as Bishop of Milan from 374 to 397. He expressed himself prominently as a public figure, fiercely promo ...

, Henry Hall, Geraldo and other British dance band leaders. The main elements of these programmes were retained for a number of years after Dell's death, in a Sunday night programme introduced on Radio 2 by

Malcolm Laycock Malcolm Richard Laycock (1 November 1938 – 8 November 2009)Peter VacheObituary ''The Guardian'', 10 November 2009 was an English radio presenter who hosted jazz, big band, and dance band programmes for BBC Radio 2 and the BBC World Service. ...

. DJ

John Peel John Robert Parker Ravenscroft (30 August 1939 – 25 October 2004), known professionally as John Peel, was an English disc jockey (DJ) and radio presenter. He was the longest-serving of the original BBC Radio 1 DJs, broadcasting regularly fr ...

, known for his promotion of

progressive rock Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog; sometimes conflated with art rock) is a broad genre of rock music that developed in the United Kingdom and United States through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early 1970s. Init ...

and other cutting-edge music, was an admirer of Dell's broadcasting style and regularly pointed his listeners to Dell's dance-band show.Peel owned a considerable collection of vintage 78s, including a number of dance band records. A compilation of these was released after his death.

Other work for the BBC

Though Dell mostly presented programmes of music from the dance band and

swing Swing or swinging may refer to: Apparatus * Swing (seat), a hanging seat that swings back and forth * Pendulum, an object that swings * Russian swing, a swing-like circus apparatus * Sex swing, a type of harness for sexual intercourse * Swing rid ...

eras, he was also an early presenter of '' Pick of the Pops'' in 1956 and, in his later years, of ''Sounds Easy'', a Sunday afternoon programme on Radio 2 which was notable for its attention to the recordings of

Frank Sinatra Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Nicknamed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Chairman of the Board" and later called "Ol' Blue Eyes", Sinatra was one of the most popular ...

and

Peggy Lee Norma Deloris Egstrom (May 26, 1920 – January 21, 2002), known professionally as Peggy Lee, was an American jazz and popular music singer, songwriter, composer, and actress, over a career spanning seven decades. From her beginning as a vocalis ...

(both of whom he pre-deceased) and Henry Mancini with the "Mancini moment". Dell won a 1983

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...

in the Best Historical Album category for ''The

Tommy Dorsey Thomas Francis Dorsey Jr. (November 19, 1905 – November 26, 1956) was an American jazz trombonist, composer, conductor and bandleader of the big band era. He was known as the "Sentimental Gentleman of Swing" because of his smooth-toned trombo ...

Sessions - Vols. 1, 2 & 3''. Dell provided the sleeve notes for ''Dance Bands UK'' (1988), a BBC

compact disc The compact disc (CD) is a Digital media, digital optical disc data storage format that was co-developed by Philips and Sony to store and play digital audio recordings. In August 1982, the first compact disc was manufactured. It was then rele ...

of stereophonic transfers by sound engineer, Robert Parker (1936–2004) for the

Australian Broadcasting Corporation The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is the national broadcaster of Australia. It is principally funded by direct grants from the Australian Government and is administered by a government-appointed board. The ABC is a publicly-own ...

External links

*
The History of Radio 2 - Alan Dell profile
at

bbc.co.uk BBC Online, formerly known as BBCi, is the BBC's online service. It is a large network of websites including such high-profile sites as BBC News and BBC Sport, Sport, the on-demand video and radio services branded BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds, t ...

DEAD LINK *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dell, Alan 1924 births 1995 deaths British radio DJs British radio people BBC Radio 2 presenters Grammy Award winners 20th-century British musicians South African emigrants to the United Kingdom Alumni of Kearsney College