"At the Sign of the Swingin' Cymbal" (alternatively titled "At the Sign of the Swinging Cymbal") is an

instrumental An instrumental is a recording normally without any vocals, although it might include some inarticulate vocals, such as shouted backup vocals in a big band setting. Through semantic widening, a broader sense of the word song may refer to instru ...

piece written by Brian Fahey. The piece was first released in September 1960 under the name Brian Fahey and His Orchestra. It is best known as

Alan Freeman Alan Leslie Freeman, MBE (6 July 1927 – 27 November 2006), nicknamed "Fluff", was an Australian-born British disc jockey and radio personality in the United Kingdom for 40 years, best known for presenting ''Pick of the Pops'' from 1961 to 200 ...

signature song A signature (; from la, signare, "to sign") is a Handwriting, handwritten (and often Stylization, stylized) depiction of someone's name, nickname, or even a simple "X" or other mark that a person writes on documents as a proof of identity and ...

, having been used as the theme tune to his

BBC Light Programme The BBC Light Programme was a national radio station which broadcast chiefly mainstream light entertainment and light music from 1945 until 1967, when it was replaced by BBC Radio 2 and BBC Radio 1. It opened on 29 July 1945, taking over the ...

Pick of the Pops ''Pick of the Pops'' is a long-running BBC Radio programme originally based on the Top 20 from the UK Singles Chart and first broadcast on the BBC Light Programme on 4 October 1955. It transferred to BBC Radio 1 (simulcast on BBC Radio 2) from 19 ...

'' from 1961 to 1966. The original version was proposed to Alan by the BBC producer Derek Chinnery. By April 1966 it was replaced as the main theme by "Quite Beside the Point" by the Harry Roberts Sound and written by Cliff Adams. But bits of the original "Swinging Cymbal" theme were used occasionally by Alan as jingles in the show. From 5 April 1970, the show used a new version of "At The Sign of the Swinging Cymbal" arranged by former Ladybirds singer Barbara Moore and recorded by Brass Incorporated. This version is still used by the BBC today.BBC Radio, ''Pick of the Pops''
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The Propellerheads Propellerheads were an English electronic music duo, formed in 1995 in Bath and consisting of Will White and Alex Gifford. History Their first release was an EP named ''Dive!'', released in 1996 through the independent label Wall of Sound. ...

modernised the song in their 1998 re-imagining "Crash!" which was included on the second soundtrack of the film '' Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me''.

Background

After joining

from

Radio Luxembourg Radio Luxembourg was a multilingual commercial broadcaster in Luxembourg. It is known in most non-English languages as RTL (for Radio Television Luxembourg). The English-language service of Radio Luxembourg began in 1933 as one of the earlies ...

in 1961, Alan Freeman used the piece as his theme music for ''

Records Around Five A record, recording or records may refer to: An item or collection of data Computing * Record (computer science), a data structure ** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity ** Boot sector or boot record, r ...

'' and a year later as the theme to ''

''.

References

{{Authority control 1960s songs Instrumentals Radio theme songs Songs about musical instruments