Jam 1 and 2

There are many well-written and educative jingle sites. This is not one of them. But its only right to celebrate the great bit-part role that jingles have played in radio's sound over the years.

                                                                                                        In the UK, the overseas channels first brought them into our homes, followed by the 60s pirates where the first highly-produced American material was heard  on stations like Radio London or Swinging Radio England.  Both of those used PAMS, which was the company chosen for the early BBC Radio One packages.

It was said to be Alfasound's Steve England who first introduced Radio One to the work of JAM. This hugely successful American jingle house in Dallas was - and is - probably the perfect jingle-maker. Although its work is varied, having been aired on a range of formats across the World, they are probably best-loved over here for the ultra tight vocal sound.

We all have our favourite generation of jingle sounds - and this is mine. Not least when aired by Tony Blackburn (heard here), who used - rather than played - the idents, using his energy and their energy to create something even happier than the sum of the parts.

The JAM packages were first licensed for Radio One in August 1976. Whilst some commercial radio stations mischievously dipped their toes into US productions in the 70s, they were officially forbidden. Stations were required instead to deploy their Musicians Union budgets on cellists from Macclesfield and vocalists from Croydon.