Alan Dell - Pick of the Pops

Middle-aged Britons will recall Alan Dell as host of ‘Dance Band Days’ on, ultimately, BBC Radio 2, via the Light Programme and Luxembourg.

It’s true, though, that Alan notably played a key role in the origins of Pick Of The Pops. He hosted the show, then broadcast on a Tuesday night, for nine months from January 1956, having taken over from its first host Franklin Engelman. Back then, the show was purely about new releases.

After handing the cans to David Jacobs, he returned in September 1957, by which times the programme was sensibly starting to include the ‘big hits’ too, as calculated by the average chart positions from the leading music magazines.

The chart changed hands back to David Jacobs in March 1958.

Alan died on 18th August 1995.