Simon Bates

Simon Bates (born Birmingham, 1947) is best known for being a disc jockey in the UK. Between 1976 and 1993 he worked at BBC Radio 1, spending the vast majority of his time at the station presenting the weekday mid-morning show. He is now a regular on Classic FM.

Bates lived in Suffolk and Shropshire before working for radio stations in New Zealand and Australia during his teenage years. Bates returned to the UK in 1971 to join the BBC, initially working for Radio 4 and then presenting the early show at Radio 2. He joined Radio 1 in July 1976.

Initially a weekend presenter playing brand new pop records, Bates took over the weekday mid-morning programme in November 1977 and stayed there for 16 years. Arguably the most un-showbiz of Radio 1's big-name presenters, with limited banter and uncle-like appearance (sober clothes, large glasses), Bates nevertheless became very popular, with up to 11 million listeners. His voice- essentially a sped-up, slightly Americanised version of the standard Received Pronunciation associated with BBC Radio 4- has long been one of the most recognised in the UK, unusual in that most Radio 1 DJs of the time had a more informal "DJ" voice, and most Radio 4 presenters did not pep up their RP with anything like Bates' informal touch.

Two long-running features of his programme were particularly well known, The Golden Hour and Our Tune.

Bates inherited the The Golden Hour from his predecessor, Tony Blackburn. The listener had to "guess the year" from the records played and clues given by Bates.

However, Bates is mainly remembered for Our Tune, which, from 1980, became a daily 11am feature of his show. Over the background score of Franco Zeffirelli's 1968 film Romeo and Juliet, Bates would read out a true story sent by a listener. The story invariably had a theme of tragedy running through it, often starting with an initially happy courtship but followed by a disaster, such as an illness or death. The story would conclude with a record chosen by the correspondent. Although many bemoaned the largely morbid nature of the feature, it was widely listened to and earned Bates much popular acclaim. A number of spin-off albums, featuring songs chosen by listeners, would be released.

A third, less well-remembered feature was The Birthday File, in which Bates would play music by stars celebrating a birthday.

Bates afforded regular airtime to pop guru Jonathan King to comment about the music scene, and was always the presenter sent by Radio 1 to interview the stars at the Brit Awards. In 1989 he did a summer series called Round The World in which his show would be broadcast from a new country each day - the idea being that he would go around the world without flying within 60 days, an aim in which he was ultimately unsuccessful (he had to fly over Saudi Arabia, and it took him 78 days), although he did raise £300,000 for Oxfam. This won him awards, though cynics claimed he only did it in order to avoid being given one of the famed Radio 1 roadshows, and Bates himself has since effectively confirmed that suggestion. Bates' daily reports ran for only half an hour - Mike Read stepped in to present The Golden Hour during this period while the rest of the morning was taken up by the roadshow.

Bates also had two runs presenting the Sunday afternoon Top 40 run-down, from 2nd April 1978 to 26th August 1979 (during which time the Top 20 was extended to the Top 40 on 12th November 1978) and 8th January 1984 to 23rd September 1984. He presented Top of the Pops regularly from 1980 to 1988, and presented the roadshow - which he came to despise - every summer for many years until 1988, on one occasion insisting on wearing long trousers when it was compulsory to wear shorts. After his round-the-world trip in 1989, he was exempted roadshow duties for his last four summers at the station.

Bates worked on the mid-morning slot until 1993, seeing breakfast show presenters like Dave Lee Travis, Mike Read, Mike Smith and Simon Mayo come and go. However, when new controller Matthew Bannister arrived at the station intending to shake-up its "safe" feel and modernise it, Bates was one of the elder presenters whose position was thought to be under threat. He resigned before the station was able to sack him.

During his BBC career Bates was heard on all five BBC stations - apart from his stint at Radio 1 and his broadcasts for Radio 2 and Radio 4 (unusually *before* he joined the pop network), he also presented a Prom concert on Radio 3 in 1987 and presented a digest of the daily papers on the original version of Radio 5 (now Five Live) in 1990. After leaving Radio 1 he briefly worked for Irish-based long wave station Atlantic 252, reviving Our Tune and then presented a TV version of the feature on a daily basis for Sky One. He has also broadcast for Talk Radio UK (now TalkSport), Liberty Radio and LBC (both in London) and the oldies station Classic Gold.

External links

• Radio Rewind biography