BBC Big Band

BBC Big Band
BBC Big Band at Town Hall Birmingham
Background information
Origin	UK
Genres	Jazz, big band
Years active	1964–present
Website	bigbandspecial.co.uk

The BBC Big Band, originally known as the BBC Radio Big Band is a British big band run under the auspices of the British Broadcasting Company (BBC). The band broadcasts exclusively on BBC Radio, particularly on BBC Radio 2's long-running series Big Band Special. It consists of professional musicians and is directed by a number of conductors. These include arranger and composer Barry Forgie, who has been the band's Musical Director since 1977, American jazz trombonist Jiggs Whigham, and guest musical directors.

The BBC Big Band’s origins lie in the earliest days of the BBC when the BBC Dance Orchestra was formed in 1928 under the leadership of Jack Payne before Henry Hall took over in 1932. In the 1950s, the format and purpose of the Dance Orchestra was changed and modernised, and it became a big band with strings in the Billy May style, known as the BBC Showband, under the leadership of Cyril Stapleton. The band, featuring many British jazz players, was heavily featured on the BBC Light Programme and also began to be used widely in television in the company of homegrown talent, including a then unknown Matt Monro, and with international stars such as Frank Sinatra and Nat ‘King’ Cole.

The BBC Big Band came into existence in 1964 when the existing BBC Variety Orchestra and BBC Revue Orchestra were amalgamated creating the BBC Radio Orchestra.

The BBC Radio Orchestra was a large flexible studio ensemble on the Nelson Riddle/Henry Mancini model, with a full jazz Big Band and symphonic strings. The BBC Big Band made up the orchestra's brass, reed and rhythm sections, and was nominally the orchestra's jazz wing. The various sections of the Radio Orchestra, prefixed A-D, could be used for different kinds of recordings and the "C1" section of the BBC Radio Orchestra was known as the BBC Radio Big Band. The orchestra was initially directed by Malcolm Lockyer, who had previously directed the BBC Showband and BBC joined by various arrangers and guest conductors, including Barry Forgie in 1977, who remains the big band’s Musical Director. At the outset, the big band was sometimes known within the BBC as the 'Radio Dance Orchestra' or 'Radio Showband', utilising some of the names the band had been previously known under, but it was officially called the Radio Big Band from 1964.