Cast, crew, and production information, as well as viewer comments.

Top of the Pops - Wikipedia. Top of the Pops, also known as TOTP, is a British music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly between 1 January 1. July 2. 00. 6. It was traditionally shown every Thursday evening on BBC1, except for a short period on Fridays in mid- 1.

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Fridays in 1. 99. Sundays on BBC Two in 2.

Each weekly programme consisted of performances from some of that week's best- selling popular music artists, with a rundown of that week's singles chart. Additionally, there was a special edition of the programme on Christmas Day (and usually, until 1. Christmas), featuring some of the best- selling singles of the year. With its high viewing figures the show became a significant part of British popular culture.

Although the weekly show was cancelled in 2. Editions of the programme from the 1. Thursdays and Fridays on BBC Four, although episodes featuring certain former presenters are not repeated since the Jimmy Savile allegations. It was first aired in 1. Top 2. 0. By 1. 97.

Top 3. 0 was being used and the show was extended from 3. The show was also now shown in colour following the BBC1 upgrade in November 1. A switch to the Top 4. It periodically had some aspect of its title sequence, logo and theme tune, format, or set design altered in some way, keeping the show looking modern despite its age. The programme had several executive producers during its run (although not all were billed as such), in charge of the overall production of the show, although specific content on individual shows was sometimes decided by other producers. When Stewart left the show in 1.

Robin Nash. Both Stewart and Nash made brief returns to the show as producer after they left, in 1. Stewart devised the rules which governed how the show would operate: the programme would always end with the number one record, which was the only record that could appear in consecutive weeks. The show would include the highest new entry and (if not featured in the previous week) the highest climber on the charts, and omit any song going down in the chart. For example, if a song was played over the chart countdown or the closing credits, then it was acceptable for the act to appear in the studio the following week.

These rules were sometimes interpreted flexibly and were more formally relaxed from 1. Top 4. 0 (in the late 1. When the programme's format changed in November 2. Later, during the BBC Two era, the top 2. Singles from below the top 4. If a single being performed was below the top 4. It was produced in Studio A on Dickenson Road in Rusholme, Manchester.

DJ Jimmy Savile presented the first show live from the Manchester studio (with a brief link to Alan Freeman in London to preview the following week's programme), which featured (in order) the Rolling Stones with . Additionally its length was extended by 5 minutes to 3. For the first three years Alan Freeman, David Jacobs, Pete Murray and Jimmy Savile rotated presenting duties, with the following week's presenter also appearing at the end of each show, although this practice ceased from October 1. Neville Wortman filled in as director/producer on Johnnie Stewart's holiday break. In the first few editions, Denise Sampey was the .

He would continue in the role until 1. In November 1. 96. BBC TV Centre, where it stayed until 1. Elstree Studios Studio C. These features were dropped after a while, although the programme continued to feature new releases on a regular basis for the rest of the decade. During its heyday, it attracted 1. The peak TV audience of 1.

ITV strike, with only BBC1 and BBC2 on air. The first was shown on 2. December 1. 96. 5. In 1. 97. 3, there was just one show, airing on Christmas Day. In place of the traditional second show, Jimmy Savile hosted a look back at the first 1.

TOTP, broadcast on 2. December. The first show, due to be screened on 2. December, was not shown at all because BBC1 was off the air. The format was slightly tweaked for the Christmas Day edition in 1.

Radio 1 DJs choosing their favourite tracks of the year. Guest co- presenters and a music news feature were introduced for a short while, but had ceased by the end of 1.

The chart rundown was split into three sections in the middle of the programme, with the final Top 1. An occasional feature showing the American music scene with Jonathan King was introduced in November 1. February 1. 98. 5. In January 1. 98. Breakers section, featuring short video clips of tracks in the lower end of the Top 4. March 1. 99. 4. Although the programme had been broadcast live in its early editions, it had been recorded on the day before transmission for many years. However, from May 1.

The programme moved in September 1. Thursdays, where it would remain until June 1.

The end of 1. 98. December 1. 98. 8, to celebrate the 2. The pre- recorded programme featured the return of the original four presenters (Savile, Freeman, Murray and Jacobs) as well as numerous presenters from the show's history, anchored by Paul Gambaccini and Mike Read.

Numerous clips from the history of the show were included in between acts performing in the studio, which included Cliff Richard, Engelbert Humperdinck, Lulu, The Four Tops, David Essex, Mud, Status Quo, Shakin' Stevens, The Tremeloes and from the very first edition, The Swinging Blue Jeans. Sandie Shaw, The Pet Shop Boys and Wet Wet Wet were billed in the Radio Times to appear, but none featured in the show other than Shaw in compilation clips. The following year, in an attempt to fit more songs in the allocated half hour, he restricted the duration of studio performances to three minutes, and videos to two minutes, a practice which was largely continued until May 1. In July 1. 99. 0, he introduced a rundown of the Top 5 albums, which continued on a monthly basis until May 1. Ciani had to step down due to illness in 1. Hurll returned as producer to cover for two months (and again for a brief time as holiday cover in 1. Year Zero' revamp.

However, during the last few years of the 1. Year Zero' revamp. Following a fall in viewing figures and a general perception that the show had become 'uncool' (acts like The Clash had refused to appear in the show in previous years), a radical new format was introduced by incoming executive producer Stanley Appel (who had worked on the programme since 1. A brand new theme tune ('Now Get Out Of That'), title sequence and logo were introduced, and the entire programme moved from BBC Television Centre in London to BBC Elstree Centre in Borehamwood. The new presenting team would take turns hosting (initially usually in pairs but sometimes solo), and would often introduce acts in an out- of- vision voiceover over the song's instrumental introduction. They would sometimes even conduct short informal interviews with the performers, and initially the Top 1. Rules relating to performance were also altered meaning acts had to sing live as opposed to the backing tracks for instruments and mimed vocals for which the show was known. Download Super Mario 64 Rom N64 Roms For Android.

To incorporate the shift of dominance towards American artists, more use was made of out- of- studio performances, with acts in America able to transmit their song to the Top of the Pops audience . These changes were widely unpopular and much of the presenting team were axed within a year, leaving the show hosted solely by Dortie and Franklin (apart from the Christmas Day editions, when both presenters appeared) from October 1. Blaxill expanded the use of . As a consequence, Bon Jovi performed Always from Niagara Falls and Celine Dion beamed in Think Twice from Miami Beach. The last remnants of the Year Zero revamp were replaced in 1. Top of the Pops 2 some months previous), coinciding with the introduction of a new set. Blaxill also increasingly experimented with handing presenting duties to celebrities, commonly contemporary comedians and pop stars who were not in the charts at that time.

In an attempt to keep the links between acts as fresh as the performances themselves, the so- called .