Big Red Book
Celebrating television's This Is Your Life
Joe LOSS OBE (1909-1990)
THIS IS YOUR LIFE - Joe Loss, musician and bandleader, was surprised by Eamonn Andrews during a star-studded party to celebrate his 50 years in show business at the Portman Hotel in London, from where the programme was then recorded.
Joe, who was born in London, started band leading in the early 1930s, playing with a twelve-piece band at venues such as the Astoria Ballroom and the Holborn Empire. The Joe Loss Orchestra, formed in the 1930s, became one of the most successful acts of the big band era during the 1940s, through broadcasting, recording and annual tours.
During the 1950s and 1960s, the Joe Loss Orchestra was in constant demand. In addition to being the resident band at London's Hammersmith Palais, they made regular television appearances, particularly on the BBC's Come Dancing and performed worldwide with many famous vocalists.
Joe Loss was a subject of This Is Your Life on two occasions – previously surprised by Eamonn Andrews in April 1963 at the Hammersmith Palais in London.
"I never dreamed you'd do this to me!"
programme details...
- Edition No: 548
- Subject No: second timer
- Broadcast date: Wed 15 Oct 1980
- Broadcast time: 7.00-7.30pm
- Recorded: Sun 12 Oct 1980
- Venue: Portman Hotel, London
- Series: 21
- Edition: 1
- Code name: Found
on the guest list...
- Mildred - wife
- David - son
- Jennifer - daughter
- Robert - son-in-law
- Paul - grandson
- Andrew - grandson
- Harry - brother
- Harry Kahn
- Arthur Birkby
- Bert Collier
- Joyce Blair
- Lionel Blair
- Ross McManus
- Rose Brennan
- Elvis Costello
- Spike Milligan
- Alan Whicker
- Leslie Mitchell
- Ludovic Kennedy
- Moira Shearer
- Bernard Braden
- Barbara Kelly
- David Lodge
- Jon Pertwee
- Dora Bryan
- Deryck Guyler
- Zandra Rhodes
- Arthur English
- Sara Leighton
- Elizabeth Seal
- Mark - grandson
- Dani - granddaughter
- Vera Lynn Filmed tribute:
- Charlie Chester
related appearances...
- Joe Brannelly - Jan 1956
- Vera Lynn - Oct 1957
- Max Bygraves - Oct 1961
- Eamonn Andrews - May 1974
- Ivy Benson - Dec 1976
- Robert Arnott - Dec 1977
- Vera Lynn - Jan 1979
- Bill Waddington - Oct 1986
- Monty Fresco - Nov 1986
- The Story of This Is Your Life - Mar 1987
production team...
- Researcher: Katie Lander
- Writers: Tom Brennand, Roy Bottomley
- Directors: Stuart Hall, Terry Yarwood
- Producer: Jack Crawshaw
- names above in bold indicate subjects of This Is Your Life
first tribute
surprised again!
blowing a trumpet for the musicians
a brief biography
the programme's relaunch
The Story of This Is Your Life
a BBC Did You See...? special
the applause, laughter and tears
Eamonn Andrews - Answers the Question that Everyone Asks Him!
Eamonn Andrews defends his high-profile
TV Times article on Eamonn Andrews
Press coverage of the death and memorial service of Eamonn Andrews
How Eamonn carved a life from insecure beginnings
The Stage reviews the book For Ever and Ever, Eamonn
Jennifer Jankel, daughter of Joe Loss, recalls this edition of This Is Your Life in an exclusive interview recorded in November 2016
Screenshots of Joe Loss This Is Your Life
Joe Loss, the popular dance band leader, was also the recipient of the red book on two occasions from Eamonn. Afterwards, he would say, 'It was an unforgettable experience.' Now, as he sat at his desk on the fourth floor of Morley House in Regent Street, he recalled their friendship spanning nearly forty years. When Eamonn first handed him the red book back in the sixties he said he was 'stunned'. 'I think most people in my position go through the same experience – we can't call it anything else. We never think it can happen to us and when it does happen we never expect it. We are shattered.'
On the second occasion, in the early eighties, he reckoned the experience was even more profound. Mildred, his wife, was in on the secret on both occasions and found it increasingly hard to keep it to herself. 'When you've been open with your husband for so long, it's not easy to carry around secrets from him.'
It was inevitable that Eamonn should put Joe Loss's name forward at the Thames Life conference to receive the famous red book for a second time. They had always remained the best of friends. Once again Joe's wife, Mildred, was the link. She again found it very hard to keep the secret from her husband. 'I found it a bit trying really,' she recalls. 'We always talked openly and I found that I had to be on my guard in case I let anything drop.'
It had never entered Joe Loss's mind that Eamonn and the Life team would try to surprise him for a second time. When it happened, he found the experience even more profound than the first time. 'I was shattered. I deemed it a great honour of course to be chosen as the recipient of a second red book.'
Evening Standard 16 October 1980
BILL GRUNDY
I HAVE been puzzled all this week by the TV Times. On the cover is a sort of caricature of sculpture I know is of Eamonn Andrews because it says so and yet it bears a distinct resemblance to David Frost. I have met both of them and can tell you they are nothing like each other. In any way.
The cover is, of course, to celebrate, if that is the word, the return of This Is Your Life, a show which has the same sort of attraction as the macabre always does.
I think it was Osbert Lancaster who, many years ago now, wrote a superb little book all about architecture. It was called Ghastly Good Taste. And the title might have been coined especially to describe This Is Your Life.
Last night it was all about Joe Loss.
Unimpeachable
It is the manner of the programme which puts me off. There is, one is led to believe, no sort of flaw in the subject. I am sure this is true of Mr and Mrs Loss. But is it true of everybody?
Everybody seemed clean, and specially got up, as they say in my part of the world. I felt that their teeth were all tingling fresh. And I have little doubt that their strength is as of the strength of ten because their hearts are pure.
Eamonn Andrews is worth better than this if only he could overcome his innate modesty. Somewhere in British TV there must be a place for a person who is common in the correct sense of the word, whose integrity is unimpeachable, and whose intellect is far sharper than we have yet been allowed to suppose.
But I don't think This Is Your Life is it.
Series 21 subjects
Joe Loss | Julie Goodyear | Lawrie McMenemy | Peter Bowles | Mike Yarwood | John Schlesinger | Andrew Lloyd WebberJanet Brown | Rodney Bewes | Russell Harty | Joan Wells | Billy Connolly | Bill Owen | Jeffrey Archer | Brian Jacks
Melvyn Hayes | Fred Housego | Alex Higgins | Tim Brooke-Taylor | Bernard Cribbins | Gemma Craven | Jim Watt
John Thaw | Jonjo O'Neill | Judith Chalmers | Margaret Price