MY PERFORMANCE WENT FROM STRENGTH
TO STRENGTH. I’D CRACKED IT! MY VARIETY
ROCK’N’ROLL ACT WAS ON TRACK.with Billy Fury, Terry Dene, Dickie Pride,
Johnny Gentle, Duffy Power, Sally Kelly
and The Viscounts in the Larry Parnes Big
Beat Show that I felt I was on the right
track with the continuity. I opened my act
with Johnnie Ray’s up-tempo Yes Tonight
Josephine and segued into the Jimmie
Rodgers hit Kisses Sweeter Than Wine. From
having screamed their heads off for the
whole show thus far, the audience suddenly
appeared to be paying more attention to the
lyrics. During It’s Only Make Believe, you
could hear a pin drop and the end of the
song was greeted with an amazing audience
reaction. My performance went from
strength to strength and for the remainder
of my act the audiences were unbelievable.
I’d cracked it! My variety rock’n’roll act was
well and truly on track.
It was summed up by the show’s review
in the following week’s Melody Maker. Their
columnist Ian Dove concluded his review
with, “Upon leaving the theatre there’s only
one act on your mind, Vince Eager. The
others are just rock’n’rollers”. This summing
up gave me the confidence to concentrate
on entertaining, but not at the price of not
performing rock’n’roll.
IN THE COMING YEARS, one of
the aspects I began to appreciate more was
that I could tailor my act to suit different
audiences. A fine example was when, in
the late 60s, I received a phone call from an
agent I’d never worked for, or even heard of,
asking me if I had a tuxedo and could I do
a sophisticated act using just a pianist? As it
was a very well-paid gig, I jumped at it and
he went on to explain in more detail. The
location was the reputable Royal York Hotel
in York and the function was to be held in
the Ebor Suite. He told me the clients were
the York Flying Club, a well-heeled classy
group of people who were used to the best.
As the booking of the pianist was my
responsibility – and all they required was
30 minutes of Sinatra swing-style songs –
I contacted Keith, a mate and a great pianist
who could play anything. We had a quick
rehearsal, got our tuxedos out of mothballs
and set off for York.
We were allocated a nice hotel suite as
a dressing room and told to go to the bar,
where we could have a drink and wait
for the stage manager who would check
any special requirements we had. After a
couple of drinks, a young man introduced
himself and explained that he would control
the sound system and give me echo if and
when required. He also told us that we
would go on following the presentations,
and he showed us where to stand and
wait to be introduced. We went back to
the bar to relax and Keith and I noticed
that we were the only people, other than
staff, dressed in tuxedos. We found this
surprising considering the nature of the
event. In fact, many of the guests looked as
if they wouldn’t know what a tuxedo was.
Eventually, we took our position at the side
of the stage ready to be introduced. It was
then that a gentleman who looked more
like a farmer than a pilot asked me if I was
Vince Eager and would I mind presenting
the prizes before my act?
I happily agreed and within minutes I was
on stage looking at what was one of the most
unusually turned-out audiences imaginable.
The audience was wearing sweaters, jeans,
cloth caps, boots and all manner of clothing,
nothing close to what we had anticipated.
A gentleman then came to the stage andintroduced me as “television star Vince,
who has offered to present the award for
the bird of the year”. What frigging bird?
I quickly realised that the flying club
was for pigeon fanciers, not pilots. We
were going to perform sophisticated-style
material to pigeon fanciers. “I’ll kill that
friggin’ agent,” I yelled at Keith as I left
the stage following the presentation. “It’s
a bloody pigeon fanciers club,” I shouted.
Keith fell about and within minutes we
were both in fits of laughter. Thankfully, my
guitar and amp were in the car, so a quick
reappraisal of the situation saw us with bow
ties off and ready to go. After starting with
Mac The Knife, which received a lukewarm
reception, we switched to Plan B and 30
minutes of rock’n’roll on the piano and
guitar. It finished up as a cracking night.
We never did work for the agent again.
In fact, we never heard of him again. Maybe
he flew the nest... 9Our columnist scrubbed up
pretty well for his cabaret actA Life In Rock’n’Roll