A singer and his accompanying band participating in a Singing Contest in Singapore. The group is formatted with Cliff Richard and the Shadows ideal but it is not a regulation.
Winning a talentime competition could make an exciting but unstable career for musicians and singers. Some of them participated for the fun and excitement it provided. The Quests, The Jets, The Burns, The Antartics, Gaylads, were some of the groups that had won a talent competition.
The term 'talentime' was coined by radio personality Kingsley Morrando [above] in the late 50s when he organized such shows to promote singing talents those days. Morrando was a broadcaster working at Radio Malaya (Singapore) studios. He was also a popular radio announcer (term today is 'DJ' = Disc Jockey) in a pop music request programme called, 'To Each His Own'. He even had a company called, ‘Talentime’ at Shaw House. Good friend and well-known Rediffusion broadcaster Larry Lai confirmed this information. An on-line article mentioned that it was one Tony Beamish, the Radio Malaya English Programme Supervisor then, who coined it.
Among the music youths in the 60s, it was an important word but whether it is accepted officially as part of the English Language vocabulary is another question, either in the UK or in America. Anyone?
Image: The National Heritage Board, Singapore.
Original Article: Andy Lim.
2 comments:
Thanks for the memory. It was one of my favourite shows. Like Singapore Idol, it sparked a lot of excitement then. Wonder what the winners are doing now.
Many of them are senior citizens, relaxing and enjoying what time they have left. Some of them are still working, while others have lucrative businesses. Eunos is one, quietly successful but once a pop guitarist and singer.
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