BBC 9 o'clock News Memories

I don't recall that they did.

Seeing them together is interesting as they are essentially two executions of the same concept.

Which went single headed first then - the 9 o'clock News or News at Ten. I think the fish fingers was the end of double headed presentation from the clips I've seen, so I assume the 9 just edged it.

The Nine O'Clock News went single-headed in 1988, News at Ten went single-headed in 1992 when Trevor McDonald took over from Alastair Burnet.

I remember the CGI Glass opening quite fondly. It's a shame those very authoritative tunes were lost in 1999 in favour of the uniform scheme they've had since. With the exception of online, I much prefer the 97-99 era with clear separation between rolling news and main bulletins. As with BBC Choice and Knowledge, I feel the BBC didn't give it enough of a chance to prove itself.

I agree about the 1993-99 version of the Nine. That was my favourite era of the programme too. I'm too young to remember the 1985-88 "fish fingers" era but I think the music and graphics are just a bit too over the top. I much prefer the presentation ITN had in the 80s. The "transmitter" era music was great, although the titles were again a bit OTT. Once they introduced the virtual era presentation in 1993 and re-recorded the transmitter music, it was perfect for me.

Many happy memories of watching virtual era BBC News bulletins during the mid to late 90s. I liked all the virtual era presentation - the theme tunes for the Six and One were equally as good as the Nine. I did think updating Breakfast News in 1997 was a good idea, though. Although as a piece of music the 93 Breakfast News theme music was a masterpiece, it wasn't at all suitable for early morning. The 97 titles were much more appropriate.

That music at the end of the titles that goes into the headlines clashes a bit in my opinion.

I was never really a fan of the 'lightening bolt' Nine titles that came afterwards, I think they were inferior in both sound and images to the One and Six titles of the time.

I think the fish fingers were definitely the best. Did Mike Smartt have a stint presenting during that era ?

I remember Naked Video's spoof of the "fish fingers" titles - they did the opening announcement as per the real Nine, then the "fish fingers" sequence started and struck one of the presenters on the head, who then exploded. Only BBC Scotland, the producers of Naked Video, could have got away with that!

There was a user on YouTube who once uploaded near perfect quality versions of pretty much every BBC news theme from the 80s/90s up till the present day. He said he "found them on a CD near Bush House" or something like that, and didn't elaborate. Does anyone remember that?

He did, because in the One Day In The Life Of Television book, he talks about being in the newsroom behind Michael Buerk that day, the second night of the new look, and halfway through forgetting they were on air and striding across to pick up a paper. He said that more people said "Saw you on the Nine O'Clock News" about that than in the previous six months when he'd actually been presenting it.

Mike Smartt: wasn't he just on the Six? He and Laurie Mayer being occasional stand ins?