Great TV Themes of the Past, Present and Remixes

Wow. Where does our madmusician get all these excellent videos from? Bill Bailey mocking the ITN Non Stop theme is hilariously funny.

Did he also do his famous BBC News theme mock in that same stageshow?

Actually, although it was a very jolly tune, the mere association with it in the old days DID make us all sit up and take notice, purely because we associated it with "The News".

BBC News Apocolyptic rave : Part Troll

The Mission / ITN : Remarkable Guide To The Orchestra.

Both have been shown on TV and released on DVD.

The best news theme tune ever in my opinion is this:

Indeed, I saw the Remarkable Guide To The Orchestra on TV a couple of years ago, and it was the first time I'd come across the ITV theme - and I always think of that sketch when it is mentioned!

(And I came across the other remix video on a thread here a while back, and it's remained a favourite of mine!)

Here is something a little different - an excellent arrangement by composer Nigel Hess (who is mentioned upthread for composing some classic themes himself) of a variety of TV Detective themes.

The TV Detectives - Nigel Hess

Featuring Dangerfield, Campion, Wycliffe, Maigret and Hetty Wainthrop Investigates.

Ah, wasn't Non Stop great? Interestingly, when watching clips of it being used by ITN it doesn't seem out of place at all. Still, it's remarkable that it was only replaced in May/June 1982 by a more "modern" synthesised piece. There's some debate over why it was replaced - some say it was because of the Falklands War; others say it would have happened anyway. I think I'd argue it was due to the war; it seems too much of a coincidence to me. If that's true, I wonder how long it would have lasted had the Falklands War not happened? Not that I'm complaining - I liked the piece of music that replaced it for weekend bulletins (as linked to in an earlier post of mine).

I just find the theme tune to Poirot perfectly fits the air of mystery found in each episode along with the art deco style animation

Falklands or not, I really can't see it lasting much longer than it did. I'd have thought that it's days were numbered as soon as News At 10 came into being.

You are right in that it didn't appear out of place. But then TV news was a very different beast until the early 80's. Even though the actual stories were no less worse than today the way they were broadcast was very different - for a start there was no ENG and few 'lives' or 'breaking news'

I present to you a selection of themes covered live by Dream Themes (who worked with Frank Sidebottom):



This is particularly epic...

Then there was Jeeves and Wooster which was similar in terms of style, era and timeslot.... same production company too:


That, like the Poirot sequence, hasn't dated much at all.... one big advantage of doing a period piece based on classic literature!

Possibly two of the best sitcom theme tunes:
Man About The House
Terry and June

And one of the great, but most obscure theme tunes:
Reporting London