Gareth Malone Who Do You Think You Are?

Hello.

CHEERING

-Who likes singing?

-CHILDREN: Me!

-Good. Me too. Are you ready to sing?

-CHILDREN: Yes!

Er, why don't we stand up. Wow!

'I love being in front of a choir.'

Drrrrrr-drrrrrr!

-ALL: Drrrrrrr!

-Grrrr-grrrr.

And I love being involved in performance of any kind.

My favourite singing exercise of all,

grab your pneumatic drill and dig the road.

Yah, yah, yah, yah, yah!

ALL: Yah, yah, yah!

'And music is so integral to my life.'

I wake up in the morning

and it's really the first thing I think about after coffee.

-Are you ready?

-CHILDREN: Yes, Gareth!

That's good. One, two.

# If anybody asks you

# Where are you going... #

Choirmaster and TV presenter Gareth Malone was born in London in 1975.

His father, James, worked in finance.

His mother, Sian, was a civil servant.

My parents met doing amateur dramatics -

I think their eyes met across the stage.

'And so I am the product of a musical liaison.

'When I was growing up, music was a very normal part of life.'

There was just me, my mum, my dad, singing songs together.

Gilbert and Sullivan and musicals, always singing.

# I'm going up a yonder... #

On a Sunday, if somebody was round for Sunday lunch or something,

go and do...you know, I always have to do a turn.

I would...you know, bring out Gareth, do a song.

# If I can take the pain, the heartbreak that it brings... #

'In my DNA,'

I'm sure there's a little switch for singing and it's on!

# There's comfort in knowing I'll soon be home... #

And there's a fire in my belly about music

that has just always been there.

# I'm going up a yonder, I'm going up a yonder... #

I want to find out where my performance gene comes from.

I feel like it's all sort of filtered down and I've just

got a lot of the kind "ta-da" gene, if that's a real thing.

I'm not a scientist.

Gareth's come to Bournemouth, the seaside town where he grew up

and where his parents still live.

It's quite funny to be back here.

I used to busk right there, just outside this department store.

Used to have a band, it was just me and some schoolmates,

and we used to do Guns N' Roses covers

and Beatles and we'd sing for hours and hours and make

about £20 and, um...very humble beginnings for my musical career.

Home sweet home. Hi.

-Hello.

-How are you?

Mmm!

Hello, how are you? Good to see you.

Come in, come in.

Smells of new paint.

HE LAUGHS

Oh, and there's me. This is me at the piano.

When you were 18 months old.

Goodness me, I was fat!

Well, yes...you... You're smiling away.

-Right at home, aren't I?

-Yes.

-Making up pieces on the piano.

-You used to bash away.

-Bashing away, yeah, yes.

-But, yeah, this piano, but in our old house in London.

-Yes.

Did you always think I was going to be a performer?

-Did you always think I was...

-I did.

-You did, didn't you?

-Always.

-From when I was little?

-From when you were very small.

You would perform to anybody, really, at the drop of a hat.

It was very...it was very funny to watch.

-Yeah, I've not stopped that, really!

-Yeah.

And, and then this is me and my grandfather - Papa, as I call him.

-There he is, yeah.

-Look at that cheeky face. I must be, what? Two?

About two and a half.

-Two and a half.

-Yeah.

-You're obviously sharing a joke of some kind.

-Yeah.

And I always love being with my grandfather,

cos he's fun and silly and playful and comic.

I really feel like he's a sort of frustrated performer.

When he was young, he had a good baritone voice.

He wasn't on the stage?

He wasn't on the stage, no, although his grandfather, he was on the stage.

His grandfather is this man.

-Edmund Payne.

-Yeah. Short little fellow.

-Yeah.

-So he's my great-great-grandfather.

-Yes.

-Edmund Payne.

I mean, that's a name that I've grown up with,

cos his photo's on our wall.

I love this one. The Toreador.

Hmm, there he is, acting the clown.

And that's George Grossmith Jnr.

-That's right.

-So this is the person that he performed with?

-Yeah. They played together a lot.

-In London?

-Yes.

I once heard, um, a recording of Edmund Payne on Radio 3.

I remember this. I was going...

-I had to go into school to pick something up.

-Yes.

And I came out to the car and she was flapping her arms about,

was like, "Come quickly!"

And I was being very nonchalant, cos I was a teenager.

I couldn't believe it. I just couldn't believe it.

-And you've not heard it since?

-Not heard it since, no.

Family legend has it that there's, um,

a film of Edmund Payne as well but we've never tracked it down.

I don't know where it is.

-I'd love to see it but there's...

-So would I.

-So would I.

I'd love to know more about him

and what he was actually like as a person and...

because, you know, there's more,

there's more to someone than their stage self.

What's this?

This is the family tree.

When did you get this? I've never seen this. Oh, this is so exciting.

So hang on, one, two, three, four generations, five,

six generations back to Dan Lowrey.

Mmm. Yes. Now I know the name Dan Lowrey from my childhood but...

Dan - Dan Lowrey was a music hall impresario...

-Impresario.

-OK.

..and he started at a theatre in Dublin called...

-Star of Erin?

-..Star of Erin, I believe.

-I didn't know that.

-Yeah, yeah, they did...

-That's amazing.

How he came to that, I don't know.

This is Dublin here?

This is Dublin.

That's a story there.

Yes, there is a story there.

Oh, God! It's...I've got so many questions.

So I shall have to be a detective.

-Yes. Good luck.

-I know. I'm really looking forward to it.

-I'm going to have to get a deerstalker.

-SHE LAUGHS

Gareth has discovered that his four times great-grandfather,

Daniel Lowrey, was an impresario, a theatre manager in Victorian Dublin.

But before exploring his life,

Gareth is first going to follow the trail

of his great-great-grandfather, Edmund Payne, a comic actor.

I've walked past this picture I don't know how many tens

of thousands of times, cos it's been up in our house since I was a kid.

But Mr Edmund Payne I know very little about.

But I know he performed, but really that's it.

Don't know what he was like off-stage.

I don't know about his family.

I don't know much about where he lived, anything like that.

I'd really like to find out more.

When Edmund performed in the early 1900s, there were

nearly 20,000 working actors and competition for roles was fierce.

In an era before television, and with film in its infancy,

theatre was the entertainment industry of its day.

Gareth's meeting historian Matthew Neill at Her Majesty's Theatre.

Wow!

I haven't been here since I was 14 and I sat down there

and watched Phantom Of The Opera.

Good to meet you, hello.

Hello, Gareth. Very pleased to meet you.

You're going to be able to tell me

something about my great-great-grandfather?

I am indeed.

I've got a couple of things I'd like to show you.

"Coronation Gala Performance by command of the King.

"His Majesty's Theatre, June 27th, 1911." 1911!

I can't believe it! This is so exciting.

So there's a lot of Shakespeare.

-Merry Wives of Windsor with Ellen Terry.

-Indeed. Of course.

There's a big...a big night of entertainment.

The Critic by Sheridan.

George Grossmith Jnr - that's a name I know. Edmund Payne!

And there he is. Wow!

Playing Sir Christopher Hatton.

The Critic was a burlesque, really,

a parody of the business of putting on a play.

There'd been a little bit of light relief

after all this rather heavy Shakespeare, because...

Yes. This is extraordinary.

And I think it's a mark of the esteem that he was held in

that he was chosen to be part of this big theatrical event.

-And in 1911...

-He stood right here.

-..he stood right here.

That's great.

The 1911 Royal Gala Performance dedicated to the new King George V,

boasted the brightest theatre talent.

Edmund was a star of musical comedy, a hugely popular genre that

showcased his ability to sing and dance and to play the fool.

In a career lasting over 30 years,

Edmund made a name for his playful, often slapstick humour.

Edmund was an extremely accomplished comic actor,

well over 300 roles in his entire career.

Ah. So he really was at the top of his game.

I had a sense that he did all right,

but that...this is... this is fantastic.

And I also have another document here.

This is actually the prompt book of The Critic that night.

-This is the actual one?

-Yes.

And it would have situated over there in the prompt corner

and it would have been used to prompt the actors

should they forget their lines.

And there, there he is, Sir Christopher Hatton.

"True gallant Raleigh, but oh, thou champion of thy country's fame,

"there is a question which I yet must ask, a question which

"I've never asked before - what mean these mighty armaments?"

-"Points left."

-Points left.

-"Does business with stick."

-Business with stick.

-Probably whacks him on the head or trips over...

Absolutely, absolutely.

Pokes him in the eye! That's great.

And then we have here a book by a critic of the time,

-and in here he has a description of Edmund.

-Gosh.

"Payne was a little man with a very funny face,

"with which he could work wonders -

"a real funny man who was never vulgar.

"He could both sing and dance". Great, good man.

Well, I've not inherited the dancing very much!

"His greatest asset was his lisp. It gave a perfect character

"to the lovable little men he always impersonated."

-A lithp.

-A lisp.

-A comic lithp.

A comic lithp!

"If he allowed himself a little festivity

"after a successful first night,

"he would go to Gow's, the famous restaurant on the Strand.

"There he would celebrate with a real blow-out of two sausages

"and a bottle of Guinness!"

I think we would have got on very well!

"Living in Stoke Newington, near Clissold Park..."

That's like three minutes from my house.

"..he rode to and from the Gaiety on a bicycle, sometimes a tricycle."

-Mm.

-"Teddy Payne, as everyone called him, was a universal favourite..."

That's so wonderful.

"..and a very great comedian." Wow!

I mean, I, you know, we have his picture up in my parents' house

and I've seen it... You know,

I saw it every day of my childhood, but I don't think I had any sense

of just how famous he was and how appreciated he was in his own time.

-Absolutely.

-Thank you so much.

-Oh, you're very welcome.

I'm tremendously proud of my great-great-grandfather

being here, performing for the King.

You know, I'm very lucky to have also performed for royalty,

and I remember the, you know, the effect it had on my family

and how much pride they had in my small role

that I had in that performance,

and I bet it was exactly the same for Edmund Payne,

and he was somebody who could make people laugh.

What's better than that?

Gareth's come to Clissold Park in Stoke Newington,

the area of London Edmund made home.

He's meeting one of Edmund's relatives, Lesley Elsen.

-Hello.

-Hello, Gareth.

Hi. Very nice to meet you.

-And nice to meet you too.

-And we're related?

We are, yes. I'm Edmund Payne's great-granddaughter.

And I'm his great-great-grandson.

-Yes, so we are cousins.

-We're cousins. Now that's fantastic.

I know a little bit about his performance life

but I know nothing about his family at all.

-OK.

-What have you got in your brown envelope?

-Right, the first thing to show you...

-Yeah.

..is the marriage certificate of Edmund's mother and father.

Oh! I've been really wondering about who...where he came from.

So this is "Marriage solemnised in the Parish Church in the Parish

"of St Leonard's Shoreditch, August 8th, 1859."

Hang on, this is...this is Edmund Payne as well?

That's not our Edmund Payne.

-This is his father. So everyone's called Edmund?

-Edmund Payne.

There's a lot of Edmund Paynes.

Well, he's...my middle name is Edmund as well,

and then my, grandfather's called Edmund,

and then my great-great-grandfather was called Edmund,

and then my great-great-great-grandfather

is this...this is...this him?

-I'm not!

-You're not called Edmund. You should be. It's a great name.

What does this say? No!

What does that say?

-Chair maker.

-Oh, I thought it said choirmaster!

Just for a minute.

He was a chair maker.

A chair maker. Well, OK, chair maker's a good profession.

I'm kind of gutted, it really does look like choirmaster.

-OK.

-Right.

-You've got more?

-I have more. So the next...

-Great.

..thing I would like to show is the 1881 Census

which shows the Payne family.

Wow, yes. Um.... Edmund Payne, the father, important.

-That's the father.

-The father.

43 at this point, and it says here,

chair maker employing four men.

So he was doing all right.

Oh, that's nice to know.

OK, and children - one, two, three, four, five, six, seven children.

-Edmund J - so this is our...

-That's our Edmund.

My great-great-grandfather. He's 17 and he's a ticket writer.

-Oh!

-A ticket writer is somebody who worked at front of house

-and issued tickets in the theatre.

-Oh, he's got the bug already.

-He's in there.

-And he's 17.

-Yeah.

Good man. So he didn't follow his father's footsteps?

No. He's not following in the family tradition of chair makers.

No, he's breaking out.

But if he was employing four men, presumably he's doing well enough

that he could say to his son, "Go and try...

"Go and indulge your ridiculous..."

-Well, that's it.

-"..aspirations to be an actor."

Which was quite forward-thinking of them back in those days,

to follow his dreams, and his dream was to be on the stage.

Oh, history has repeated itself in my generation.

-Yes.

-I rather like that.

Is that the first theatrical person in the family, then?

As far as we know, yes. But here's something else.

-You've got more. Oh.

-You'll like this.

Good. I mean, it's not warm out here

but the cockles of my heart are warmed by this story.

Yes. Oh, there he is!

Now what a fantastic picture.

And there he is on a kid's tricycle.

A very keen cyclist.

Probably not on this bike.

Not on that one. And he looks a nice father.

He does, doesn't he? He looks warm.

Not the stern Victorian image.

My family seem to think that there's a bit of film of Edmund Payne.

There is. It's called The Gaiety Duet.

-What's it like? The Gaiety Duet?

-Yeah.

-Have you seen it?

-Yes.

-Have you?

-Yes. Obviously silent...

-Yeah.

-..but you get the essence of the man from the film.

-Ah!

-Where would I go?

-There you go.

-Oh, no! Oh!

Wow! Thank you.

Oh, that's so nice. That's really lovely.

It's so, you know, ah... Sorry, I've got to go.

Got to go and watch this now.

Ah, thank you! I'm so excited.

I have to say, when I was handed this by Lesley,

my immediate thought was, "I have to...

"My grandfather has to see this."

My grandfather is 94 and he won't be around forever

and he's never seen this film.

And here it is! I've got it.

I want to go and see him and I want to show him this.

But before leaving London, Gareth hopes to track down one final

piece of evidence.

'I'm going back to Bournemouth later to show my family the film of

'Teddy Payne, but before I go,

'I want to see if I can find a recording he made

'that I heard a brief moment of when I was about 16-17.

'So I'm going to the British Library where, I think,

'if it's going to be anywhere, it'll be here.'

The British Library holds over a million audio recordings,

including many from the early 20th century,

when Edmund was at the peak of his theatrical career.

'I'm really enjoying being a detective.

'I always wanted to be a detective when I was a kid

'and I feel like I'm sneaking around and finding out about the past.

'It's really fun.'

I'm in the, um, I'm in the British Library

and I'm looking on the Sound & Moving Image Catalogue,

which is where I hope to find a bit more information about Edmund Payne.

Payne...

Ooh, here we go.

An oral history of the Wine Society.

What?

Doesn't sound right.

Ooh, here we go.

"Proteger le repos des villes, Offenbach. Grossmith, George Jnr.

"Sung in English, recording."

Right, details.

What is this?

There he is. "Contributor - Payne, Edmund, singer.

"Tag - vocal music.

"Play this."

HE GASPS

Oh, great!

I've waited a long time to hear this.

RECORDING CRACKLES

It's just really crackly.

MUSIC STARTS

Ah! There's a little orchestra...

like a brass band.

# We're public guardians Bold yet wary... #

I think that's him.

# ..And of ourselves we take good care

# To risk our precious lives... #

That's amazing.

I mean it's not a... It's a comic voice.

GARETH JOINS IN: # ..We're never there... #

Oh, that's great.

-# ..If we see a helpless woman... #

-Ooh-ooh!

# ..Or a little boy that does no harm... #

What an incredible sensation to hear a voice,

to hear these two men.

-# We run them in

-We run them in

BOTH: # To show that we're the bold gendarmes... #

The Bold Gendarmes. Funny.

I know this song because I performed it with my dad

in the Bournemouth Music Festival in, I think, 1997.

MUSIC CONTINUES

# Tum-ta-dah, tum-ta-dah... #

Oh, he's talking!

'What is that little child doing in the field?

'What is that old woman doing in the back garden there?

'Washing her face.'

"Washing her face"!

-HE OVERENUNCIATES:

-You can hear that they're theatre people,

so they speak like that!

# Provided that they make it right... #

Oh, I can't believe it's my great-great-grandfather.

Fantastic.

# Or give to us our proper terms

-# We run them in

-We run them in

-# We run them in

-We run them in

GARETH JOINS IN: # To show

# That we're the bold gendarmes. #

Gareth's back in Bournemouth to share his discoveries

with his parents and his grandfather Papa.

DOORBELL RINGS

Edmund died before Papa was born, so they never met.

-Hello, Papa. How are you?

-Hello.

-Hello. How are you?

-Very well.

-Lovely to see you. You all right?

How did you know I was coming?

I don't know, I just had a sense. You're invited. Come on in. Come in.

How was your journey? Was it all right?

OK. No trouble at all.

No traffic? Good.

Go on through to the sitting room.

-My grandfather.

-Salute your grandfather.

PAPA LAUGHS

Go on in. Through here, come on through.

You're probably wondering why I've gathered you here today.

Well, the reason is, I've been looking into our family history...

-Yes...

-..and the name I've been focusing on

has been a name that we know very well, which is Edmund Payne.

-Yes.

-Your grandfather, my great-great-grandfather.

Yes.

And, amazingly, I've managed to track down one of his relatives,

one of his descendants that we didn't know about.

-What's her name?

-Lesley.

I said to her we've got wind that there is a film of Edmund Payne...

-Yeah.

-..and she just said, "Yes, I've seen it."

WOMAN GASPS

Oh, no!

So she said she's seen it and she says it's absolutely wonderful.

-Where is it?

-It's right here.

-Oh, marvellous.

-You've never seen this, have you?

-Oh, no. I really have never...

-Well, this is it.

So this is, um... It's called The Gaiety Duet,

it has George Grossmith Jnr in it and Edmund Payne.

-Would you like to see it?

-Yes, yes, yes! I'd love to.

-Yeah.

-Let's watch it.

I didn't know how famous he was

-and how successful he was, but he was...

-Oh, yes.

..hugely successful. By the way, it's silent.

I've been wanting to see this for 94 years

and I'm going to see it at last.

-Well, this is the moment of truth. Let's watch it.

-Yeah. Yeah.

-Gaiety Duet.

-Gaiety Duet.

Oh, there he is!

-That's him!

-Oh!

PIANO MUSIC PLAYS

-That must be George Grossmith Jnr on the right.

-FATHER: That's him.

Oh, he was very famous too, yeah.

There he is.

George Grossmith, sort of typical straight man, isn't he?

Yeah. And Teddy Payne's doing the clown.

-Slapstick.

-It's great, isn't it?

And he's got a funny little stature, hasn't he?

PAPA LAUGHS

-Yes.

-He's tiny. Quite round.

Yes, quite round but very distinctive.

THEY LAUGH

Apparently, he had a lisp.

-Oh, did he?

-Yeah.

His father was a chair-maker.

-Oh!

-No!

Yeah.

Ah...

What's it like to watch your grandfather?

It's too much.

Yeah.

It's incredible, actually. Really is.

You get sort of a true character coming through

rather than just a still photograph. Hmm.

I've always longed to see my grandfather,

and I've seen him now.

Yeah.

PAPA CHUCKLES

'I feel so lucky that I have seen

'and heard my great-great-grandfather

'from over 100 years ago.'

# We're public guardians Bold but wary

# And of ourselves we take good care... #

I can't describe it, really. It's extraordinary.

It's overwhelming, actually, to be able to watch him

and to be able to hear his voice.

And that's going to stay with me for a really long time.

# ..or a little boy that does no harm... #

# We're public guardians Bold yet wary

# And of ourselves we take good care

# To risk our precious lives we're chary

# When danger looms we're never there... #

'This whole process feels like a gift for my grandfather, really,

'as much as it's for me,

'and that's really special.'

-# We run them in

-We run them in

-# We run them in

-We run them in

# To show them we're the bold gendarmes... #

It's interesting. I mean, that picture in the hall

that I've looked at so many times,

you just get the sense of a clown, somebody sort of pratting around,

but he was much more than that.

# Sometimes our duty's extramural... #

'He made it. He made it huge.'

# We like to gambol... #

'I feel like I would have liked him a lot.'

# ..Commune with nature face-to-face... #

'I feel a connection to him.'

# To our beats then back returning

# Refreshed by nature's holy charms

# We run them in We run them in... #

Having explored Edmund Payne's life as an actor,

Gareth's now going to investigate his four times great-grandfather,

Daniel Lowrey,

according to the family, a theatre manager in Dublin.

I've got the family tree from my mother

that suggests that the furthest back we can go at the moment is 1823,

and he married somebody called Hannah Elteringham.

So I'm going to look them up on the internet

to see if there's any more information.

First and middle names... Dan Lowrey.

Year...

Birth - 1823.

OK.

OK, Mr Lowrey, where are you?

Oh, there's a couple of things here.

Um, is that him?

That looks right.

Married 1840.

I can look at that.

Right.

August 22nd 1840,

marriage solemnised at the parish church in the Parish of Leeds.

Leeds!

I'm Northern!

Well, there you go.

That's not what I was expecting.

I was expecting to find Dublin.

Profession - dyer.

OK. That doesn't sound like my theatrical impresario.

I mean, dyeing material, that's a very sort of working-class...

very different sort of profession.

And his father Patrick Lowrey is a weaver.

A weaver?!

This doesn't fit at all with what my mum was telling me.

That just doesn't tally.

There's one more thing on here.

I might just go back and have a look.

OK. The census - Dan Lowrey and Hannah Lowrey...

Oh, this is 1851. Oh, great.

OK, there's more.

Liverpool.

And he's moved to Liverpool.

OK, well, we're getting closer to Dublin.

Right, there he is.

Dan Lowrey. Head.

And now he's 28.

And there's children.

Thomas, who's ten years old.

And what's that? No, hang on.

Servant.

They've got a servant.

That doesn't sound like somebody who was a dyer in the wool trade.

That sounds like somebody who's doing really well for themselves.

And what does he do? What's this?

Ooh, it's difficult to read. I'm going to zoom in.

Oh, this feels really, really important,

and I can't read it.

S...

It's definitely an S, looking at the other words, like "scholar".

So that's an S. That looks like an I,

cos there's a dot...

S-I-G-S is all I can really make out.

S-I-P-S? No.

Not ships, is it?

C-O-N... Cone...

Is that an E?

Conner...

Connercuts. Connercols...

Ablonical?!

Stigs ablonical.

He was a "stigs ablonical"!

Well, that's the mystery solved, isn't it? That's great(!)

Stigs... Stag...

Do I look very stupid here?

And what is that?

You'll cut this out, right?

Agh, this is agonising!

C-O-N... Conc...

Concerts.

Is it "concerts"?

Does that say "sings at concerts"?

Oh, my God!

Sings at concerts.

It's not "ships conical" at all.

He sings at concerts!

That's Dan Lowrey! OK.

Oh, wow!

He was a dyer and he became a singer at concerts.

That's fantastic.

What kind of concerts?

What did he sing?

Agh! God, it's so exciting.

It's really good.

I love Liverpool. That's great.

It's fascinating to find that your ancestor did

something like leave working in the mills to go off and become

Dan Lowrey the singer.

What made him do that?

You know, it takes a certain kind of determination and bravery

and feeling that you...you can't do anything else, in a way,

that you HAVE to become a performer.

And he had the ambition to believe

that he was going to become something.

I know from my own life, you know, it's really hard.

I had years of doing, you know, not very exciting jobs.

I worked in bars, I sold ice creams, I swept floors,

I picked up cigarette ends from the beach.

I did all sorts of things that were not glamorous

for a good ten years before I finally, you know,

got to where I wanted to be.

And so I warm to him for that.

There may be a little bit of that

that's come down through the generations,

a little bit of that, don't know, grit or personality or something.

I hope so.

Gareth's in Liverpool to meet

an expert in popular Victorian entertainment,

Dr Caroline Radcliffe.

They're meeting at the Caledonia Pub.

LIVELY FOLK MUSIC PLAYS

Hello.

-Caroline, hello.

-Hello.

Oh, this is cosy.

Oh, I love it.

I feel like dancing!

Until very recently, I didn't know anything about Dan Lowrey at all.

He was just a name in the family,

so I'm hoping you can fill in some gaps.

Well, this is a Liverpool trade directory from 1857

and you can find his name...

I've just noticed here - "lunatic asylum".

There's all sorts of things on here.

Provision dealer, tobacconist... And Lowrey.

-Is that him?

-That's the one.

Victualler. Vict...

Do you know what that is? He's a publican.

He's got his own pub now.

Wow! Publican.

So, in the years since the 1851 census,

-he's amassed enough money to buy a pub.

-Yep.

And this, 22 Cleveland Square, where is that?

It's down by the docks.

And if I show you this one,

you'll find out a bit more about that pub

and what he was actually doing with it.

And this is a very well-known theatrical paper.

-The Era. And this is 1859.

-Yeah.

Bayliss... No...

Um...OK...

Dan... Ah, here we are. Oh! Oh, my gosh!

"Liverpool - Dan Lowrey's music hall." This is a change.

Yeah. A lot of pubs at this time turned into music halls.

What Dan actually was, was a music hall performer.

-Right.

-And he'd already established quite a reputation.

"This splendid music hall is nightly crowded

"to witness the following talented company -

"Mr & Mrs Hughes, the clever duettists and pantomimists

"with their wonderful dog Polly."

This is Britain's Got Talent.

"Dan Lowrey, the greatest Irish singer of the present day,

"bar none." Why is he an Irish vocalist if he came from Leeds?

That was his speciality.

Liverpool was full of Irish immigrants

so he chose traditional Irish songs

which the audience would have known.

It was the real music of the people.

In the 1850s, Liverpool was a thriving port

and Britain's second city after London.

Migrants came in their thousands,

particularly from Ireland, to seek a living.

As the city's population boomed,

so did demand for entertainment.

Many pubs, like Dan Lowrey's, were adapted to become music halls.

Unlike traditional theatres,

they were allowed to serve food and drink during performances.

And we've got some more information about his particular music hall

in this catalogue of all the music halls

that were in Liverpool during the 19th century.

-All the music halls, right. The Malakoff Music Hall.

-Yeah.

"The Malakoff Music Hall was situated in Cleveland Square

"and was a very popular resort for youthful and ancient mariners.

"Outside the Malakoff, there is a statue of Mr Lowrey

"in one of his favourite Irish characters."

So if we just turn back...

-Ah.

-..there's a picture of the actual Malakoff.

That's it!

-And there...

-There he is.

Taking pride of place over his music hall.

Looking quite the gentleman.

And was this erected during his lifetime, do you know?

Yes, I think he erected it.

He had a statue commissioned of himself?!

-He's a real self-publicist.

-Yeah.

He needed to be, because to climb from those roots,

to establish your own music hall

-and move up the social ladder, took a lot of business acumen.

-Yeah.

He's not a dyer or a weaver's son any more.

-That says quite a lot of about him, doesn't it?

-Yep.

Dan's music hall proved a big hit.

Audiences poured in to see a variety of acts -

comic singer, acrobats, even performing animals -

and with alcohol flowing freely,

Victorian music halls, like Dan Lowrey's,

quickly became THE place for a drink and a singsong.

I'll show something which I think you'll find really interesting.

That's him?

This is him doing one of his Irish songs.

Wow!

Dressed in a sort of typical music hall character.

In all his finery.

He's quite a stocky man, isn't he?

He looks like he can handle himself.

And the docks were very, very rough at that time.

Where you get sailors, there are lot of prostitutes,

fights, police raids.

I'm so glad you didn't tell me he was running a brothel.

Maybe you're going to tell me that in a minute!

Now, we've got one more thing for you.

We've actually managed to find one of the songs that he performed.

Goodness.

Pat Came Over The Hill.

Or the Whistling Thief.

Whistling Thief. What's the song about?

Well, it's about a man who's courting his sweetheart,

his colleen, and his little signal to her is a whistle.

So he starts whistling to her.

Unfortunately, the mum hears, and says,

"Daughter, go back to bed, we're not having any of that..."

-You're not going out.

-"..hanky-panky."

You can never take a music hall song at face value.

-You always have to imagine what was going with it, the act...

-Yes.

-..and the business, as they called it.

-The business.

So it's traditional, but with a bit of sauciness and fun.

The audience would have joined in and it would have become a whole...

-And they'd be banging on the table and...

-All those sailors.

-Yeah. Yeah.

-How's your sight reading?

-First-rate. Let's have a go.

-Do you want to have a go?

-Yeah.

Um, right, so, erm, ladies and gentlemen,

in honour of my great-great-great-great-grandfather,

the great Dan Lowrey,

we give you a very under-rehearsed version of the Whistling Thief.

You don't know it? Well, you'll pick it up.

# When Pat came over the hill

# His colleen fair to see

# His whistle loud and shrill

# The signal was to be

# Oh, Mary, the mother cried

# There's somebody whistling sure

# No, Mother, it's only the wind

# That's whistling through the door

# That's whistling through the door. #

'Dan must have really had something about him.'

Ruff! Ruff! Ruff!

He's got charm.

# ..The dog is barking now... #

And enough charm to draw in an audience

and win them over with a song.

# ..Now, how can you see the moon when you know... #

And that's what leaps out of this picture for me,

is a man who is confident

and he's able to perform.

And here we go again.

# ..I'm not such a fool as you think

# I know very well it is Pat

# Get out, you whistling thief... #

There was a ready audience for Irish song.

You would get up and you'd entertain a crowd,

and people obviously loved it.

# ..Although I've lost my eyes I haven't lost my ears... #

I like songs that are light and fun and entertaining and comic,

and so did my great-great-great-great-grandfather,

Dan Lowrey, and that's really exciting for me,

to find that there's that immediate connection with the past.

# ..Now, boys don't courting go

# Too near the house, do you mind?

# Unless you're certain sure... #

I want to go to 22 Cleveland Square

and find out whether there's still anything there

and whether the statue's still there.

So I want to go and find out.

I hope it is.

# ..A fiddle, pig, dog and a man

# A fiddle, pig, dog and a man. # Whoo!

MUSIC CONTINUES

MUSIC ENDS, APPLAUSE

Well, this is it. This is Cleveland Square.

I'm drawn to that building

because it kind of looks a little bit like Dan Lowrey's music hall,

but it's not the right shape,

it's not wide enough and it's not grand enough.

And that building's got... It says 1882, so it's from the right period.

Right, though, it's not the right building.

There's a number 22 on that gate over there.

Oh... It's a house!

This statue would have been just on the first floor, just there.

Huh!

Oh!

HE TUTS

I'm really gutted about that.

I was really hoping to find Dan still looking out over the square.

I get the sense that this was someone for whom

things were really beginning to happen.

And I want to find out what happened next.

Gareth's going to search the British Newspaper Archive.

Right, let's have a look online.

OK.

Newspapers.

What have we got?

Ah, there we are.

There's quite a lot of articles here, mentioning him.

This is the Daily Post,

and that's from 1st June 1860.

Erm, OK, here we are.

"Dan Lowrey's new Malakoff Music Hall, 22 Cleveland Square,"

just over there.

I think it must be an advert.

"Dan, the unrivalled Irish comedian

"appears every evening at half past ten o'clock precisely."

He's always called "the unrivalled",

"the unparalleled", the sine qua non of music hall.

Brilliant.

Oh, here's another one.

Huh!

"Every evening go and hear DAN..." - capital letters -

"..with the best company in Liverpool. Dan Lowrey!"

Exclamation mark.

Pause. "Dan Lowrey" again.

And again, "Dan Lowrey".

He wants to get his name and his brand out there.

Good for him.

"A private box for captains and gentlemen."

Wow. That's interesting.

When he says a private box for captains and gentlemen,

it sounds like, actually,

he's trying to make this sound like a respectable place.

He doesn't just want riff-raff, he wants captains and gentlemen.

He wants to be the classy establishment

that's making more money, perhaps.

OK, this one looks interesting.

"Daily Courier. 25th October 1870."

Let me make this bigger.

Here we go.

"Municipal elections, Pitt Street ward.

"Last evening, a meeting for the friends and supporters

"of Mr Daniel Lowrey, the people's candidate..."

Wow, come on, Dan!

"..was held in the Malakoff Music Hall, Cleveland Square.

"Dan himself came on amidst loud applause,

"which he acknowledged, bowing two or three times."

Well, that sounds right. I love that.

The idea that he comes out at a political rally

and just bows ceremoniously, like, "Yes, it's me!"

That's really interesting.

So the Pitt Street ward...

So this is local elections.

The people's candidate for Pitt Street ward.

Presumably that's this area.

So he's really coming up in the world, isn't he?

That's extraordinary.

He's now wanting to get into politics.

What ambition!

He must have been a smart guy.

I wonder if he was successful. That I want to know.

By 1870, Dan had been performing in Liverpool for over 20 years.

His music hall business had flourished

and now he sought a new challenge...

in local politics.

At the time, Britain only had two political parties -

the Conservatives and the Liberals.

Gareth's meeting local historian Mike Royden

to find out more about Dan's electoral campaign.

Hi, Mike, hello.

-Hi, Gareth, it's nice to meet you.

-Yeah, lovely to meet you.

Why this part of Liverpool?

Why have you brought me here?

Well, this is the Pitt Street area,

and this is the ward where your ancestor Dan Lowrey

decided to go into politics,

and this is the area he was going to hopefully represent.

And he's decided to stand as an independent Liberal.

Now, this was about 20 years before the Independent Labour Party.

So he's standing for the working man.

And the document I have here

-will show you a little bit more about that.

-Where am I looking?

See here with the Pitt Street ward, there.

So this is 1870, the Daily Courier.

"In this ward, which has generally been considered

"a Conservative stronghold,

"there was a perfectly unique contest.

"The Conservative managers of the ward introduced

"a very eligible candidate in the person

"of Lieutenant Colonel CE Hamilton, a merchant and ship owner."

Yeah, so as far as they're concerned,

anybody Conservative would win this seat.

So Dan Lowrey was very, very unusual -

the determination of this man to stand against all the odds.

"Lowrey has been steady and industrious

"and has thrived in all his undertakings

"but perhaps he is hardly, either in social or mental culture,

"the sort of material out of which to manufacture a town council."

-He's not the right type.

-He's not the right type.

He's a bit rough round the edges.

I mean, you think of what he's achieved in his life,

-and where he's come from, it was very rude...

-Very disparaging.

Thank you very much. The right mental culture?!

I mean, I suppose they were unused to people like Mr Lowrey

getting political ideas.

Yeah, they're not taking this guy seriously at all.

You know, with his music hall background,

-I suppose they thought, "Who is this man?"

-A singer.

"It was evident yesterday that a great number of their party

"considered Dan Lowrey's candidature a mere joke."

A joke! Oh, and here we have the result.

"The hourly progress of the voting is shown by the following return.

"Ten o'clock - Hamilton 70, Lowrey 65."

It's like the football results!

"12 o'clock - 191 to 151." He's opening up the lead.

Oh, then at the end,

"For Lieutenant Colonel Hamilton 363 votes

"and Mr Lowrey 298, making the majority for Colonel Hamilton 65."

Very, very close.

Yeah. He did well.

I think he did amazingly,

because in consideration of where he came from and the way

the local press treated him as a joke,

the Conservatives treated him as a joke,

he was really up against it, and he did extremely well.

Good man.

"Mr Daniel Lowrey, who was vociferously cheered,

"then addressed the assemblage as follows."

And this is his words.

"I threw myself before you as the working man's candidate." Cheers.

"When I issued myself,

"I was told I was putting up for the working men,

"but the reply I gave was, 'I am a working man myself.' "

More cheers.

"Let me say that although I have been called a comic singer,

"I am proud of it.

"I have amused thousands of you for 23 years

"in the town of Liverpool, and whenever Dan Lowrey is called upon,

"Dan Lowrey is there to sing them a comic song with all his heart".

HE BREATHES DEEPLY

Yes!

But he didn't last in Liverpool much longer.

-He stayed only about a year.

-Really?

And this document here will give you an idea of where he went to next.

And if you look at the advert over on the left-hand side.

I'm just reeling from the speech.

"Star of Erin Music Hall, sole proprietor - Mr D Lowrey.

"The above hall will open on Monday evening next,

"with a complete and powerful

"company of vocal and instrumental artists."

And where is this? This is...

Look at the adverts, they might give you an idea.

-Dublin.

-That's quite right.

This is the piece of jigsaw that makes sense to me,

because my mum always said that Dan Lowrey is from Dublin

-and that he had a theatre there.

-Right.

So it's great to find that that's true, it's true, he really did.

Yeah. So we know that he left the following year, after the election.

-Why?

-Well, maybe he thinks he's run his course here,

-maybe he was affronted by what had happened to him.

-Yeah.

Maybe he thinks it's time to move on.

Dublin. I feel like that's my next step.

-That's where you need to go next, yeah.

-Yeah.

In 1871, Dan Lowrey sailed with his family from Liverpool for Ireland.

He left his eldest son, 30-year-old Thomas,

in charge of his music hall.

There have been so many surprises with Dan

and now he just ups sticks and leaves and goes to Dublin.

He's a self-made man, Dan Lowrey,

he branded himself as the ultimate Irish singer in Liverpool,

and now he's going to, you know, go and take that,

that's taking coals to Newcastle, isn't it, really,

going all the way to Dublin to become, who knows,

a singer and performer and a proprietor over there?

It must have been a challenge.

I admire that about him, that he's got the determination to succeed,

the determination to reinvent himself.

I don't know what surprises are ahead.

I'm sure he's got a few tricks up his sleeve.

When Dan Lowrey arrived in Dublin,

music hall entertainment was only just catching on,

and he had ambitious plans.

To find out more, Gareth's meeting Professor Kevin Rockett.

-Hello. Kevin?

-Ah, hello, Gareth. How are you? Welcome to Dublin.

Thanks very much. I love the pub.

-Yeah, it's gorgeous, isn't it?

-Wonderful.

Can you tell me a bit about my great-great-great-great-grandfather?

-I can tell you lots about him.

-Good.

But I think we'll find a quieter spot, rather than here.

-Right, lead on.

-OK.

-Past the bar.

-Right.

-I should pick up a Guinness, really, shouldn't I?

-Oh!

As it happens, we have one of his music hall programmes here.

Is this the theatre?

-This is the theatre. Now, this is...

-This is amazing. It's huge!

There's an orchestra,

there's ballerinas,

gentlemen in top hats. Goodness me!

It looks like an opera house.

This is a very, very different theatre

from the Malakoff Music Hall in Liverpool.

This is quite middle-class entertainment, isn't it?

-It's got aspirations.

-Exactly.

You're pointing out exactly the sort of things

and the image that he wanted to convey.

Because he was trying to make more money?

Trying to make more money

but also maybe it was, in part, a search for respectability.

I'm amazed, because we've...

I've gone from Dan Lowrey being a sort of man of the people

and entertaining prostitutes and sailors in Liverpool,

-to coming to be... He's a social climber.

-Yes, indeed.

-What drive in this family. It's amazing.

-Yeah.

He had a great entrepreneurial spirit

and he saw an opportunity,

because Dublin didn't have a significant music hall.

Oh, look at this!

There's so much to take in.

"Programme for the week ending 27th December 1884.

"Grand production entitled Lalla Rookh,

"supported by the following eminent artist,

"Miss Alice Rogers from the Alhambra Palace, London."

-Hmm.

-"The gorgeous dresses supplied by Nathan and Son,

"in Leicester Square."

So they're getting... This is very fancy, isn't it?

"professor Buer and his troupe of performing dogs and monkeys!

"He will also introduce for the first time in Dublin

"his wonderful performing mule!"

A performing mule.

-We don't know what it performed, but it was...

-Who knows?

-Maybe it sang!

-That's proper entertainment.

I love it. This is a hell of a show.

It's got everything -

mules, monkeys, ballerinas and big stars from London.

It's proper variety, isn't it?

Indeed it is.

Some more on the back.

Oh, there he is!

There's a picture!

Oh, there's two.

Dan Lowrey Snr

and Dan Lowrey Jnr.

-Mm-hm.

-Which is this, then?

By 1884, we have another figure coming into the picture.

Who's that?

That is Dan's son, Thomas, now called Dan.

He's changed his name to Dan...

To maintain...

-The family...

-..the marketing of the Dan Lowrey name.

That's hilarious.

So what actually happened was that Thomas was summoned over

by Dan Snr to be a manager,

as Dan himself was becoming old and somewhat ill,

and Thomas was then simultaneously renamed Dan Jnr.

-It was part of the marketing.

-Yeah.

It's now a brand, the Dan Lowrey brand.

That's right. Dan Jnr.

He was never a performer, cos he had a serious stammer,

-but he was a magician at promotion and advertising.

-Hmm.

And Dan Snr really left

the running of his music hall in Dublin to his son.

Ah. Is there anything there?

Can I go and see it?

Yes, the theatre was and indeed still is...

Still there?! Not a bingo hall!

Not a bingo hall. A theatre.

That is wonderful.

Perhaps tomorrow,

it might be possible to see what is actually left.

Oh, you're teasing me.

Oh, I can't wait.

I'm really bowled over by this.

Two Dans for the price of one.

I can't believe it. Father and son.

I think my family had always had the wrong Dan in their minds.

They'd been thinking about Dan Lowrey Jnr,

who was the manager, the impresario,

and, actually, his father is the one that I've been so excited about,

and this man who created this theatrical legacy in his family

and had all the talent.

It's wonderful.

Wonderful. What a revelation.

Dan Lowrey Sr died in Dublin in 1889 aged 66.

He'd been a performer for almost 50 years.

Dan's eldest son Thomas, now known as Dan Jnr,

took over the management of his father's theatre.

It has since been renamed the Olympia.

Come and have a look what I've found. There he is.

Dan Lowrey Snr.

He looks rather august and upright,

in a little bow tie.

And it looks like he's in the theatre

cos there's a hint of a velvet curtain coming down.

He looks like a man that's, you know, come good.

Wow! Look at this.

Welcome to Dan Lowrey's!

I can't believe it. It's extraordinary.

What a...what a treat.

Look at that!

It's quite ornate, isn't it?

The chandeliers, plush boxes,

and just vast.

It's a really proper theatre.

Yes, this is a really classic late-Victorian music hall,

the 1897 version restored to all its original power and beauty.

Dan Lowrey, look where you've got to!

And to come from Leeds, working in the mills,

to a building...

to owning and running a building like this - amazing.

Yes. They're doing extremely well.

The family had truly arrived.

Yes.

And it's still a theatre.

I can't believe it. It's really amazing.

I mean, of all the things for my family to have done,

it's extraordinary.

Quite overwhelming.

What a man. What men.

What men, indeed.

I think I'm going to change my name to Dan!

I've always liked the name Dan.

I set out to find out where this theatrical gene came from,

and it's clearly there right through my family,

in many parts, but particularly in Dan Lowrey Snr.

And it's just so moving to be in this room

and think, you know, this was my family that built this place up.

And here it is, 130 years later.

# When Pat came over the hill

# His colleen fair to see

# His whistle loud and shrill

# The signal was to be

# Oh, Mary, the mother cried... #

I've always stepped into rooms like this

and there's one place that I want to be, and it's not here,

it's down there on that stage.

And Dan Lowrey, I think, was exactly the same.

Ruff!

# ..The dog is barking now

# And the fiddle can't play the tune... #

How wonderful to be related to somebody like that.

# ..When they see the moon

# Now, how can he see the moon

# When you know he's old and blind?

# Blind dogs can't see the moon

# Nor fiddles be played by the wind

# Nor fiddles be played by the wind

# I'm not such a fool as you think

# I know very well it is Pat

# Get out, you whistling thief

# And get along home out of that

# And you must be off to your bed

# Don't bother me with your tears

# For though I have lost my eyes

# I haven't yet lost my ears

# I haven't yet lost my ears. #